Queen Victoria to sail south

CUNARD'S latest grand dame of the high seas, the Queen Victoria, will visit four Australian ports in February as part of its maiden world voyage.

New queen ... Cunard's latest grand mega liner of the high seas, the Queen Victoria, will call into Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Port Douglas in February on its maiden world voyage / file

IT weighs 90,000 tonnes, cost nearly $700 million and is heading to Australia's east coast.

Cunard's latest grand dame of the high seas, the Queen Victoria, will visit Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane and Port Douglas in February as part of its maiden world voyage.

The 300m-long liner was due to be named overnight by the Duchess of Cornwall, Camilla Parker Bowles, in the southern English port of Southampton.

In Australia, the Queen Victoria will not be lonely for royal company. On February 23, it is due to pass Queen Elizabeth 2 as it sails out of Sydney Harbour bound for Queensland.

Tickets are not cheap, with fares ranging from about $25,000 to $268,000 a head for the complete 106-night voyage. But passengers will travel in style, with 13 bars and clubs, seven restaurants, a cigar lounge, boutique shops, a casino, three swimming pools and a 6000-book library with two librarians.

Other features include a $2.3million art collection, a champagne bar, an English-style pub serving fish and chips and an 830-seat theatre in the style of those in London's West End.

The Queen Victoria, which can carry 2000 passengers and travel at up to 23.7 knots, is larger than its predecessor the QE2, but smaller than the Queen Mary 2, which attracted thousands of people and caused traffic chaos when it visited Sydney earlier this year.