What’s It Like to Travel to Antarctica with Quark Expeditions?
In November 2019, I traveled on board of Ocean Endeavour of Quark Expedition to Falklands, South Georgia and Antarctic Peninsula. The trip was 20 days long, with one night in Buenos Aires, so basically 18 nights on the ship.
While Quark provides you with pre-departure info, packing list and basic info, but before the trip I had been trying to find more information based on guest experience to know how to prepare myself – and I didn’t find much.
This post is NOT sponsored by Quark Expeditions in any way. Both me and my husband paid a full-price for the trip and have no association with Quark. Feel free to ask us any questions about our trip to Antarctica in the comments.
What’s It Like to Travel to Antarctica with Quark Expeditions?
Spoiler alert: it’s an amazing, once in a lifetime kind of trip!
About the Ship – Ocean Endeavour
Before coming on board Quark Expeditions I went on two cruises. One on a big Royal Caribbean ship and one small ship called Fathom by Carnival Cruises.
However, Antarctic ships could really be compared only to maybe those ships that travel on the Baltic Sea to Russia. In fact, “our” ship was actually built in 1982 in Szczecin, Poland for the Soviet Union and used for these overnight voyages from Scandinavia to Russia.
Unlike on big ships I’ve been before, you can definitely feel the rocking motion of the ship all the time on the open waters on the way to Antarctica. Nonetheless, it isn’t so bad when it comes to rocking.
Ocean Endeavour was a relatively small ship, so at first glance, you might think you’ll be bored, but the staff really provides you with a bunch of activities to keep you occupied (more on this later).
Sure, you won’t find a nightclub or big swimming pool with slides onboard, but there’s a small gym, spa (extra cost), and two cafes on board.
* Note: Quark is actually retiring Ocean Endeavour after 2019/2020 season (another company is buying it) and replacing it with World Explorer ship. It’s a larger ship that feels more ‘cruise-like’ than expedition ship, with more luxurious cabins.
How Much Does It Cost to Go to Antarctica?
You might want to know how much money do you need to go on a trip to Antarctica and how to score the best deal. There are actually a few tricks, so I decided to write a dedicated post about it.
But, be prepared that the lowest you could pay for a very basic Antarctica trip is $5000 and for trips stopping in South Georgia like mine $10,000.
That doesn’t include cabins with portholes or windows, extra activities, internet, flights and other extras.
One Advice: if you heard that someone tells you they scored 50% off during the last-minute flash sale, ask them how much exactly did they pay. Many people think they scored a deal while in reality, they paid the same as others or more.
Cabins
Everywhere I read that cabins on Ocean Endeavour were dated and small. While I’d agree with the first statement, they weren’t tiny. They were way bigger than my rooms in London when I used to live there.
And, truth to be told, we had one of the smallest rooms on the ship. My husband and I had a twin porthole with bunk beds on Deck 4.
We had space to put our luggage, keep clothes in a dresser and wardrobe, and felt like we had some space to move around. It wasn’t a luxurious cabin, but wasn’t as small as many Tripadvisor posts tend to describe it.
Passengers on Board
You never know who you’ll meet on board of your ship and whether you’ll get along with the group or not. Our ship had 199 guests, 115 crew and 30 Quark staff members.
Most guests were definitely over 50 years old. There were two arranged groups traveling together – Chinese & Israeli that filled half of the ship, but everyone else signed up on their own. Couples, small groups of friends and various solo travelers.
In the past, some cruises were also French-oriented, but we only had a few French guests on board. As there were two groups a lot of guests didn’t speak much English, so all the announcements were also made in Chinese.
As our cruise didn’t sell out until the very last minute (find out how to score a cheaper trip to Antarctica), there were a lot of people who were friends and family of the expedition crew.
Everyone was encouraged to sit together and mingle at meals, so we quickly found a group of people we became friends with.
All guests were divided into 4 disembarkation groups to keep the mudroom (the place where you leave your parka and boots and get dressed before hopping on a zodiac) not full of people and smooth the process.
The staff specifically asked everyone to wait until their group is called to go into the mudroom, but half of the Chinese guests were already there before anyone got called. It really took a good few days to get things in order.
Food on Board
Food on board of Quark Expeditions was honestly great. Breakfast and lunch were served in a buffet form, while dinner was a la carte menu. In from of the dining hall they also had a showcase of how your dinner dish would look like.
The menu changed every day. Usually, there was one meat-based dish, one fish dish and one vegetarian option to choose from. Alternatively, if you didn’t like any of the options you could ask for pasta, burger or something from the menu cooked the way you want it.
I think all the guests were quite impressed by the variety of choices considering that the ship had to store the food for 19 days! We still had fresh salad until the end of the trip.
Soft drinks, beers and wine for dinner was included, but you could also purchase hard liquors at any time for a reasonable price.
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Internet
I came on board with a perception that I’ll be disconnected from the world for the duration of the trip. Based on what my friends who have been on trip to Antarctica have told me and what I was able to find online, there was no internet on the ship.
However, it turned out that Quark Expedition provides internet on board! There are actually two options:
1) “chat” – It’s totally free and you’ll be able to send WhatsApp messages back and forth using it. You won’t be able to send or receive photos though. Quark claims this option is also good for Facebook Messenger App, but I can tell you it’s only working for WhatsApp.
2) “guest Wifi” – Costs $75 for 10 days or $100 for 30 days, and allows you to browse, send and receive photos, short videos and check emails.
Regardless of the connection you choose, wifi is obviously not fast and you won’t be able to catch up on Netflix. It’s just enough to load your email on apps, use facebook chat, send and post some photos and do some VERY basic browsing.
There are days that wifi simply doesn’t work though, so keep this in mind.
You can also purchase a phone card for $20. If you’re calling the US landline, it’s enough for about 50-60 min of talking.
What to Pack for Antarctica
We were told countless times that due to luggage limits on a charter flight from Buenos Aires to Ushuaia we could only bring 23kg checked bag and 8kg carry on, no exceptions.
This turned out to be only partially true because in reality, most Chinese guests had more or less 4 carry-ons definitely over 20 kg each. Nobody said a word about that and they only weighted a suitcase of one guy, told him it’s overweight and still let him pass.
Another information that was spreading online that turned out not to be true was that you cannot wear your own clothes for landings and you must wear the gear provided by Quark – yellow parka and rubber boots.
The boots were compulsory, but the use of parka was really up to you. Many guests opted for their own jackets, myself included. As long as you had your boots, waterproof pants and waterproof jacket on you were good to go on a zodiac.
Waterproofness of your clothes is important because you always get splashed on a zodiac (sometimes all over your head as well!) and you need to disembark into the water.
There’s laundry on board for $29.99 per load (you can stuff a big bag), not per item. It’s usually done in less than a day.
Traveling to Antarctica with Quark Expeditions
Ushuaia
Our trip actually started at the Intercontinental Hotel in Buenos Aires, as we opted for a package with a charter flight to Ushuaia.