About the Best of Antarctica Cruise on Ocean Endeavour with Intrepid Travel / Chimu Adventures

Thinking about booking with Intrepid Travel / Chimu Adventures Best of Antarctica tour on Ocean Endeavour? Here is some information I wish I knew before I traveled.

I am generally very hesitant to post reviews, but since this is a relatively new product and information on it is scarce I would like to think that someone out there will find this review helpful. I’d also like to think Intrepid Travel and Chimu Adventures are paying attention, as well.

All information valid as of mid-November 2022, unless otherwise indicated, and -no- I was not furnished to write this review.

I booked the “Best of Antarctica” cruise with Chimu Adventures on Ocean Endeavour in early 2020; this tour is known by the same name when booked through Intrepid Travel. While Intrepid Travel purchased a 50% stake in Chimu Adventures, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, they were unable to formally unveil their joint product until the 2022-23 cruise season. I was on the second voyage of this new product. I booked into a triple, but was “upgraded” to a double once onboard.

Generally speaking, no. Intrepid and Chimu are both experienced tour operators and at no point did I feel like they were out of their depth. As far as I could tell, the vast majority of the crew had extensive previous experience working in Antarctica and carried that knowledge over.

For the most part it didn’t. That said: Intrepid Travel is the public face of the trip - their name is on the side of the boat, their flag flies at its front, their signage is ubiquitous throughout the vessel, the crew wears Intrepid Travel apparel, and you get an Intrepid Travel-branded jacket. Chimu Adventures has very little presence on the trip, and - aside from your booking agent - you are unlikely to interact with any of their employees (or those identifying as such, at any rate).

Admittedly, booking with Chimu Adventures was … trying at times. You are assigned a booking agent and are at the mercy of their availability and attentiveness. I suspect my experience was complicated by the fact that Chimu is Australia-based and my booking agent was located in the United Kingdom, while I am in the United States - this made live customer service next to impossible. Admittedly, if I were to do it again I’d probably deal directly with Intrepid Travel. Having used them for other trips in the past, their customer service experience is much more streamlined and their customer service agents can more easily provide direct support, particularly to customers in the United States. My recommendation for Chimu Adventures would be to give some flexibility to your booking agents to assist across accounts with customer support - there is no reason why customers should be reliant on a single-point-of-failure, especially for time-sensitive matters.

I’ll keep it short-and-sweet: the crew excellent, from the excursion leaders to the hotel staff to the wait staff and cooks in the dining room. Everyone was very professional, had a positive attitude with loads of enthusiasm, and it was obvious that Intrepid and Chimu went out of their way to find experienced personnel to crew the ship. Kudos to them for providing a top-notch experience!

No trip is perfect, but -considering the myriad of challenges this journey encountered- this one was pretty close. Overall, I had a fantastic experience and, again, I want to thank the crew for facilitating an excellent voyage. That said, there’s always room for improvement (particularly with a new product line.) Intrepid and Chimu: if you’re listening, here are some things for which there is room for improvement:

• Chimu Adventures: As discussed, allow your booking agents the flexibility to cover-down on one another’s accounts to provide more timely and direct customer service. Not having agile communication with your clients is the fastest way to get a bad reputation as a vendor.

• There were points where I wish the communication between the crew and the guests was a little bit more frequent and transparent. As you’ll read in my travelogue, we had to turn back to Ushuaia early due to incredibly strong winds in the Drake Passage. While I wholeheartedly believe the ship’s captain made the right call (and I salute the crew for sticking to the decision), information concerning the logistics of disembarkation were sparse. It is possible the crew didn’t have details from the harbormaster, for example, but -if that is the case- it is easy enough to let the passengers know to put their minds at ease. We were not told we could depart the ship early until long after we were moored in the port; this was not a big deal for me, but -as some folks had their return flights cancelled and needed to rebook- this information could have been useful earlier for their decision-making. Making more frequent use of the public address system with updates would have gone a long way, particularly during disembarkation.

• The process of checking-in and checking-out was a bit scuffed. For embarkation, we were told to leave our checked bags in the hotel lobby at 7AM; for someone like me who had flown for 36 hours and didn’t get to bed until around midnight, this was admittedly a bit of a tall order. That the bags were still there awaiting pick-up to be brought on the ship a few hours later made me rethink if the early wake-up was really necessary. Check-out was also a bit of a messy affair, to be honest. The credit card machines used to process the on-board transactions were painfully slow and frequently timed-out. It would also be incredibly helpful to add additional personnel behind the front desk to expedite these processes.

• Room temperature in the lower deck cabins was incredibly hot. There were long stretches when no doubt the temperature in my cabin was above 25 Celsius / 77 Fahrenheit. I’ll get into this a bit more when I discuss the room, but there was no individual temperature control in each cabin - what you feel is what you get. This unbearable heat not only made sleeping difficult, but caused my body to whiplash quickly between the cold Antarctic air and desert warmth which, obviously, is a recipe for illness.

