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After our very successful tour to Antarctica this season, we are going to be running another exclusive adventure down to the Peninsula in 2025, this time crossing the Antarctic Circle! While the scenery is mesmerising throughout, the choice of month can tailor very different wildlife encounters and unique experiences. One thing we’ve discovered over the years is that no two Antarctic expeditions are the same – both in experience, and in service. Learn more about what to expect on an Antarctica ocean voyage and our ultra-luxury experience—or find your perfect itinerary.
Discover South Georgia, Antarctica and Falklands
Bird enthusiasts should look skywards to spot some of the 45 species of Antarctic seabirds that live here, such as skuas, cormorants, petrels and terns. Your adventure begins with an early morning flight to Ushuaia, where we'll meet your hybrid-powered expedition ship, specially designed for sustainable cruising in polar waters. This bustling port is the capital of Argentina’s Tierra del Fuego Province. Set against the magnificent backdrop of the Martial Glacier, Ushuaia vies for the title of the world’s southernmost city. Start planning your journey to exploring this pristine world of ice, wildlife, and awe-inspiring beauty.
Go with the global leader in expeditions to Antarctica
I took a cruise on a ship with 107 versus 7000 passengers: here's how they compared - Cruise Blog
I took a cruise on a ship with 107 versus 7000 passengers: here's how they compared.
Posted: Tue, 09 Jan 2024 08:00:00 GMT [source]
Indulge in a feast for the senses on an epic South America cruise with Princess®. Feel the rhythm of more than a thousand years of history and culture while savoring an incredible variety of regional cuisine. Marvel at captivating views of the legendary Amalia Glacier, make friends with the famous Falkland Island penguins and sail to the very bottom of the world with our all-new Antarctica cruise itineraries. Spectacular monuments, stunning natural beauty and one-of-a-kind experiences from ship to shore will both inspire and surprise you. Enjoy the adventure and excitement of a South America cruise and come back new®.
South Shetland Islands & Antarctica Voyage
Check out our guide on the best time to visit South Georgia based on our personal experience. Some Antarctica tours go to the eastern side of the Peninsula and enter the Weddell Sea, which promises a different experience again and is not often visited by travellers. So if you’re unlucky and just so happen to get two days of bad weather in either Punta Arenas or Antarctica during your scheduled days of departure, your entire trip can be cancelled. Just because it’s the most common tour doesn’t mean it’s not worth doing. A Peninsula trip is truly mind-blowing, and allows you to officially step foot on the 7th continent.
Antarctica Cruise Itineraries
Safety is paramount and the ship’s captain will decide the final sailing itinerary during the voyage. Therefore every voyage is unique and all advertised routes, by the very nature of the region, can only be indicative. An endless white wilderness, Antarctica is nature at its most sublime and haunting. Read more about some of the possible landing sites you could explore on a sailing to Antarctica with Hurtigruten. Named after the first man to cross Antarctica and to reach the South Pole, MS Roald Amundsen leads the way towards an even more sustainable way of travelling.
South America Cruises
These trips usually take around days, with 5-7 days spent on the western side of the Antarctic Peninsula (the rest of the days are travelling over the Drake Passage), and no two trips are the same. Depending on your style, budget, interests and length of time available you’ll find some trips that are common (for good reason), and others that are very unique and only happen once every few years. Unfortunately tourists cannot visit Antarctica in winter due to the extremely cold weather and huge congestion in sea ice limiting access.
MS Fram is a category 1 vessel, offering the widest possible range of landing sites. In the Science Centre, at the heart of the ship, you’ll discover more about the places you sail to and listen to talks by the Expedition Team. With key expedition features and technology, MS Fram is primed to bring you on a journey of discovery to our planet’s most alluring and unspoiled regions. In this article, we’ll introduce you to the 7 best Antarctic cruise expedition companies and specific trips for 2024, from the best luxury cruise to the best small ship cruise.
