Экспедиционное судно Silver Cloud: ключевые особенности и советы для путешественников

10 Things Travel Advisors Should Know About Silver Cloud by Dori Saltzman Silver Cloud, one of Silversea Cruises’ four expedition ships, is also the cruise line’s oldest ship in the fleet. Built in 1994 as a classic luxury cruise ship, it underwent a $40 million refit in 2017 to become an ice-strengthened expedition vessel. It is capable of holding up to 254 guests, but capacity is capped closer to the 200 mark on polar voyages. With crew kept at about 212, this means polar voyages generally provide a one-to-one crew-to-passenger ratio. While it is best known for operating some of Silversea’s Antarctica expeditions, Silver Cloud also does warm-weather cruises. TMR spent 10 days onboard the ship during one of the ship’s much-in-demand Australia Kimberley Coast voyages. Here’s everything a travel advisor should know about the ship when talking to clients, along with some advice to pass along. 1. Old, But Immaculately Updated Silver Cloud might be the oldest ships in the Silversea fleet, but it is regularly updated and you’d be hard-pressed to find anything that gives away its age. During its last dry dock (May 2026), carpets and other soft goods were replaced throughout the ship, and all suites received new bathroom tiles, among other updates. 2. All Suite, but Not All Balcony Silver Cloud is an all-suite ship, but entry level Vista Suites (240 square feet, all on Deck 4) do not have a balcony. In fact, some 20% of the suites onboard do not have balconies. Word of advice: When talking to clients about suite choices, it’s important to remember that Silver Cloud only sails in expedition destinations, where a private balcony for taking in the beautiful scenery can make a big difference to the overall experience. Additionally, Vista, Veranda (295 square feet), and Deluxe Veranda (295 square feet) suites are not true suites in the sense that there is no division between the bedroom and the rest of the stateroom. (Veranda and Deluxe Veranda suites are identical, differing only by the Deluxe Veranda’s better locations on the ship.) While all suites receive butler service, Medallion Suites (517 square feet) and above come with extra services including complimentary laundry and unlimited Premium Wi-Fi (Medallion Suite and above) and complimentary dinner in La Dame once per cruise (Royal Suite and above). Silver Suites and above all have two full bathrooms. 3. Lots of Dining Options for a Small Ship For a ship that holds less than 300 passengers (254 in non-polar waters), Silver Cloud offers an impressive choice of dining options, all but one of which are included. (Room service is also free of charge for all passengers.) Ingredients on our sailing (a Kimberley Coast cruise in Australia) were extremely fresh. Australia does not permit any meat or produce from outside of Australia or New Zealand (seafood is the only exception) onboard and you could taste the freshness of ingredients that had been loaded on the day of embarkation. Silver Cloud’s main dining room, The Restaurant (Deck 3), is open for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, every day. All meals are served a la minute, except for a once-per-cruise Gala Brunch, which consists of a sumptuous buffet. Dinner menus feature a three-course “Tastes of” option that focuses on a different region each day (U.K., France, Italy, Australia, etc.), along with evening recommendations specific to that day, and a larger selection of appetizers and main courses that stay the same for two to three days before changing. Desserts comprise a cheese platter, a small variety of ice cream, and two to three pastries or cakes that change each day. You can also order off of the room service menu, which we discovered when we wanted a simple chicken soup one evening. Each dinner menu has several vegetarian options, but most menus are heavy on red meat, pork, and fish. (The menu on our Kimberely cruise might have been influenced by the large percentage of Australians on our sailing.) La Terrazza (Deck 7) does double duty, serving as a buffet for breakfast and lunch, and as an Italian specialty venue for dinner. Word of advice: If your client likes cooked eggs for breakfast (omelet, over easy, scrambled, etc.), they can order from their waiter at the table. No one ever mentioned this to us; we figured it out on our own. The dinner menu is divided into Antipasti, Primi (appetizers), Secondi (mains), Cantorini (side dishes), and Dolci (desserts), with specific items changing every three to four days. As with The Restaurant, there is always a choice of vegetarian options. While there is no fee, reservations for dinner at La Terrazza are required. Side note: As