• There could have been a few more group-oriented entertainment activities. Not including the Compass Club (the ship’s library / quiet area), there are three lounges on the ship, but I expect if you were to ask most passengers they would say they only ever regularly made use of the Nautilus Lounge (the large area where daily briefings are held, as well as the area where the bar is located). This was a missed opportunity for things like karaoke, trivia, organized board games, and other cruise-like activities. I realize this is mostly a no-frills experience not comparable to a traditional cruise, but these small investments would yield great customer service returns.

• The variety of vegetarian / vegan options food was limited, unnecessarily so by the deliberate inclusion of meat into meal items for which it could have easily been subtracted or supplemented later. Additionally, a planned vegetarian-only day did not occur.

• The tour’s claimed “ethical” status was partially undermined by questionable food options like veal, as well as corporate staff intending to use remotely-piloted aircraft for marketing purposes, an act openly discouraged by the expedition’s scientists and contrary to Intrepid Travel’s own ethical guidelines.

• Stop catering to and sponsoring influencers. Antarctica is beautiful and serene all by itself, it doesn’t need a self-absorbed media campaign to sell it.

If your experience is like mine and many others I spoke with, be prepared for a never-ending string of flight cancellation and rescheduling. Arriving by air into Ushuaia almost always requires transferring through Buenos Aires and one if not both of its two airports - the internationally-focused Ezeiza and the domestically-focused Aeroparque. While security at both Buenos Aires airports was efficient, due to the distance between them the absolute minimum time I would consider for a transfer is three hours … and even that is pushing the limit. Considering most flights to Ushuaia leave from Aeroparque, there is a very good chance you’ll have to make the cross-city journey. I only bring this up here to highlight how quickly connections become imperiled by Aerolineas Argentinas, FlyBondi, and JetSmart’s willingness to shuffle or cancel flights around with little warning. This leaves you with two choices: fly overnight internationally, arriving in Buenos Aires in the morning and leaving a comfortable amount of time for your transfer but at the expense of a late-evening arrival in Ushuaia; or, arrive into Buenos Aires a day or two earlier, stay overnight, then catch an early morning flight to Ushuaia and have time to explore sights there. I opted for the former as my vacation window was limited. This meant I missed the early evening icebreaker at the hotel. If I were to do it again, I’d probably opt to arrive in Ushuaia a day early. Lastly, I’ll note that Ushuaia Airport is extremely small and incredibly efficient - you’ll be from the bridge to the arrivals lane with your bags in a matter of minutes.

Here is another area where I think some better communication could have been provided in advance. The group was divided into two halves, with one half staying at the Wyndham Garden Ushuaia (as I did) and the other staying at the nearby -and much nicer- Las Hayas Resort. I am not sure how they determined who stayed where, but I expect that the higher booking classes are assigned to Las Hayas, while those in sharing accommodations (as I was) were placed into the Wyndham (I want to be clear that the Wyndham is by no means a “bad” hotel and I had an extremely lovely stay!) Why I thought it important to communicate this to passengers a bit more in advance is that both the Wyndham and Las Hayas are way, way, way outside of town, up on a hill and a very long walk to restaurants, shops, bars, etc. There is a shuttle bus that takes you to downtown, but this runs very sparingly and almost certainly wasn’t going to run after I checked in at 10PM. The location was an issue for me as I wouldn’t be arriving into Ushuaia until early evening and I wasn’t sure if the hotel had a restaurant as one is not listed on their website. Thankfully, the hotel did have a restaurant, and the bar served food until 11PM. My room was clean, the staff was extremely nice, and the views cannot be beat! But that location, man:

Well, like I said I arrived later in the evening the day before embarkation which meant I missed out on the icebreaker which was held a few hours beforehand (between 6 and 7PM, if memory serves). If you are a solo traveler, I’d make every effort to go to that (thankfully, my good friend arrived earlier than I and found an amazing group of people with which we were able to spend the rest of the voyage.) There was also an opportunity to book a departure morning trip to Tierra del Fuego National Park with Intrepid Travel which guarantees arrival at the port for embarkation (about $79, left around 7AM). I chose to sleep in and just walk around the town before boarding the boat.

We were instructed to leave our checked baggage in the hotel lobby at 7AM; the tour operator was to collect it and bring it to our cabins on the ship (which was dutifully executed). As mentioned previously, my angst with that was 1) 7AM is a very early wake-up call for folks arriving late the night before as I did, and 2) the bags were still there some a few hours later, which means to me this time could have been pushed to the right a bit. You took your carry-on baggage with you into town (or, to Tierra del Fuego National Park if you choose to do that option).

This rather depends on where you were staying / what activities you were doing that morning, but for me up in the Wyndham there were three options: first, if you were on the Tierra del Fuego National Park tour, you’d be brought straight to the meet-up point; second, if you wished to depart from the hotel, a shuttle bus was arranged at around 2PM to take you to the rally point; or, third, you could meet at 3PM at the rally point in central Ushuaia. The rally point is the car parking lot adjacent to the End of the World sign. This is on the map above. Do not go to the dock itself; you will be shuttled from this parking lot to the boat for, I dunno, safety reasons or something.

