Swan Hellenic's Norwegian Lure

Join Swan Hellenic on their June voyage to Oslo and the Fjords with a special late price from just £995 per person (Saver Fare, based on two people sharing an inside cabin).

Passengers can experience Minerva’s maiden call to Førde to explore the Black Friday Museum, dedicated to one of the fiercest air battles of World War II or visit the 90-metre-high Huldrefossen waterfall.

The 16-day cruise departs from Portsmouth and calls at Olso, Haugesund, Ulvik, Flåm, Førde, Åndalsnes, Olden and Bergen (above), as well as Aaaolborg in Denmark,  before returning to Portsmouth (UK). 

Price is based on a June 5 departure and includes relevant transfers, a tailor-made programme of shore excursions, talks by eminent Guest Speakers, meals and entertainment on board, all gratuities and all relevant cruise taxes/fees. A supplement for some shore excursions may apply. Cabin numbers may not be allocated at time of booking.

No single supplements are also available on selected cabin grades for solo travellers on this cruise.

For bookings, follow this link to The Cruise Line, the UK's luxury cruising specialists.

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Explore The East With Swan Hellenic

Swan Hellenic have a wonderful 15-day Middle East cruise option this November on their boutique ship Minerva.

Highlights include ancient Egyptian temples on the banks of the River Nile and French colonial architecture in Djibouti. Guests can delve into the maze of souks in Muscat (Oman) - a treasure trove of silver and gold, coffee pots, frankincense and textiles - and, from the port town of Khasab (Oman), visit traditional Bedouin villages before travelling onto the diverse city of Dubai and the historic Bastakiya district.

The Passage to Oman voyage starts from £1,705 per person (based on two people sharing an inside cabin). The cruise departs on November 21 from Safaga (Egypt, overnight) and calls at Djibouti, Salalah (Oman), Muscat (overnight), Khasab and Dubai (overnight).

Price of cruise includes return flights from the UK, transfers, a tailor-made programme of shore excursions, talks by eminent Guest Speakers, meals and entertainment on board, all gratuities and all relevant cruise taxes/fees. 

For bookings, follow this link to The Cruise Line, the UK's luxury cruising specialists.

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Learn A New Skill At Sea With Swan Hellenic

Want to perfect your handiwork with a paintbrush, get to grips with Tai Chi or learn the art of needlework? Join Swan Hellenic’s recently refurbished ship, MV Minerva, for a 15-day Passage to Oman cruise and try your hand at a new skill.

Passengers on board the Middle Eastern cruise can make the most of the ship’s enhanced facilities during their time at sea and take part in a range of workshops and masterclasses. Tai Chi master Qu Leilei will join passengers on board to teach them the ancient art of body and mind relaxation whilst Sophie Long, who is trained in more than 30 embroidery techniques, will also be hosting fascinating needlework workshops.

The Passage to Oman cruise starts from £1,595 per person (based on two people sharing an inside cabin) and departs from Safaga (Egypt, overnight) to call at Djibouti, Salalah (Oman), Muscat (Oman, overnight), Khasab (Oman) and Dubai (United Arab Emirates, overnight). The price is based on the November 21 departure. Masterclasses on board other Swan Hellenic cruises can include painting, bridge, writing, singing and wine-tasting.

The price also includes return flights from the UK, transfers, a tailor-made programme of shore excursions, talks by eminent Guest Speakers, meals and entertainment on board, all gratuities and all relevant cruise taxes/fees. 

For bookings, follow this link to The Cruise Line Ltd, the UK's adventure-cruise specialists.

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A Right Royal Celebration with Swan Hellenic

Here's a truly Royal cruise idea - celebrate The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee on board Swan Hellenic’s newly refurbished ship, MV Minerva from just £2,185 per person (based on two people sharing an inside cabin).

Departing from Portsmouth on May 22, passengers on the 16-day St. Petersburg and the Baltic cruise will be able to celebrate the Jubilee by taking part in ‘A Right Royal Quiz’ including musical clues taken from Her Majesty’s 60-year reign. Passengers will also be treated to a special performance of ‘Theatre Royal’ from the Shakespeare Revue Company, enacting some of the Queen’s favourite shows from across the ages, as well as a commemorative meal to mark the occasion.

To accompany the onboard entertainment, Swan Hellenic offers a programme of shore activities fit for any Queen, visiting the prestigious Mariinsky Theatre to celebrate St Petersburg’s 20^th Music Festival “Stars of the White Nights”, seeing a performance of Tchaikovsky’s Opera ‘Eugene Onegin’, and a behind-the-scenes tour with a curator at the Vasa Museum in Stockholm.

The full voyage sails through the Kiel Canal and then visits Ronne (Denmark), Visby (Sweden), St. Petersburg (overnight), Tallinn (Estonia), Gdansk (Poland) and Copenhagen (Denmark).

