Antarctica Tours & Cruise

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Antarctica Tours

Minimum age: varies

Antarctica offers dramatic landscapes, stunning wildlife, and exciting adventure activities such as kayaking and ice camping. These experiences can provide once in a lifetime travel memories to delight the senses of travelers of all ages. However, these unique sea voyages are not a good choice for every family. Parents should carefully consider the interests and limitations of their own children before deciding on an Antarctica tour.

Getting to Antarctica takes much longer than traditional cruise voyages and the relatively small boats have much fewer facilities than a typical cruise ship. These long voyages at sea can become tiresome for even the most hearty child traveler. Entertainment options onboard are often limited to educational lectures, wildlife viewing, and whatever you pack along. Be sure to bring plenty of books, arts and crafts materials, puzzles, or other age-appropriate entertainment options. You may also want to consider upgrading to a larger room or suite to give kids more room to spread out. A few of the larger luxury vessels do offer additional facilities such as swimming pools, cinemas, or in-room television that can also help keep kids occupied.

Since family travel to Antarctica is a relatively new concept, it is unlikely that there will be other children onboard for your kids to play with. Talk with your kids in advance to prepare them for this situation and for the trip demands in general. The more that your family researches and selects options together, the more fun everyone will have!

Since there is no access to medical facilities, children with chronic conditions such as severe asthma, diabetes, etc are not advised to visit. Some vessels have minimum age requirements ranging from 6 to 12 (see below). Other vessels leave it up to the parents to decide whether or not the cruise would be appropriate.

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