Blog By Andrea McVeigh

Hello from the high seas! So far this week, I’ve woken up to a different view every morning - from the sights of Lisbon to the scenery of northern Morocco - eaten in a Marco Pierre White restaurant, worked out in the gym while enjoying amazing panoramic views, met children’s character Noddy, taken in a West End show, gambled in a casino and soaked up the Mediterranean sun while sipping cocktails on the balcony of my cabin. If you haven’t already guessed, I’m currently on a cruise, in particular, a fabulous Riviera Romance maiden season voyage onboard the P&O liner Ventura, which launched in April this year. The daily shore excursions are just one of the highlights of the trip, but with a theatre, nightclub, spa and 11 different places to eat onboard (including The White Room restaurant, from culinary legend Marco Pierre White) my hubby and I could quite happily live on board, never mind simply stay here for two weeks. Noddy, by the way, is here for the children, but it has to be said, he’s gone down a storm with nostalgic adults like myself, too.

We left for our Med cruise just a week after coming home from Singapore and Australia, which led my husband and I to think that maybe we’d started to live some bizarre Truman Show-style reality TV lifestyle without knowing it. We’re living like millionaires, only without the requisite bank balance! But late last year, we designated 2008 our ‘year of travel’ and we’re staying true to that aim.

The night before we left for Southampton (from where the liner set sail), I got invited to a champagne dinner in the Four Winds’ Ink restaurant - one of my favourite restaurants. How could a gal say no to that? Needless to say, I didn’t! It was for one of Ink’s Gourmet Evenings, which are held every couple of months or so. The events are always themed, with creative, five-course menus and different wines for each course plus an expert guest speaker talking diners through the various different vintages. This was the first time they’d had a champagne theme, so I’m glad they thought of me when the prospect of that invitation came up! We had the pleasure of sitting with Teresa and Susan from Wine Inns, as well as local photographer extraordinaire Bill Smith and Belfast-born, New York-based movie actress, Geraldine Hughes - who starred alongside Sylvester Stallone in Rocky Balboa. Down-to-earth, charming, funny, intelligent and interesting, you couldn’t get a nicer silver screen star than Geraldine. The Gourmet Evenings are starting up again in September, after a summer break, and I highly recommend them. You may not always spot a Hollywood celeb there, but you’ll have a great time nonetheless!

By the time I get back home, a new fashion era will have started in Belfast, with the relocation of Topshop from Donegall Place to the new Victoria Square centre. “Meet you outside Topshop” - I must have said that thousands of times, and had it said back to me an equal number of times, over the years. In the days before mobile phones and texting, you had to arrange a meeting place in advance and stick with it. And so I spent most Saturday afternoons during the 1980s standing outside Topshop waiting to meet up with friends, before we did our circuit of the city centre, checking out the shops, the scene and the boys! The Donegall Square branch of Topshop opened in August 1980, so it would have marked its 28th anniversary in that location this summer. And throughout The Troubles, when few big-name High Street stores wanted to open in the city, and when some of those that did soon closed again, Topshop was always there for us. The new store promises to be bigger and better but I’ll always be nostalgic for those teenage Saturdays standing outside Toppers, waiting to meet up with my mates. Like my friend Katrina, Editor of online magazine Sugahfix.com, quipped, “before there were mobile phones, there was Topshop.”