Well, for better or worse my boat left on a Sunday. This meant very little was open, particularly in the morning. We did manage to find some open souvenir shops, as well as a grocery store from which to buy snacks and drinks. Of course, there was the Tierra del Fuego excursion which you could book; while I obviously didn’t do this, the feedback I received from those who did was mixed.

Well, basically you wait around. Then you get onto a random bus and wait around. Then get onto the dock and wait around. Get in line at the check-in desk and wait around. Look, I’m not trying to be an ass here: it’s a cruise boat, there is going to be some waiting around. You’ll surrender your passport at the desk when you check-in (yeah, it’s dumb, just accept it for what it is), then you’ll get your cabin keycard and be reunited with your hold baggage in your cabin.

Yes; it was quick and painless.

Well, I can only speak for my room and the rooms I had quick access to during my voyage. The quickest way to summarize the decor, fit, and finish is to compare it to a university dorm room - it was nothing eye-catching or Instagram-worthy, but it was hearty and was well-suited to survive the dangerous journey it undertook. As I mentioned, I was originally booked into a triple (Category 2) but was upgraded into a double share Interior Twin (Category 3). I was on Deck 4, oddly in a room that isn’t on the ship’s room plan. I am going to guess that, with all of the COVID-19-related rebooking, there were four males booked into a triple and they thought it easier to book us into surplus doubles (note: triple rooms are not mixed gender unless a party of three books the whole room). Anyway, the photos on Intrepid’s website were pretty accurate … at least for the rooms I saw.

All of the Category 3 rooms I saw were exactly the same. Two narrow single beds were separated by a small but satisfactory aisle. Each bed had an average firmness mattress, two pillows, a throw pillow, a duvet, and a blanket. The beds were, in my opinion, satisfactorily comfortable and I never woke up with a bed or neck ache. Between the beds was a small dresser, one drawer for each passenger; the drawers had hooks to stop the drawers from opening during transit. You could easily fit a medium-to-large suitcase worth of clothing into one of these drawers. Atop the dresser was phone, the remote control for the small television, volume controls for the PA, and a European-style outlet. There were also a mirror and some light controls above the dresser. There were two additional bunks folded up on the walls, and I suspect the crew used these as storage areas for extra sheets and blankets.

In front of one of the beds was a small desk and mirror; my cabin did not have a chair but I would image it would just get in the way so I’m glad it wasn’t there. The area under the desk had a small trash bin (emptied daily) but was also ideal for storing hard-sided or large luggage pieces. The desk had an additional European-style outlet. Between the desk and the door were two nearly ceiling-height closets. While not terribly wide, I was able to hang a raincoat, a winter puffy coat, and six shirts without issue. There was also room beneath the hanging area, which I used to store a laundry bag (note: one was not provided).

Across the aisle from the closets were two coat hooks. Behind this wall was the bathroom, which was of an adequate size. The commode was a good size with lots of legroom. Loo paper was adequate, and was hung on a paper holder which I believe would have doubled in the past as an ashtray (please don’t smoke in your stateroom). A mirrored vanity with plenty of storage was above the good sized sink. Several towel holders lined the wall besides the sink. Lastly, the shower occupied a corner of the room. While a bit of a tight squeeze and lacking a functional rim, the shower was always hot, had great pressure, and got the job done well. The shower curtain was in good condition and kept the stall mostly water-tight. Shampoo and soap (suspiciously both the same shade of blue) were provided. The shower controls were quirky, with separate knobs for temperature and flow. The shower also had a pull-across laundry drying line.

I will speak really, really quickly about the other categories of room I saw. First, the Single Interior (Category 1) room was exactly the same as my room, except it was occupied by one person as the name implies. The Triple Interior (Category 2) rooms had multiple variants, particularly in the bathroom layouts (separate shower and washroom cabinets vs. one large shared cabinet vs. two small wet cabinets); additionally, some of the triples had a bed turned on the side (long way of the boat). The Single/Twin Porthole/Window (Categories 4/4a/5/5a) rooms were basically the same as mine, except with a small porthole or window which apparently did not open. I did not see any Category 6 through 10 rooms.

All in all, my cabin was all I needed it to be and more. The crew made sure it was always clean and the towels restocked. I had no complaints about the layout or amenities. If you are expecting a luxury experience (you might, this will certainly be among the most expensive vacations you ever take), you may be disappointed to some degree. Just remember: no matter how much you paid to be on Ocean Endeavour, someone else paid more to be in the smallest room on the Ponant ship you’ll see underway in the same ocean. Expectation management is important.

There were two basic amenities I was expecting that were absent. The first was a climate control knob. I’ve mentioned before, the room was incredibly warm and some sort of climate control would have been nice. The vent on the ceiling had a baffle to control airflow, but this did not significantly change the temperature. Second, I would have liked to have a small refrigerator. It is important to note some rooms I saw did have a refrigerator, but apparently none of them worked.

