DESTINATIONS CRUISE | EXPEDITION
new BEST EXPEDITIONS BEST FOR THE ROSS SEA
AE Expeditions’ new ship Douglas Mawson, launching in December 2025, will sail from
Australia to east Antarctica and explore New Zealand’s subantarctic islands. The vessel will hold 154 passengers and offer single cabins to cater for the growing number of solo travellers.
BEST FOR SHORT EXPEDITIONS HX Expeditions has released 10 new seven- night Ultimate Norway cruises round-trip
from Tromso, operating between January and March 2026. Sailings on the 160-passenger Spitsbergen visit the Lyngen Alps, Senja,
Lofoten and Vesterålen in northern Norway. BEST FOR POLAR BEARS
Polar bears and walruses await as Scenic’s Scenic Eclipse I circles Svalbard on a 12-day
Arctic expedition round-trip from Longyearbyen, departing August 17, 2025. Prices from £14,165 include flights and transfers, a night in Oslo plus drinks, tips and expeditions ashore.
BEST FOR PENGUINS
Atlas Ocean Voyages is off in search of glaciers, penguins and orcas on a 13-night voyage from Ushuaia that visits Chile’s Magdalena Island, Argentina’s Isla de los
Estados and West Point Island and Stanley in the Falklands. Prices for the March 3, 2026, departure are from $6,999 excluding flights.
BEST FOR WELLNESS
Swan Hellenic is offering two five-night Explore and Restore cruises from Salvador de Bahia in Brazil this autumn. Both include daily yoga and meditation sessions, self-discovery workshops and Ayurveda-inspired meals. Prices start from $2,480 including the wellbeing package.
BEST FOR ISLANDS
The remote archipelagos of Vanuatu, Solomons, New Guinea and the Federated States of
Micronesia come under the microscope on a trilogy of new expedition voyages from Coral
Expeditions departing in January and February 2026. Two voyages are 16 nights, the third is 21 nights, and between them they offer wildlife, culture and opportunities to dive and snorkel.
ABOVE: Scenic Eclipse II’s helicopter in Kimberley, Western Australia
cold, the Galápagos Islands are also up there, while the Kimberley across the top of Western Australia is going great guns. The region is deliciously warm during the dry season, when ships are there, which this year includes Seabourn and Scenic joining stalwarts Coral Expeditions, Silversea and Ponant. All that’s just for starters. HX reports strong
interest for Greenland, while Marozaite picks Antarctica’s Ross Sea, Africa and the British Isles as next year’s rising stars. AE Expeditions sales director Andrew Turner
says its Wild Scotland voyage in May (to be repeated in 2025) was a bestseller for the line, adding: “For travellers from the UK, we put this down to the growing desire for no-fly trips.” For 2025, Silversea and Atlas Ocean
Voyages are following AE’s lead with new expedition-style voyages in the UK. Silversea’s sailings on Silver Wind explore islands and lesser-known harbours in Ireland and Scotland. “We expect 25% of guests to be from the UK as it is close to home, so very attractive,” says Shanks. Ponant is offering a slew of new expeditions
that explore remote islands in Indonesia, subtropical islands in Japan and Canada’s St Lawrence River in winter. A 20-night Arctic cruise from Nome in Alaska to Longyearbyen in Spitsbergen attempts to reach both the geographic and magnetic North Poles,
Agents are starting to
understand the commission they can make – there is fierce competition but room to grow
while the aforementioned month-long expedition from Hobart to Cape Town ventures deep into eastern Antarctica. Both fit a trend for longer cruises that’s being noted across the industry. Examples include HX’s 96-day Pole to Pole voyage this summer and Coral Expeditions’ 60-night circumnavigation of Australia in October 2025, while Seabourn has two 23-day Northwest Passage sailings in August 2025, which Narraway calls the “ultimate adventure”. They are fine for the majority of expedition
cruisers, who are generally retired, aged 60-plus and have time and money for longer voyages. To attract a younger audience, HX also has new shorter itineraries for 2026 (see box). Silversea’s fly-in, fly-out Antarctica cruises spend six nights in the White Continent and also appeal to those worried about cruising across the often turbulent Drake Passage. Similarly, AE Expeditions has new 10-night Fly the Drake cruises, starting in 2026, targeted at the same audience.
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27 JUNE 2024
travelweekly.co.uk
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