This was the Chilean Fjords Cruise starting in Buenos Aires, Ushuaia to Santiago. Sadly after just a couple of days on board Covid closed all the Chilean and Argentina Ports, which meant diversion to the Falklands, and a repatriation flight home to UK. In short we spent 14 days on board, mostly circling around port Stanley, being fed and watered, but only made two short excursions before the ...
During a recent cruise on the Silver explorer of the Chilean fjords, a fellow guest was transferred to the local medical centre in the beautiful village of Tortel. As the local authorities were concerned that the guest was possibly infected with COVID19, all guests who were ashore were directed to return to the ship immediately. The ship was shortly thereafter granted permission to continue the ...
Day 7 of our Ponant “Luxury” cruise. Today they told us that, because of maintenance, there will be no water on board from 2pm until 5pm. Typical of this remodel cruise. But first things first….DO NOT, EVER TAKE A PONANT RELOCATION (ie remodel) CRUISE. There are only 88 passengers on this cruise from Ushuaia Argentina to Easter Island instead of the 249 capacity so I guess they thought they ...
Background: We were on Le Soleal for a 20 day cruise that turned out to be 24 days due to a precautionary 14 day CV19 quarantine. Originally scheduled to go from Argentina to Tahiti with stops throughout the South Pacific, we were able to make only one stop due to the CV issue. Fortunately no one on the ship had showed signs of the virus at the time we left on March 24.
Many things can be ...
We planned the trip of a lifetime to Antarctica on Ponant, impressed with reviews, the small size of the ship and everything French about it. We had no idea that the trip would be memorable in more ways than one. We had an amazing 15 days at sea, with highlights including stops along the Peninsula and South Georgia Island with surprise stops at the international research station (because a ...
Since we did an Arctic cruise in 2017 wanted to also do Antarctica. We were lucky enough to be offered a deal of 2 for 1 so grabbed it and consider ourselves very lucky.,
It was actually a sailing with embarkation on 16 Feb from Ushuaia which was an APT charter. This sailing does not appear on the Cruise Critic list! Unlike some of the other reviews we found the staff to be very friendly, the ...
This report includes information on our February 3-19, 2020, “Beyond the Polar Circle” expedition cruise on the Le Soléal with Ponant. Although we had traveled on a “drive by” cruise of the Antarctic Peninsula in 2007 on the Golden Princess, this expedition offered the opportunity to experience the Antarctic region in more depth and the possibility of better wildlife sightings. Unfortunately, the ...
I have always wanted to visit Antarctica and chose National Geographic because of their outstanding reputation. Nat Geo exceeded my expectations and then some. I can't say enough about the total experience. Seeing Antarctica was like being on another world. There are not enough superlatives to describe the journey. The icebergs were magnificent, the penguins adorable, the whales were ...
We traveled with Lindblad/National Geographic last year to the Galapagos and Machu Picchu and it was excellent, so we decided to take the Antarctic cruise.
This trip was fantastic for many reasons. The ship was small enough (148 passengers) so it felt like a community or like minded adventurers. It was well maintained with spacious cabins. The crew from the hotel staff to the waiters and ...
We picked the NatGeo Explorer/Lindblad cruise to go to Antarctica because we figured we would get more than just a tour of Antarctica and it truly went above and beyond our expectations! The price tag was more than worth it and we couldn't recommend this trip more - our only regret was not going for a room with a full window instead of a porthole.
Our expedition leader (Lucho) did an amazing ...