Discover Antarctica
Learn about geology, climatology and ornitholgy, and collect samples and take part in experiments with our onboard scientific experts. Experience the tranquility of vast panoramas and sail among the sublime frozen icescapes of Antarctica, as we pass between icebergs, close to calving glaciers, and past huge ice floes in the Southern Ocean. WWF-Australia is a well-established conservation organisation helping protect our natural environment. Donations from our trips help their pioneering whale research and conservation efforts to establish marine protected areas around Antarctica and save whale species from extinction. If you have an average fitness level (and above) you are compatible with Antarctica travel, so you don't need to spend hours in the gym before considering booking a trip.
Smaller ships have much better manoeuvrability, which allows them to navigate through narrow channels and into tight bays to allow you to access Antarctica close up. Besides that, there’s other considerations when it comes to ship size and choosing the best Antarctica expedition. You don’t really want to spend all that money just to get down there and look at the continent from your balcony. So as you can see if you are booking a trip to Antarctica on a large ship, you run the risk of not even getting off the ship. IAATO, the body that regulates tourism in Antarctica, has strict rules around the number of passengers from any one ship that can leave the vessel at any one time. The average age onboard an Intrepid trip is around 45, so it’s an entirely different atmosphere compared to something like Ponant or Lindblad that has an older average age.
Nowhere on Earth feels as remote as Antarctica, yet the wildlife here is abundant and spectacular. The icy shores are a haven for millions of penguins, as well as seals and seabirds, while the deep blue waters support a huge population of whales. Your Expedition Team will help you spot and photograph iconic animals, and there will be lectures on ornithology and natural history from our wildlife experts. In the Science Centre you'll learn more, and perhaps even help out with wildlife conservation through out Citizen Science projects. Our Attempts are voyages where we challenge the elements in true expedition style. As we explore these remote and captivating areas in a safe way, our adventure will ultimately be guided by nature.
You'll join the Expedition Team on landings and ice-cruises whenever opportunities present themselves. On an HX expedition cruise to Antarctica, you’ll be an explorer not a passenger. Cross the Drake Passage and explore expedition-style as we seek out remote landing sites for nature encounters. Whether you cross the Drake Passage in a small expedition ship or do a "sail by" on a larger vessel, this magical voyage will not only impress your friends, the otherworldly scenery will touch your soul. As summer arrives the sun returns to Antarctica, and with it comes rafts of penguins, pods of whales and herds of seals.
Some of the animals you could see are many penguin species such as gentoos, adélie penguins, Magellanic penguins, rockhoppers, chinstraps, king penguins, emperors (if you’re super lucky) and macaronis. Any decent company, like the ones we recommend above, will also have daily onboard seminars from guides, scientists, biologists and historians to share information about the continent. Setting foot on the Antarctic mainland, or one of its many islands, is an indescribable moment. There are no ports in Antarctica that allows for a ship to dock, so the only way to get off the ship and explore land is on a small, inflatable boat called a Zodiac. You’ll then have a massive three sea days to get to the Peninsula for your 4 days hanging around here. One thing to keep in mind though is that the length of time the companies advertise is not how much time you get to spend in Antarctica.
But visiting in November and December lets you experience the snow-covered White Continent in its full glory while a March trip is excellent for whale watching. Antarctic voyages on the Europa provide an incredible opportunity to journey to the White Continent and hone your sailing skills at the same time. The ship can accommodate only 48 guests, all of whom get to play an active role in sailing to and from Antarctica. Unlike most other Antarctic expedition companies, Heritage doesn’t regularly offer voyages to the Antarctic Peninsula. Rather, all of the organization’s month-long voyages sail from New Zealand and stop over at the Subantarctic Islands and the historic Ross Sea region. With Silversea, you can opt to sail the Drake Passage from Ushuaia or you can hop on a quick 2-hour flight from Punta Arenas and meet your ship in Antarctica.
If stepping foot on the Antarctic continent isn’t enough, you can become one of the 0.001% of the human population who will ever cross the fabled Antarctic Circle at 66º southern latitude. If your flight to Antarctica is cancelled on one day, the company usually only has one more attempt to get their guests down there before they have to forfeit their spot for the next company’s charter. Seasickness might be a concern, but there’s medication to help with that and every trip has a doctor onboard. All commercial operators that run trips to Antarctica during the Southern Hemisphere’s spring and summer months, stretching from late October to March, with the majority being between November and February.
