The legendary Cunard Queen Elizabeth 2 on the Hudson River in New York City, October 16, 2008, as she departs for the final time.



18 October, 2009

QE2 on the Clyde


I posted my first ever YouTube video of this special day.  The video is a slideshow of my photos of our traversing of the Firth of  Clyde and or arrival at Greenock.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuANyk2Ytz8


Regarding the music to the posted video; when we were in Edinburgh before the cruise, I heard this track playing in one of the gift shops as I was spending a significant amount of money for gifts for family at home.  I asked the cashier who was the artist and he pointed out that the CD was the featured CD for sale that day.  It was "Parallel Tracks" by the Royal Scots Dragoon Guards.  The CD was added to our purchase and remained in our bags until I unpacked at home. 

"Parallel Tracks" is one of my favorite CD's of modern Scottish music.  Not only are the musicians actual military personel, the are quite talented with their modern interpretations of traditional Scots tunes, featuring the bagpipes.  The track that got my attention was "Going Home", which vaguely sounded familiar, as it should have.  This song was originally written and performed by Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits fame and was part of the soundtrack he did for the cult movie "Local Hero".   I had seen the movie many years ago and vaguely remembered that it was a very enjoyable movie about a oil executive from the states who ends up in Scotland sent to buy up the entire town, but has to deal with the locals.  A Google search interestingly revealed that the movie was filmed in Pennan, on the Aberdeenshire coast just above my grandfather's hometown of Peterhead.  In fact, we saw actual oil refineries of Fergus off in the distance.  I had no idea the track I heard in the store was called "Going Home."  What a coincidence.  This song as well as the "Time to Say Goodbye" song that was often heard onboard would become the theme songs for this trip.  Every time I hear them, they take me right back to our epic trip.

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