It was amazing that she has lasted this long, considering. The SS France was the great, graceful queen of the ocean, back when I was young. I remember seeing her at full run, in the Channel when she was spanking brand new. I was in my secret reading spot, high up, just behind the wheel house of the SS Rotterdam, heading to Le Havre from Southampton. The SS France was going back the otherway. It was glorious, I just wanted to jump up and down waving. Her bow wave cutting an elegant scythe through the sea.For the last few years she has been laid up in Bremerhaven (long ago having become the SS Norway. A gal so beautiful that two countries wanted their name on her). Now the news that she is on her way to the graveyards in India or Bangladesh, where she will be run up hard onto the sand, and slowly broken apart by ant like humans. (Mr. Golby should like this :-))
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A sometimes vistor to Cape Town (her final tow took her under the shadow of the mountain during July), the 1,000-foot liner's winged twin funnels and sleek-but-cutting grace reinvigorated an era dominated by mailship travel. Dodging everything from the purser to the palm-court orchestra (before ice-creams in the lounge), I'd frequently clamber through liners docked in Cape Town prior to one of my step-grandmother's many trips 'back home' aboard one of the Union Castle line. Most every Cunarder and other great liner would 'pitch up' at some stage (sometimes I'd note a well-known silhouette dominating Table Bay or the harbour when traveling to work along the mountain in the morning), but my enduring memory is of looking down on the SS France at night. As the Norway, she lost her looks, and much of her iconic status. A truly beautiful, majestic ship. I'm really sorry to see her go. Thanks for bringing her back a short while, Peter (Chittagong looks something of a Dickens-Orwell hybrid).
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