The rooms had European-style two pin plugs at 240V. My cabin had one outlet for each passenger. The power supply was generally reliable, but the ship was obviously built before the time when people would roll onboard with multiple devices requiring charging. You can roll the dice on bringing a power strip, but know there is a good chance of blowing the fuse if you put too many items on the tap at once. For U.S. travelers in particular, I recommend a plug-USB combo tap like this one.

Ocean Endeavour is a small boat. IAATO regulations effectively limit the number of passengers on ships which conduct shore landings to 200, and Ocean Endeavour feels like a 200-person ship. Put another way, you can get from one end of the ship to the other in a matter of minutes. The ship is not complicated to get around, and you will quickly get oriented to where you are. That said, there are stairwells that do not connect to each floor and hallways that do not run the full length of the ship, so every now-and-then you may get turned around (your first visit to the open bridge will certainly be disorienting).

The bulk of the ship’s activities were centered on Deck 6. Here you will find the Nautilus Lounge, the Compass Club, and the Polaris Restaurant, as well as the large rear deck. The Nautilus Lounge is the heart of the common areas on the ship; this is where the lectures, evening meetings, and large gatherings occurred. It is also where the bar is, so day or night you’ll be spending a fair amount of time in here. Between it and the ship’s only restaurant is the Compass Club, which features a library, comfy chairs, a coffee station, and afternoon tea time and cookies. The aforementioned restaurant can hold about half the ship at once, but we will talk about that at length in a bit.

Unless your stateroom is Deck 5, the only times you are likely to spend time here is at the Reception Desk or at the Doctor’s Office.

Deck 4 is where the Mud Room is located. Here is where you will prepare and depart for your zodiac excursions. Beyond this, you’ll not spend any time down on Deck 4 unless you are berthed down there (and bless you if you are, as mentioned this might as well be Hades).

Deck 7 features the moderately-sized Aurora Lounge. I’m not sure if this was intentional or by accident, but during my voyage the Aurora Lounge acted as a de facto employee lounge and dining area. I don’t know of any specific prohibition on hanging out up there, but you do feel kinda strange busting in on the staff while they are dining or having a staff meeting. The Deck 7 patio at the rear of the ship features the ship’s small heated tub, as well as a smoking area (Club Starboard Seven). Top tip: there are some barbecues lashed to the side of the ship here; these are great places to store your beer to cool down during the day. Just be aware: there might be a barbecue night, so keep your eye on the announcement board to know if your stash is going to get pitched (you also risk it being nicked by another passenger).

Deck 8 houses the gym, spa, salon, and saunas. Deck 8 is also where the open bridge is located. Deck 9 houses the under-used Meridian Club, which was used most frequently for morning yoga classes and photography group seminars.

In short: as someone who does not have what one would call a “refined pallet” nor any major dietary restrictions, I thought the food was excellent and plentiful. I can see how someone with a dietary restriction would have been left wanting, but I’ll discuss that in detail below.

There are basically four meals a day: breakfast, lunch, and dinner in the restaurant, and tea time in the early afternoon in the Compass Club.

Breakfast was buffet-style and leaned very heavily on western-style food, featuring eggs, potatoes, and even baked beans. The meal usually had some type of egg preparation station for omelets. Fruit was generous, as was a fruit juice of some kind (typically orange juice). Coffee was available from the serving staff. There was also oatmeal and toast in abundance. Breakfast started at 7AM (or earlier, some days) and ran until around 9AM. There was open seating for breakfast, and tables were first-come, first-served.

Lunch was served around mid-day (obviously), but the time varied depending on what activities were going on. Seating was generally open, and the food was served buffet-style. Generally speaking, there was one or two types of starch available (rice or pasta) and a couple of complimentary meat options to pair. The salad bar was a popular option during lunch.

Dinner was usually a set menu table service and guests were divided into groups with half occupying the dining room at any one time. The dinner menu typically had a choice of three or four starters, three main dishes, about five or six desserts, and a selection of ten permanent additional items like parmesan fries, chicken breast, and baked potatoes. Starting time for dinner would vary depending on the day’s activities, but typically would start around 7PM (rather than the traditional Argentine 9PM).

The fourth meal -tea time- served small sandwiches and cakes, as well as cookies, along with coffee and tea.

The ship’s chef was Italian, and many of the dishes had Mediterranean flavor. Perhaps influenced by the staff, there was also a wide selection of Indian food available for lunch and dinner.

As mentioned, I thought the quality of the food was quite good. Surely, there were some confounding misses (Baked Alaska is not Neapolitan ice cream on sponge cake, Cream of Mushroom soup is usually not broth-based, etc.), but I certainly lower the bar for quality when eating a buffet meal at the end of the world.

Again, expectation management is in order: while this is not a cheap trip, this is not a caviar-and-champagne-with-each-meal-type vessel. All the same, the food was all made with care and was very filling.

