Memories are made of this: Why now is the time to splash the cash on an epic cruise

Pairing fabulous itineraries with onboard facilities that go the extra nautical mile, cruising is quite simply unbeatable as a way to tick off your bucket list.

Sending a postcard from the world’s southernmost post box, champagne breakfasting at the foot of Mount Everest or being mentored by a National Geographic photographer in the Brazilian Amazon – all of these can be accomplished on a great ocean voyage.

Stocking you up with dinner-party tales for years to come, these are the kind of goose-bump experiences that stay with you for ever. So sit back, dream big and dive head first into our guide to making memories that never fade...

ROUND THE WORLD CRUISES
Great for: Globetrotters

Traversing oceans and cultures, these itineraries reward cruisers with a flood of once-in-a-lifetime experiences, illuminating and intoxicating in equal parts. One week you could find yourself stepping back 2,800 years in the Eternal City of Rome, the next, dune-bashing in Dubai’s desert.

Ancient wonders such as the temples of Angkor Wat are spliced with futuristic cities like Tokyo; glacier-lined fjords follow lava-spitting volcanoes.

Some sailings also take you through two of the world’s great engineering marvels: the Panama and Suez Canals. Strictly speaking, most world cruises aren’t true circumnavigations of the globe. Instead, they typically span three or four continents over the same number of months, setting sail in December or early January and returning to port in March or April – making them the perfect escape from the miserable British winter.

Many itineraries sail round-trip from the USA, which isn’t a bad place to start on your bucket list (imagine yourself ice-skating in NYC’s Rockefeller Center, biking along Miami’s Art Deco beachfront, then practising your jazz hands on New Orleans’ famous Bourbon Street).

With port stops in the hundreds, you’re virtually guaranteed to visit that sight you’ve always longed to see, whether it’s Cape Town’s Table Mountain or Brazil’s jungle-draped Iguazu Falls; Greece’s Mount Olympus (the legendary home of Zeus) or the sacred Inca citadel of Machu Picchu.

While you’ll also get a fair few sea days in which to explore the delights of your ship, the pinch-me moments come thick and fast. When you’re island-hopping through the Caribbean, for example, you’ll be eating jerk chicken in Jamaica, swimming with pigs in the Bahamas and riding in a Crayola-coloured Cadillac in Havana – all in less than a week.

Of course, three months of once-in-a-lifetime experiences will make a serious dent in your wallet as well as your bucket list. But here’s the good news: you can still tick off a handful of amazing adventures on a world-cruising ‘segment’, which can last anywhere from a week to a month.

Get on board
Viking Cruises' 162-night ‘2025 Viking World Voyage II’ aboard Viking Sky, from Los Angeles to New York City, overnighting in destinations including Hawaii, French Polynesia, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, Southeast Asia, India, Arabia and the Holy Land, the Mediterranean, Scandinavia, Iceland, Greenland and Canada, departs January 5, 2025. From £57,990 per person.

MSC Cruises' 116-night ‘MSC World Cruise 2025’ aboard MSC Magnifica, round trip from Marseille via 21 countries across five continents and destinations including the Mediterranean, South America (via Casablanca and Cape Verde), French Polynesia, New Zealand, Australia, Indonesia, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, Sri Lanka, the Suez Canal, Jordan and Egypt, departs January 6, 2025. From £14,999 per person.

EXPEDITION CRUISES
Great for: Adventurous travellers
If taking a polar plunge straight off the deck of your ship or joining an archaeologist among the stone temples of French Polynesia piques your interest, expedition cruising could be for you.

Journeying far from the madding crowd to places where wildlife outnumbers people and wilderness reigns supreme, these are voyages for the curious and active traveller unafraid of sailing out of their comfort zone.

With no hour-by-hour schedule to rule their day, passengers can spend longer living out those goosebump moments, whether it be whale-watching in Alaska or swimming with playful sea-lions in the Galapagos archipelago.

The latter location, some 600 miles off the coast of Ecuador, has been inspiring nature-lovers since Charles Darwin began to unlock its evolutionary mysteries aboard HMS Beagle, and it remains one of the most popular expedition cruising destinations to this day.

For many travellers, however, the ultimate prize is Antarctica – the highest, coldest and emptiest continent on Earth. Here you can retrace the footsteps of the great polar explorers Shackleton and Scott, with only the penguins for company.

Antarctica-bound ships usually depart from the Argentine port of Ushuaia, but expedition itineraries are often bookended by stops in the nation’s seductive capital. So if you’ve always longed to tango – or tuck into the world’s tastiest steaks – make sure your itinerary includes an overnight (or two) in Buenos Aires.

Elsewhere in South America the adventure opportunities are almost limitless, with the mighty Amazon offering access to the planet’s greatest rainforest. Here you can swim with pink river dolphins in Brazil or fish for piranha as the sun rises over the Amazonian headwaters in Peru.

Most of these immersive experiences are only possible thanks to the agility of smaller-sized expedition vessels, which also offer the intimate onboard atmosphere that’s often missing on ‘big box’ ships. And bringing your bucket-list moments to life are the specialist crews – from ornithologists to oceanographers – who may even enlist you as a citizen scientist to help with their ongoing research.

As well as the Polar Class integrity of theirconstruction, Arctic and Antarctic expedition ships boast a whole range of impressively hi-tech features – think helicopters, military-grade Zodiac inflatables, underwater drones and – for passengers of Ponant’s yacht-like Le Lapérouse – a truly amazing subaquatic viewing lounge.

Get on board
Hurtigruten's 10-night ‘Highlights of Antarctica’ cruise aboard MS Fridtjof Nansen, round trip from Ushuaia via South Shetland Islands and Gerlache Strait, departs January 27, 2025. From £5,489 per person.

San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance Adventures' eight-night ‘The Great Amazon River Expedition 2025’ aboard Delfin II, round trip from Lima via Iquitos and the Ucayali, Yarapa, Marañon, Dorado and Pacaya Rivers, departs June 21, 2025. From £6,689 per person.