The price includes a tailor-made programme of shore excursions, talks by eminent Guest Speakers, meals and entertainment on board, all gratuities and all relevant cruise taxes/fees. Special terms and conditions apply.

For booking details, follow this link to the The Cruise Line Ltd, the UK's luxury cruise specialists.

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Tight squeeze! Minerva In The Corinth Canal

Here's a fab Photo of the Day - Swan Hellenic’s boutique little ship MV Minerva gave passengers a REAL close-up of the famous Corinth Canal in Greece this week as she squeezed carefully through on her Aegean Sea voyage.

With only 350 passengers, Minerva boasts a real country house ambience on board, and is renowned for her off-the-beaten-track itineraries and ability to go where other ships can’t. And there are certainly not many who can transit this Canal these days!

For more info, visit www.swanhellenic.com or the UK's leading cruise specialists of the Cruise Line Ltd.

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New Brochure from Swan Hellenic

By guest blogger Steve Newman

The winter 2011-2012 season brochures are going on sale now and Swan Hellenic’s latest features cruises throughout northern Europe, the Mediterranean, Black Sea, North Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Following particularly successful sales for Far East cruises this year, the cruise line will return to the region in late 2011 with ports of call throughout India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Malaysia, Vietnam, China, Indonesia and the Philippines , including a return to Yangon in Myanmar.

New ports, all accessible only by smaller ships like Swan Hellenic's Minerva, featured in the brochure across Europe, Asia and Middle East include the wildlife conservation reserve of Sir Bani Yas island in the United Arab Emirates, the Vietnamese coastal city of Qui Nhon, and the French fishing town of Port Vendres close to the Spanish border. The 320-guest ship (above) is also small enough to transit the Corinth Canal in Greece, the Kiel Canal in Germany, the Yangon River in Myanmar and the Saigon River in Vietnam.

One of the highlights is an insight into the tribes, religions and cultures of Indonesia and South East Asia, with a 22-day ‘East of Java’ cruise from Singapore to Hong Kong and ports of call that Semarang in Java, Bali, Lombok, Komodo, Sandakan in Malaysia for a visit to an orangutan sanctuary, and Manila in the Philippines, before arriving in Hong Kong. Prices are from £3,345 per person for a 22-day fly-cruise in January 2012.

Brochures can also be viewed online at www.swanhellenic.com/2012brochure.

Swan Hellenic will be exhibiting at the Cruise Show in Birmingham on October 16-17. and at London's Olympia on March 26-27 2011.

Time Spent at Sea has moved and can now be found at World of Cruising. You can follow World of Cruising on Twitter and Facebook for the very latest in cruise news.

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Iceland, Dublin, Faroe Isles and St Kilda

By guest blogger Steve Newman

To many of us, a cruise is made by the amount of wildlife we see from the deck or on land when taking organised excursions. To this end, Swan Hellenic has partnered with Marinelife, the marine conservation research charity, to bring a daily wildlife image blog to cruise passengers and the public alike.

The Marinelife team has been recording all sightings and engaging with passengers on board the Minerva throughout her visit to Iceland with a programme of presentations and deck watches. Marinelife’s team is writing a daily blog on the Swan Hellenic website to keep the general public up to date with a range of spectacular encounters, which include many hundreds of dolphins of multiple species, a Humpback Whale mother-and-calf pair and sightings of the infamous Eyjafjallajokull volcano.

Minerva will be returning to Iceland sailing on a round trip from Portsmouth from 21 July - 05 August 2011. She will be visiting four ports on the “Land of Fire,” including the capital Reykjavik. Iceland is place renowned for its ice fields, volcanic springs and thundering waterfalls. The ship will also call at Dublin and Torshavn in the Faroe Isles.

Apart from elation at the coastal scenery and the wildlife, there is sadness on this trip, too. It rather depends on how it affects you, but I defy anyone not to be moved when you’re on St Kilda. Fifty miles out from the Western Isles, even as you start to approach you wonder how people could have lived here. This feeling is enhanced when you pass where the young men climbed the cliffs to collect seabird eggs in swells they would have regarded as nothing but have many visitors clinging to the rail.

Surviving until the 1930s, when they asked to be evacuated, you wander among their stone houses (above) now numbered and marked with the occupants' names, trying to imagine how they eked out a living here and marvelling at their dry-stone walling skills. The sadness comes when you discover that in just one egg collecting trip, almost half the young men of the island were lost in heavy seas.

Having visited both here and Iceland, I can assure you you’ll be left with memories that will stay with you for ever.

For those wishing to know more, Swan Hellenic will be exhibiting at the Cruise Show in Birmingham in October.

For more info in the meantime, go to http://www.swanhellenic.com

Time Spent at Sea has moved and can now be found at World of Cruising. You can follow World of Cruising on Twitter and Facebook for the very latest in cruise news.

If you haven't already, subscribe to the World of Cruising magazine today.