With an interest in birds, no expedition cruise is ever boring. You may or may not be a birdwatcher. If you are, you won’t need convincing of the appeal of birds. If you’re not, you may see birding as not for you: a specialist pursuit beloved by those with endless patience, a battery of optical gear and a weird obsession with ticking off ‘little brown jobs’. But an expedition cruise might just change your mind.

On an expedition cruise, birds are unavoidable. Indeed, in some destinations, they’re the main attraction: think penguins in Antarctica or puffins in Iceland. The good news for the non-birder is that many seabirds – which comprise most of the birds you’ll be seeing on a cruise – are large, spectacular and often highly tame. It’s hard not to be enthralled. For the more serious birder, an expedition cruise offers close encounters with these A-listers and amazing avian variety in some of the world’s most remote locations, from windblown pelagics on the ocean wave to endangered endemics on tiny islands. 

With an interest in birds, no cruise is ever boring. While polar bears and blue whales can be elusive, birds are everywhere – on the emptiest ocean, the barest rock and the bleakest tundra. Keep your binoculars with you; you’ll always have something to look at.