At the beginning of the cruise, the tour operator stated that they could cater to all dietary needs besides kosher (halal was not explicitly mentioned, so please contact Intrepid or Chimu if this impacts you). I eat pretty much anything and everything, so this didn’t really impact me too much. However, a vegetarian co-traveler -who has generally provided me feedback- noted there was room for improvement in this area. She noted (and I fully concur in hindsight) there were many meal options which easily could have been vegetarian- or vegan-friendly but weren’t (meat pasta sauce, meat included with the poached eggs, multiple meat-based soups, etc.) While this situation could be navigated (albeit unnecessarily) during the buffet meals, she noted it was more difficult to find vegetarian-friendly options during the fixed menu seatings. It is worth noting that a promised vegetarian-only day did not happen. (See, Em! Bet you never thought when you met me that I’d be lobbying for the veg crowd!)

A quick word for pescatarians: Intrepid Travel noted difficulty in securing “ethically-sourced” fish for their kitchen. While European bass was available as an a la carte item during fixed menu dinners, there was no other seafood option that I noticed.

No. That said, during rough seas, the kitchen was happy to provide a cling-wrapped dish of food for ill, cabin-restricted guests.

Yes, and I highly encourage you to use it rather than cramming your suitcase more full with clothing. Each room had a laundry bag and an order form. During my voyage, prices varied by garment from $2.50 for a pair of socks to about $8 for a dress shirt. Later in the voyage, they had a one-time rate (I think $36??) for a full bag of clothing. The form promised a three-day turn-around, but mine was ready the following day. Or, you can wash your smaller items in the cabin’s sink and hang it on the drying line in the bathroom.

Indeed, and it was not offensively expensive, either! There were two ways to get alcohol: there was a barman in the dining room during dinner service from whom you could order beer or wine. Additionally, there was a bar in the Nautilus Lounge which served mixed drinks, beer, and wine. There was always a $8-9 cocktail of the day (like a Manhattan), as well as a continuous 6-beer-bucket for $26. The bar was well stocked, and only late into the evening did their refrigerators start to run low.

There was also champagne served during the Captain’s Welcome, and during the Charity Auction towards the end of the voyage.

Don’t know, didn’t use them. Some quick notes I can add: the spa rates seemed comparable to those on any mainline cruise ship, the hot tub was open about half the journey (likely due to rough seas), and everyone I spoke to seemed to enjoy the spa and sauna. According to a co-traveler who -unlike me- cares about their health, the gym was small, had a few basic weight machines, stationary bikes, a rowing machine, and workout mats.

Yes! The Polar Boutique was open randomly during the trip. Here you could buy basic souvenirs -like postcards and shirts- as well as any critical items you may have forgotten or misplaced (camera SD cards, over-the-counter medicine, etc.) If your voyage is not going to the British store at Port Lockroy, you may also deposit your postcards here for posting when the ship is able to visit.

There was intermittent satellite internet onboard. It seemed reasonably priced (I did not purchase it), but the feedback I got was that it was only really good for text messages, emails, and posting maybe one or two photographs to the socials.

Tips are pooled among the staff and crew and are paid at the conclusion of the voyage. You may either pay at the front desk in hard currency (crisp U.S. dollars are king in Ushuaia nowadays), or charge a specified amount to your onboard bill and pay by credit card. You do not need to tip the staff as you go; while in theory you still have that option, my recommendation would be to instead identify specific crew members on your tipping form and a specified tip amount for each.

There were a fair number of lectures that the crew put together on a variety of topics, including birds, whales, the history of Antarctic exploration, and geology. There was typically one lecture in the morning and one in the afternoon. I attended all but one of these and I found them incredibly informative. Early morning featured yoga (when seas allowed). There was also an onboard Citizen Science Program which leveraged guests to conduct scientific surveys on things like seabirds and clouds. And, obviously, mealtime. Otherwise, you were free to explore whatever amenities there were on the boat.

There were some board games in some of the lounges (good luck playing in rough seas, though…), a nice open deck out back for whale watching, the open bridge, the books in the library, and the same few movies on the TV. And that was about it. I think everyone copes with the nothingness in their own way. I spent quite a bit of time outside whale watching, reading a book, listening to music while sitting on the outer deck, and attending the lectures as I’ve mentioned. As I said, some additional tour-organized leisure activities would have been nice.

It doesn’t, but it isn’t pretending to be one either. There is no theater with shows, there is no casino, there is no zip-line, there is no jumbo pool slide, and (thankfully) no black-tie dinner events. This is a former Soviet-bloc car ferry converted to shuttle people to the most inaccessible continent on earth; it is utilitarian, not a leisure craft.

My best advice: make new friends and make great memories together.

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Now back to the review!

Each guest was issued a very nice puffy coat (yours to keep), as well as a waterproof parka and muck boots (to be returned upon conclusion of the voyage). You’d also be given a life vest for wear on the zodiacs.

