RMS Titanic headed for the French port of Cherbourg, a journey of . The weather was windy, very fine but cold and overcast. Because Cherbourg lacked docking facilities for a ship the size of "Titanic", tenders had to be used to transfer passengers from shore to ship. The White Star Line operated two at Cherbourg, the and the . Both had been designed specifically as tenders for the "Olympic"-class liners and were launched shortly after "Titanic". ("Nomadic" is today the only White Star Line ship still afloat.) Four hours after "Titanic" left Southampton, she arrived at Cherbourg and was met by the
First class facilities of the RMS Titanic from their main dining saloons. This was in imitation of the Ritz restaurant first featured on board the Hamburg-Amerika liner SS Amerika in 1905, which had proven to be enormously popular. The restaurant could accommodate 137 diners at a time. On the "Olympic" the room was sandwiched between the Second-Class promenades on either side, making it smaller than the version on "Titanic", whose restaurant extended to the port side of the ship and whose starboard-side promenade deck was converted to the Café Parisien. The restaurant was the preferred alternative to the main dining saloon and gave passengers the option of