Size (well, passenger numbers) matter with Antarctic cruises

Recently some representatives of a large cruise line came to our office for training on their ‘expedition’ cruise product to Antarctica. It was a lovely ‘product’. Beautiful cabins, expansive spa facilities, awesome dining options.

Plus they had all the trappings of an Antarctic expedition.

They had zodiacs for the landings. Expedition leaders. Expert lecturers.

But it took a very long time to get a key piece of information out of them even though we asked the question several times…..”how many off vessel excursions do your passengers get?”

Eventually we got the answer. “We try to guarantee our passengers at least two off vessel excursions……per voyage!’ 

Umm, sorry, we said. Just two per voyage. Not two per day?

So we have never booked this company. Two excursions per voyage is just not enough.

Another company also offering ‘expeditions’ to Antarctica operates a lottery system for excursions! We can’t imagine anything more frustrating that watching your fellow travellers embark on land, walk amongst penguins, climb up vantage points, all whilst knowing your turn isn’t until the day after tomorrow – thats torture.

It is very hard for a genuine expedition cruise vessel to operate in Antarctica with passenger numbers significantly over 200 and (in our opinion) impossible once you get over 300 passengers.

Ships with around 100 passengers can pretty much take all guests on land at once. This maximises time spent on excursions so that the smaller Antarctic vessels often achieve 2 hours plus per excursion.

We prefer to not book the bigger vessels. This can be hard as the pricing is sometimes very attractive with the larger vessels

But taking into account the fact that it is a once in a lifetime experience we really recommend cruises with twice daily excursions that are not rushed.