The Mud Room on Deck 4 was where all the pre-zodiac activity happened. Each guest was assigned a locker in which your issued parka and muck boots were stored. You may also leave hats, gloves, etc., in the locker, but be aware that all items must undergo biological controls prior to heading to the continent. The Mud Room is a short walk away from the zodiac loading area.

Let me state up front that not every zodiac cruise will result in a landing. While this may seem like a bummer, I think the vast majority of people enjoyed the cruises as much as the landings. The cruise I was on was supposed to do eight zodiac tours -one in the morning and one in the afternoon for four days- but we ended up doing three scenic cruises and two landing cruises before our trip got cut short due to the bad weather. I expect they shoot for four zodiac-only cruises and four landing cruises over four days, but, obviously, they can only support those activities which they can do safely.

Now that you are aware of this nuance, know that IAATO rules prohibit more than 100 guests on the continent at any given time. As such, how any zodiac activity proceeds is entirely dependent on whether or not it is a landing cruise. If it is a landing cruise, one half of the ship will go ashore while the other half does a brief scenic cruise; after a certain time, the two groups will switch. If you are keen to do math, this means roughly 75% of the time you are out on expedition is on the zodiac (four zodiac-only cruises and half of the time during the four landing cruises).

Due in part to this 100 passenger cap, and in part due to the nightmarish logistics of having 200 people in the Mud Room at any one time, the entire ship was broken into four boarding groups. Each boarding group would report to the Mud Room in turn, prep up, and head out. Turn-around time per group averaged about 10 minutes, so the whole affair was pretty darned efficient.

Something I’ll be clear about right now: each zodiac holds ten guests. If you are traveling with companions, or you were fortunate enough as I was to find nine awesome new friends to share your experience with, work with the expedition team to ensure you are in the same boarding group and on the same zodiac. If you are orderly and prompt, they are more than willing to work with you!

Preparing for the zodiac was really easy - basically, just trade your shoes for muck boots, put your parka on, attach your key card to the lanyard, put your life vest on properly, gather your photo equipment, hats, gloves, etc., find your nine mates, and head to the check-out. You’d have to step into some soapy goop if you are landing (to sterilize your muck boots) before getting to the loading area.

Getting onto the zodiac was really easy, as well. Hand your backpack to the awaiting crew, grab a hold of the expedition leader as you step onto the zodiac, sit down, and scoot over to your spot. We had some zodiac boardings and disembarkations in rough weather, and -while they looked intimidating- they weren’t a huge challenge. If you’re relatively fit don’t overthink it and you’ll be fine.

Once on the zodiac, you’ll putter around looking at wildlife, ice floes, and the amazing landscapes. Take your directions from the expedition leader, particularly on when to stand up or kneel, but they are very accommodating if you want to photograph something. I was concerned that I would have a difficult time taking pictures while on the zodiac, but this turned out to be a non-issue.

If you are lucky enough to do a landing, you’ll either be stepping off the front of the zodiac onto land, or turning and stepping into the ocean before walking ashore.

There are plenty of zodiac videos on my YouTube channel, but this one shows most of the activity from the Mud Room to landing:

Returning from a zodiac cruise was basically the same thing, but in reverse.

If you are still apprehensive about going to Antarctica because of the zodiacs: if you are healthy, smart, and careful, you’ll have no cause for concern.

The tour operator has zero itinerary when they travel to Antarctica aside from knowing when to be back in Ushuaia, and they are at the mercy of the ship’s captain for landing and zodiac opportunities. Don’t get married to a specific itinerary, don’t get upset at the crew if you don’t get to do an activity you expected to do (pretty please), and don’t let missed opportunities be the enemy of having a good time.

The weather during excursions is absolutely unpredictable. It can be snowing and windy in the morning, crystal clear when you board the zodiac, cloudy on the continent, and foggy by the time you get back to the ship. If pictures are worth a thousand words, these two photographs were taken 25 minutes apart:

Long story short, you should be prepared for all types of weather while out on the zodiacs. Sometimes things can get a bit crazy, like they did for us at Foyn Harbour:

Editor’s Comment: Please ensure the video is playing back at the highest available resolution for the best experience.

Our tour had multiple optional activities planned: the photographic workshop, the kayak program, the day paddle program, camping, and snowshoeing. Unfortunately, because of the weather, only the photographic workshop and the kayak program were able to go forward. The camping program -of which I was scheduled to be a part- was unable to head out because of ice blocking our potential campsites and the early return. The day paddle program had drawn a lottery, but ultimately wasn’t possible. I’m not sure snowshoeing was ever considered possible.

(Here’s the awkward part of the webpage where I’m unprepared to answer a question despite me being the one literally asking it to myself….)

There are plenty of things I am very glad I had with me that I'm sure I’ll end up listing in a very inconvenient and confusing order. To start with, the aforementioned single plug-USB European-style power plug adapter was money. Oversized ski or snowboard goggles like these were also a tremendously great pickup. I suspect that most people on the boat caught me once or twice wearing my puffy winter booties. Haters gonna hate; they may look dumb as hell, but they are comfortable (and there are no open-toed shoes allowed onboard). Lastly, and perhaps most importantly, if you need seasickness tablets, bring them; hell, bring them even if you don’t think you need them.