someone who eats primarily poultry, I found a lack of chicken dishes (or other poultry alternatives) in both the Restaurant and La Terrazza at both lunch and dinner. The third included dining venue onboard is The Grill (Deck 8), which is open for lunch and dinner (reservations required). The lunch menu features burgers (veggie option included), plus salads, poke bowls, sandwiches and wraps, and a small grilled meat selection. The dinner menu features salads and appetizers, seafood (a fish of the day, plus prawns), two types of steak, and a pork dish. Several sides, a choice of sauces, and a small dessert selection round out the menu. (We pre-ordered a turkey burger for our dinner at The Grill a day before hand.) Located outside, The Grill is a lovely location during good weather, but not the best spot when its cold or raining. When we asked if its actually open during Antarctic sailings, we were told yes, but with only one waiter on duty because virtually no one elects to eat there. Like La Terrazza, there is no fee for The Grill but reservations are required. La Dame (Deck 4) is the only extra-fee dining venue onboard Silver Cloud. The French-themed menu is not as heavy as other French restaurants we’ve been to at sea, but your clients should still come prepared to be full at the end of the meal. Appetizers include caviar, foie gras, escargot, scallops, asparagus salad, and more. Meat dishes range from duck to beef to lamb, while fish dishes include lobster tail, Dover sole, and a Chilean sea bass that was the best meal I had on Silver Cloud. There’s also a vegetarian dish of layered potatoes and vegetables. The star of the dessert menu is a pistachio and dark chocolate souffle that must be ordered at the start of the meal. (We were so full after our appetizer and main course, we skipped out on dessert.) On top of La Dame’s dinner menu, your food-and-wine-loving clients can also check out The Chef and the Sommelier specialty lunch, served once per sailing for a fee (our sailing was $150). The four-course meal is limited to no more than 10 diners. It is designed by the chef is accompanied by four wines hand-picked by the sommelier, with the entire meal hosted by the Sommelier, with introductions to each course made by the chef. On our sailing, the courses included a smoked salmon praline, grilled fillet of seabass, filet of Limousin beef, and a “summertime” dessert. The wine selection was a unique blend of vintages from France, Greece, Germany, and the Napa Valley. If given notice ahead of time, the chef is happy to swap out alternatives. For instance, a diner at our meal was given caviar instead of salmon, while yours truly had a delicious chicken dish instead of beef. Clients should be prepared to spend close to three hours at this lunch and should probably not make any big plans for dinner. Guests onboard Silver Cloud can also find snacks in the Panorama Lounge throughout the day, and room service is available, free of charge, 24/7. 4. Bathroom’s Doorless Showers Like many cruise ships and hotels, Silversea chose doorless-showers for Silver Cloud. Though aesthetically pleasing, we found this often led to a wet bathroom floor. By day 10 of our cruise we’d managed to figure out how to keep splashing to a minimum but an extra towel rolled up and placed alongside the plush bathroom rug helped. 5. Observation Lounge Is Best-Kept Secret Being such a small ship, just nine passenger decks, you might think there aren’t any hidden nooks and crannies for your clients to discover. But with its location at the very front of the ship on Deck 9, tucked away in front of where the Zodiacs and kayaks are stored, the Observation Lounge is a hidden gem that many passengers forget about. With nearly floor-to-ceiling length windows wrapping three-quarters of the lounge, the views from the lounge are fantastic. The lounge is also stock full of travel books and board games, making for a peaceful spot to relax in-between active shore excursions. The lounge’s one drawback is that it’s only accessible from outside. In bad weather or when there are high winds, the outdoor decks might be locked down, making the lounge unreachable. 