Long Beach

Bridge of the Queen Mary

The Queen Mary was designed for the transatlantic run in the pre-air travel days when speed was essential. Her keel was laid at the John Brown & Co. Ltd. shipyard in Glasgow on January 31, 1931. The depression resulted in the suspension of work in December 1931 but work restarted in April 1934. She was launched on September 26 by Queen Mary and she made her maiden voyage on May 27, 1936. On her sixth round-trip voyage in August 1936 the Queen Mary won the Blue Riband for the fastest North Atlantic. She lost the Blue Riband in 1937 but regained it in 1938 and then held it for 14 years. This picture shows the bridge from which her record-breaking transatlantic crossings were commanded.

Long Beach from the Queen Mary

The waterfront has a lot to offer with its marina, the Long Beach Convention & Entertainment Center, the Aquarium of the Pacific and Shoreline Village’s shops and restaurants all within a short distance of hotels.

The Queen Mary liner

Long Beach is perhaps most famous as the resting place of the Queen Mary. The Cunard liner retired from service in 1967 and was sold to the City of Long Beach for conversion into a tourist attraction and hotel.

Shoreline Village at dusk

Shoreline Marina is a relatively new marina opened in 1982 right in the heart of downtown Long Beach and next door to Shoreline Village. There is no doubt that the sunsets in Long Beach can be better than this one, but even though we have stayed several times in a hotel near the marina this is the best that we have managed to record.

Long Beach

Long Beach is a city in its own right, located in the county of Los Angeles. In the late 1700s under Spanish rule two ranchos were set up here, Rancho Los Cerritos and Rancho Los Alamitos. In 1882 portions of Rancho Los Cerritos were sold to William Wilmore who founded Wilmore City on the land that he had bought. It was not a great success, by 1888 only one school and less than 50 residences had been built, and the population voted to rename it the City of Long Beach. By the early 20th century, Long Beach had become a seaside resort and developed as a port. In 1921 the discovery of oil started a boom that lasted until 1933 when a major earthquake flattened much of the downtown area, killing 120 people. The city was rebuilt with buildings designed to withstand earthquakes.

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Ballroom of the Queen Mary

The Queen Mary accommodated 776 passengers in cabin class, 784 in tourist class and 579 in 3rd class. For those in cabin class she offered a luxurious crossing. When she retired to Long Beach in 1967, the plan was to offer the luxury for which she was famous to hotel guests. The first rooms opened in 1972 and in 1988 the Walt Disney Company took over the running of the Queen Mary. In 1992 Disney gave up the lease and the Queen Mary was closed. The hotel and tours both reopened in 1993.

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- A pleasant coastal city. If we have to fly into LA, this is where we often head for the first night.

- Nothing to report.

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