The newer ships were better equipped and designed for both emigrants and tourists alike. Many voyages had a relaxed holiday feel, with plentiful food and drink and very much better than home!:

‘The food, I couldn’t believe it…we were on rations in London and there was so much and such tropical fruits’

Kathleen Upton, who emigrated in 1954

For one lucky couple, John and Sylvia Cannon, the assisted passage scheme assured their place on CANBERRA’s maiden voyage to Sydney. At every port they were met with crowds cheering and streamers flying:

‘…people would be there waving and it would be as exciting as anything’.

Punctuated as it was by ports, parties and entertainments, the passage to Australia was for the ‘ten pound Poms’ a transition, a brief period of time suspended between two far flung destinations and, as many were to discover, two different lives.