6. DIY Laundry While free serviced laundry is available to guests in Medallion Suites and above, for everyone else there is a DIY launderette on Deck 4 with complimentary washing machines and dryers, and an ironing board and iron. 7. Photo Lab Is Least Used Spot on the Ship The Photo Studio on Silver Cloud takes up a significant amount of real estate on Deck 5, with several computers for photo editing, photo printers, and items for sale on display. While it’s hard to know if this is true on every sailing, on our Kimberely cruise virtually no one used the Photo Studio, possibly because virtually all the services of the Photo Lab come with an extra fee. (These include photography classes, editing lessons, private photo outings, and more.) We were honestly a bit disappointed to discover there were no photo classes or lectures, not even Photo 101, that came without some kind of surcharge. However, clients can participate in each voyage’s photo contest for free. Winners (there are two each sailing, one for an individual photo and one for a three-photo “story,” receive a small photo-related item, such as camera memory.) If you have clients who have been on other expedition cruises with a line other than Silversea, they might be expecting a take-home photo slideshow at the end of the voyage with images taken by the onboard photographer. Silversea does not do this. There are voyage photos, but they must be purchased as a package of about 100 pictures. 8. Small Spa, Even Smaller Gym With so much of a cruise onboard Silver Cruise spent ashore exploring expedition destinations or in the Explorer Lounge for lectures or recaps and briefings, there’s not much space put aside for wellness. The spa offers less than a handful of treatment rooms, but with a full slate of treatments available the space fills up whenever there’s a stretch of a few hours unfilled by the expedition team. The busiest spot in the spa during our sailing was the small salon, where women often came for a shampoo and hairstyle in the late afternoon. Clients who have their hearts set on a treatment or hair service during the cruise should either reserve ahead of time or visit the spa on day one. The small changing rooms also feature a sauna and steam room. For clients who can’t leave their fitness routine behind for 10 or so days, the small gym on Deck 6 has two treadmills (one was broken on our sailing), two ellipticals, pulley strength system, one each recumbent and upright bicycles, and free weights. There are also complimentary classes (stretch, Pilates, etc.) offered in the Dolce Vita bar and lounge. 9. Limited Onboard Entertainment As with all expedition cruise ships, the entertainment on Silver Cloud is very limited. (Franky, with so much time spent ashore in the hot sun on our sailing, we didn’t miss evening activities one bit.) For clients asking about entertainment, there was usually one trivia or Bingo game per day, as well as pool deck bean bag tosses. In the evening, the entertainment host usually arranged something like movie trivia, a pool deck dance party, karaoke, and other similar activities. There’s also a guitarist every night in Dolce Vita, which we never made it to. We could also have taken advantage of the free movies on demand system, but we were usually asleep by 10 thanks to the early mornings, long days, and lingering jet lag. 10. Expedition Amenities/Experiences During its 2017 refit, Silver Cloud’s hull was reinforced to an Ice-class rating of 1C (it can navigate through sea ice up to 1.3 feet thick). All glass windows were swapped out for thermal-resistant glass, and sonar and thermal imaging technology were added to ensure safe maneuvering in polar regions. On the passenger-facing side of things, the ship houses 20 Zodiacs (including one glass-bottom Zodiac for guests who don’t want to snorkel) and 10 kayaks. With 20 Zodiacs, all guests can be off the boat at the same time, though the Zodiacs do get a bit crowded when this happens with about 14 guests and one expedition guide/Zodiac driver per boat. By day two, all passengers are divided into Zodiac groups – on our sailing one Zodiac cruise group numbered 28 passengers. Excursions operate by Zodiac group using a rotation system that allows each group to be the first to depart at least once per cruise, depending on the number of outings per cruise. Word of advice: If you have clients who want to be together during excursions – but aren’t booked together – they should let the expedition team know on day one that they want to be in the same Zodiac group. The expedition team generally runs about 25 people (ours was 26), with team members from around the world specializing in a variety of sciences, and usually one historian as well. Word of advice: We found that expedition guides did not mingle with guests the way we’ve experienced with other expedition cruise lines. However, we discovered that if we let the Matre’d know at dinner that we’d like to take a larger table (in our case, a table for four) and open it to guides, some would join us if they had time. No one onboard ever mentions this, so if you have clients that you know would like to spend more time getting to know the expedition guides, let them know about this so they can start on day one. Unfortunately, we discovered this about eight days into the 10-day cruise.