Some other things I am glad I packed were large five-fingered waterproof gloves, a book to read, a music-playing device with headphones, a waterproof backpack for the zodiac, and way more lens cleaner than even I thought I’d need.

But the star of the show, in my opinion, was my 360-degree camera. There is so much going on all the time during zodiac cruises you can’t possibly capture it all with a regular camera or cellphone. The nice thing about the 360-degree camera is you just hold it and let it do the hard work for you. The travelogue is full of these 360-degree videos, please go check them out.

I brought a rain jacket which I never once used; I suppose it could have been necessary if I had spent more time in Ushuaia, but really my puffy coat was more than sufficient. I brought two pairs of thermally-lined pants, but with my waterproof pants over top, these didn’t even get close to dirty and one pair would have been enough. Knowing what I know now, I would have also leveraged the laundry service a bit more and not brought nearly as many undershirts, socks, and underwear. Lastly, I wouldn't have brought flip-flops knowing that open-toed shoes were prohibited.

Along the same lines: there is no “formal” evening as on traditional cruise ships, so don’t worry about bringing a dinner jacket or cocktail dress.

Besides the video camera I mentioned above, I wholeheartedly recommend bringing two camera bodies if you are a serious photographer rather than trying to execute lens changes. Zodiacs are constantly wet and you cannot put anything on the ground on the continent, so rocking two rigs -one telephoto, one wide-angle- is the way to go in my opinion. Pay a chiropractor to deal with the after-effects later.

I didn’t bring my 150-600mm lens (affectionately called “Lenszooka”) and -frankly- I kind of regret it. While my 70-300mm lens performed admirably, there were some shots where I wish I had the additional range.

Tripods / monopods are really unnecessary and probably more of a pain to carry around than anything. The only exception I can think of is if you are doing the camping and want to do some long exposure photography.

Last but not least: bring every single piece of camera cleaning equipment in your arsenal. Hurricane blowers, brushes, lens cleaners … you’ll need it all. If you want to pull off the real pro-move, bring along a USB lens heater - that thing saved my ass many, many times after zodiac cruises (lots of people had fog issues going from cold to hot to cold to hot).

Well, you can probably anticipate my answer based on the above: it didn’t, really. With the early return to Ushuaia and a clogged port, we were initially instructed that we’d need to stay on the boat in port overnight, disembarking no later than 6AM the following day. As the situation developed, we were told we could leave the boat to head into town for drinks, but would not get our passports back until the following day. Finally, in the early evening we were told indeed that if we wished to leave the boat early we could. Rather than spend another night in the boiling hot room on Deck 4 and deal with a 5AM wake-up call, I quickly booked a hotel in town for the evening, paid my bill, packed my stuff, and head into town. Disembarkation was chaotic, to say the least, and I sincerely hope your experience is better than mine.

Your booking includes either a free transfer to the airport if you are departing the same day your cruise returns, or a free transfer to your follow-on hotel if you are staying in Ushuaia. Since I left early, I don’t have any insight into how well or poorly this was executed.

We were very, very fortunate on the way to Antartica to have the so-called “Drake Lake”, a relatively calm Southern Ocean. Only a few folks (who, presumably, had never been on an ocean-going ship before and didn’t know how to prepare) got seasick. The way back was full-on “Drake Shake”, complete with violent listing side-to-side. The number of people affected by seasickness rose dramatically, obviously. You can see some Drake Shake here:

Your results may vary, but the best advice I can give you is prepare for the worst and bring medication.

I don’t get seasick for some reason, but the feedback I got from people is that 1) fresh air is incredibly helpful, and 2) being able to see the horizon is often more helpful than being cooped in a closed room. I’ve also heard having a full stomach and liquids in your system are helpful, even if you don’t think you can keep them down.

If you are relatively fit and have sound decision-making: yes, going to Antarctica is about as safe as any leisure activity you can engage in. Is it totally safe? No. Do accidents happen? Of course they do. Is an external medical service going to be able to help you if something goes wrong? Certainly not. Should any of these possibilities stop you from getting onboard? No.

No, but to believe that any trip to Antarctica is entirely ethical or environmentally-friendly is, in my opinion, extremely naïve to begin with.

With that out of the way, the better question might be: is this trip as ethical or environmentally-friendly as it could be? For the most part, yes. I salute that Intrepid Travel runs this voyage as “doubly carbon-offset” (whatever that means), and certainly going on a smaller boat is more environmentally-friendly that going on a behemoth expedition ship carrying the same number of passengers which lugs around unnecessary vanity equipment (like helicopters). Furthermore, I mentioned Intrepid Travel committing to (nearly) eliminating fish meal options due to ethical concerns above. I’ll also call-out the benefits of the Citizen Science Program, which makes use of travelers to conduct basic science experiments and observations; this endeavor saves the energy required to send scientists to the continent to conduct basic observations. Lastly, I’ll quickly mention that the cruise’s auction raises money for two wildlife preservation charities.

