1,000 departures across 14 operators and 39 ships
803 upcoming Antarctic expeditions with Antarctic Peninsula on the route, from $7,300 per person.
The Antarctic Peninsula is the continent's great arm reaching towards South America — and where the vast majority of expeditions spend their time. Sheltered channels wind between glaciated peaks that rise straight out of the sea, and almost every landing puts you among gentoo, chinstrap or Adélie penguins.
Expect one or two landings or Zodiac cruises a day: penguin rookeries at Cuverville and Neko Harbour, humpbacks feeding in the bays from January onwards, and seals hauled out on ice floes. It is the mildest, most wildlife-dense corner of Antarctica — the classic first taste of the continent.
Silversea Cruises Silver Cloud 200 guests
Dec 18, 2028 – Dec 28, 2028 · 18 days
Puerto Williams
Dec 19, 2028 – Dec 29, 2028 · 11 days
Ushuaia (Argentina)
Quark Expeditions World Voyager 168 guests
Dec 19, 2028 – Dec 29, 2028 · 11 days
Punta Arenas, Chile
Secret Atlas Aureum 36 guests
Dec 19, 2028 – Dec 29, 2028 · 11 days
Arrive at Weskar Lodge in Puerto Natales, Chile
Lindblad Expeditions National Geographic Orion 102 guests
Dec 21, 2028 – Dec 29, 2028 · 9 days
Lindblad Expeditions National Geographic Explorer 148 guests
Dec 21, 2028 – Dec 31, 2028 · 10 days
Silversea Cruises Silver Wind 274 guests
Dec 21, 2028 – Dec 27, 2028 · 6 days
King George Island
Dec 22, 2028 – Jan 8, 2029 · 18 days
Ushuaia (Argentina)
Silversea Cruises Silver Endeavour 220 guests
Dec 24, 2028 – Dec 30, 2028 · 6 days
King George Island
Quark Expeditions World Voyager 168 guests
Dec 27, 2028 – Jan 4, 2029 · 9 days
Punta Arenas, Chile
Lindblad Expeditions National Geographic Resolution 138 guests
Dec 27, 2028 – Jan 7, 2029 · 12 days
Lindblad Expeditions National Geographic Orion 102 guests
Dec 27, 2028 – Jan 4, 2029 · 9 days
Wildlife
A stocky, orange-billed penguin of the genus Pygoscelis, closest kin to the Adélie and Chinstrap. Its loud, trumpeting call, delivered with head thrown back, carries across the shoreline colonies where expedition landings are made.
Wildlife
A 14–17 metre baleen whale known for breaching and long pectoral fins, often seen feeding on krill in loose groups along the ice edge.
Wildlife
Black and white apex predator instantly recognizable by its pale eye patches, the orca is the largest of the dolphins and one of the ocean's most capable hunters. Sightings often involve a tight-knit family pod working the ice edge together.
Wildlife
The leopard seal is the Antarctic's second-largest seal after the elephant seal, built long and muscular with a spotted, leopard-like coat. It is the region's top predator, hunting penguins, fish, and even other seals along the ice edge.
Wildlife
One of the most widespread penguins in Antarctica, the Adélie is often the first tuxedoed local guests meet ashore. Its stark white eye-ring and brisk, purposeful waddle make it easy to pick out along the ice edge.
Wildlife
A stocky baleen whale with no dorsal fin and a head crusted in pale callosities, once hunted almost to extinction and now the whale most likely to breach or wave a fluke at passing ships. It favours the same cold, food-rich waters that expedition itineraries already follow.
Wildlife
The Antarctic minke is a small, fast-moving rorqual, the most abundant baleen whale on Earth, though singles and pairs still take some looking to spot. It surfaces briefly among the pack ice, more often glimpsed than watched.
Wildlife
A large seabird of the southern oceans, also called the Antarctic giant petrel, giant fulmar or simply the stinker. Its range overlaps broadly with the near-identical northern giant petrel, the two told apart chiefly by the colour of the bill-tip.
Wildlife
A large, heavy-built seabird of the skua family, the south polar skua ranges the Southern Ocean and its ice edges with an unmistakable, gull-like silhouette. Its older name, MacCormick's skua, recalls the naval surgeon who collected the first specimen.
Wildlife
The fin whale is the second-longest animal on Earth after the blue whale, reaching up to 27 metres. Its long, slender, countershaded body is most often seen slicing through open water rather than breaching.
Wildlife
The blue whale is the largest animal known to have existed, reaching up to 30 metres in length and 200 tonnes in weight. Sightings are rare but unmistakable, usually a distant blow and a long grey-blue back rolling at the surface.
Wildlife
The snowy sheathbill is the only land bird native to the Antarctic continent, and one of just two sheathbill species in the world. Look down, not up: it spends its time walking the shoreline and rocks rather than flying.
Wildlife
The Antarctic shag is the only cormorant species found on the continent, easy to pick out by its blue-ringed eyes as it stands stiffly upright on ice floes and coastal cliffs. It nests in small colonies apart from the penguin rookeries along rocky shorelines.
Wildlife
The pintado petrel, better known as the Cape petrel, is one of the most abundant seabirds of the Southern Ocean, with a population estimated at around two million. Travellers usually meet it long before they see land, tracking ships across open water.
Wildlife
A small, sooty-black seabird that flits and patters over the wake like it's walking on water. Named for ornithologist Alexander Wilson, it's reckoned among the most numerous bird species on Earth.
Wildlife
Pale grey above, white below, and marked with a distinctive white wing patch, the southern fulmar is a familiar shape trailing expedition ships south of the Antarctic Convergence. It breeds on Antarctic cliffs and islands, then disperses north with the winter ice.