I would like to introduce myself!

[Lauranne]

Greetings, 

I am Laurie and I hale from Canada. Although I have been a member of Cruise Critic for a number of years. My DH and I are infrequent cruisers. We tend to prefer land travel but Silversea Expeditions caught our eye in 2014 when we explored the Galapagos. We have cruised with extended family a number of times on other lines and in the fall of 2019 we did a crossing with Cunard from New York to Hamburg. This was a retirement trip. Recently we have booked an Antarctic Expedition for February, 2023 and given the wonderful experience that we had in the Galapagos we didn’t look at any other lines. While we have not sailed on a “regular” sailing with SS I am interested in the information and insights from the members of this forum. We have been slow to get back to travel but have taken two road trips so far this year. We ventured to Palm Springs/Napa Valley in January and to the Willamette Valley in Oregon in March. Yes we like good wine 🍷. We plan on flying to Mendoza after our Antarctic Expedition to sample some Malbec’s. If you have read this far, thanks for your time. Any and all information on Antarctica and the Silver Wind would be much appreciated. 
Laurie

[FauxNom]

Welcome! It sounds like you're primed to enjoy your expedition!  I will sail on the Wind at the end of May and will try to post a bit about my experience--it's her maiden voyage as an expedition ship, so nobody knows much about her details in this new role.

[jpalbny]

Hi and welcome to the addictive world of Silversea expedition cruising! We have done six SS expeditions now (one with FauxNom!) and we are looking at another one next year, also on the Wind, to some more remote islands near Finland and Sweden.

 

We have done Antarctica twice, once with South Georgia which was fantastic. There is a link to my cruise blog in my signature (Silver Cloud January 2020). That may answer a few questions for you about expedition cruising abord the Cloud, which should be fairly similar to the Wind.

 

We cruised on the Wind four times prior to her (impending) conversion to an expedition ship, and five times on her sister ship Silver Cloud (two as an expedition ship and three prior). I am confident that the Wind will be an excellent expedition ship, as the Cloud now is.

 

We did a wine tour in Mendoza in 2019 as part of Chris's birthday trip to South America. We also enjoy wine tasting and all things related. Be warned, the wine tastings in Mendoza can go on for quite a while, and the pours are not small. We barely made it through three tastings in one day. I think we started at 10AM and by the time we left the first winery we were at least seven tastings into it. Mendoza is beautiful and the wine is great. Pace yourself! And I hope you have arranged a driver. Enjoy.

[RetiredandTravel]

We've been researching SS/Seabourn Antarctic expedition cruises.  We have found these "tips for travelers" YouTubes  to be very helpful.  They aren't SS specific (Ponant) but give good general information.  There are more if you google it.  good luck.  

 

 

 

 

[QueSeraSera]

Welcome @Lauranne and your DH.  We're kind of new to this too and have found this board to enhance cruising Silversea, and fun too on its own

[Lauranne]

Thank you to all that responded for the kind welcome. 

RetiredandTravel

The videos were excellent. This was exactly what we need to see. Not sure how we can wait for nine more months. 
 

QueSeraSera

I have been reading the forums on Cruise Critic since our first cruise in 2013. As I said we have done numerous grand land adventures. This is only our seventh cruise and second on Silversea, both will be expedition cruises. We certainly love to travel and unfortunately this pandemic came just eleven months after our retirement. Thankfully we were able to have two major trips before the lockdown. We have a couple of land based trips planned and of course the expedition of a lifetime. 
Cheers!

Laurie

 

[RetiredandTravel]

9 hours ago, Lauranne said:

Thank you to all that responded for the kind welcome. 

RetiredandTravel

The videos were excellent. This was exactly what we need to see. Not sure how we can wait for nine more months. 

 

 

You're welcome.   Seabourn is rolling out two new expedition ships (Venture & Pursuit) that you might want to check out for future cruises.  They look very cool & have a submarine!

 

Enjoy your journey.  Please let us know how it goes.

 

Great to be travelling again.

 

 

Edited April 27, 2022 by RetiredandTravel

[ex-hippie]

Hi Laurie!

 

We did a Silversea Galapagos trip in 2018 and loved it so much that we booked a London ➡️ Lisbon expedition that was ultimately cancelled.

 

Now we're going in June on the Wind for a Reykjavik ➡️ Tromso expedition. Getting very excited! It's a long time to be on a ship where you spend a lot of time on the water; most of our other cruises have been very port intensive, where we used the ship as our floating hotel as a means to visit many cities. One other exception was Antarctica with Hurtigruten in 2008.  Seems like a lifetime ago! We are a bit older and realize we need to squeeze in these expeditions while we are still physically able!

 

Really curious about reviews of the newly refurbished Wind and other thoughts on Arctic Expeditions on Silversea. There isn't much info on line. Constantly rethinking my packing decisions with regard to wet vs. dry landings, and what I'll need onboard and on shore. 
 

It was easy in the Galapagos, because you can leave things on the beach, and change from hiking to snorkeling gear. In Iceland and the Arctic, I imagine the terrain is quite different. In Antarctica, it was all mushy snow!

 

Cheers!