However, the onboard experience belies some of the public-facing claims made by its operators of ethical decision-making, particularly in two areas: food choice, and collection of marketing materials.

While not serving fish due to a lack of an ethical vendor is laudable, the menu featured ethically-ambiguous food choices such as veal. I am by no means vegetarian, and I had no reservations about trying the veal option so don’t get the wrong opinion of me. That said, even I was left wondering: what the heck is ethical veal? Please, consider consistency if you are going to prop yourselves up as a vendor which provides ethically-sourced food choices.

The other ethics concern relates to the intention of the vendor’s employees to use remotely-piloted aircraft to collect video for marketing purposes while on shore landings. Before proceeding with this line of thought, three things I want to make clear: first, these employees claimed to have secured a license to lawfully conduct this activity; second, the marketing material generated by this team does not yet obviously or otherwise explicitly depict footage collected by remotely-piloted aircraft (I won’t link to it because, frankly, I don’t want to promote it); and, third, I am completely and totally opposed to the use of drone aircraft to video record wildlife for commercial purposes, full stop.

I understand the desire of the marketing team to want to secure this type of footage; however, I believe that in simply stating an intention to do so they ran contrary to the Intrepid Travel’s Global Ethical Marketing Policy, particularly as it relates to truthful promotion of product. Additionally, their intended actions ran contrary to the ethical guidelines espoused by the company’s own expedition’s scientists, who requested all passengers try and depict wildlife encounters on social media as realistically as possible, and in such a way as to not create the perception of up-close access to animals. All I ask is some consistency between words and actions.

Photographer’s Comment: Before you say, “You hypocrite! All your wildlife photographs are up-close!”, I want to address my opinions on the crew’s social media directive. Indeed, I confess that I (obviously) do not present wildlife in an entirely realistic way; however, all of my Antarctica photographs were taken from a distance which ensured the safety of the animal. I wholeheartedly believe that taking “whole-face” or “in-close” telephoto photographs as I did will always be safer for and less intrusive to wildlife than a cellphone photograph taken at closer range. More importantly, so long as I am complying with the distance requirements set forth by the crew, I should be able to use whatever magnification lens I damn well please and share any derived work without any ethical predicament. Photography is an artistic medium and it is my right to take whatever aesthetic liberties I want in the presentation of my images. Would one consider National Geographic -who applies similar artistic standards- to be unethical? Putting aside photographic platitudes for a moment, here is really where this matter starts and stops: it is the passenger’s responsibility to comply with crew-specified animal distance rules and it is the crew’s responsibility to enforce these rules; any other crew consideration beyond this is, frankly, irrelevant.

Any browsing of social media in late November / early December 2022 might have led you to believe that the entirety of the influencer world was floating around somewhere in the Drake Passage. Certainly, Ocean Endeavour wasn’t immune from this phenomenon. This article, for example, features multiple videos taken onboard the ship, presumably from the voyage after mine. And, indeed, there were so-called “influencers” on my voyage, as well.

But why on Ocean Endeavour? Is it that Ocean Endeavour’s greater-than-average door-width accommodated their increased cranial-displacement needs? No. It’s because the vendors are actively sponsoring influencer travel to Antarctica.

Do I have a problem with this? Hell yes, I do.

Perhaps more than any other place on earth, travel to Antarctica should be conducted with solemnity and with a keen awareness of how remote and untouched by man it truly is. Reverence for one’s surroundings and respect for the obligation to preserve them are paramount. Writ large, I don’t feel that influencers’ interests align with these principles. Put simply, people should be motivated to travel to Antarctica for the right reasons, not as an opportunity for vapid self-promotion. Funding a media campaign centered around this form of conceit can only serve to be destructive.

The other issue is simple: Antarctica is amazing, wild, beautiful, stunning, and incredible. It doesn’t need help to sell itself.

Chimu, Intrepid: Ditch the influencers.

Absolutely, assuming Antarctica doesn’t completely devolve into a TikTok dumpster fire in the coming years. It is an amazing place, home to some of the world’s most incredible wildlife and scenery, and who would honestly pass up a chance to see something like that a second time if they could?

I’d go for a longer cruise. Yes, the cost ratchets up very quickly, but 1) the per day cost of being in Antarctica is totally worth the investment, and 2) you have to suck up two days of Drake Passage (and offset its accompanying environmental impact) each way, so you might as well make the journey count.

On the whole I do, and -assuming they work to address some of the issues I outlined here- I’d be more than happy to give them my business to travel on Ocean Endeavour a second time. I very much look forward to seeing how they evolve their product in the years to come.

I think this about covers it, but I’ll update this page if I think of anything else. If you have any specific questions, or if you have been on Ocean Endeavour with Intrepid Travel and Chimu Adventures and have more feedback, please reach out to us at hdhuntphoto@gmail.com or drop a comment below.

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