The Little Things We Love About Silversea
We love cruising with Silversea and could probably go on all day about how utterly smitten we are with their fleet and those on board who provide such exceptional levels of service. But since you probably only have a few minutes to read this post we will try to sum up our absolute favourite things that make sailing with Silversea extra special.
They do ocean and expeditions
There are a few excellent ultra luxury cruise companies in the world that compete with Silversea, and very few of those also offer ‘expedition style’ cruising to very special places around the world that are mostly inaccessible to ordinary cruise ships. But what we love most is that they are the only ultra luxury cruise line in the world that are permitted to offer cruises around the Galápagos Islands, and from 2021, they will do it in incredible style with their first ever purpose built ship, designed for the Galapagos, the sublime Silver Origin.
In the cruising world as we know it, only they and their sister company Celebrity hold licences to operate in the waters of these islands, which are unsurpassed as one of the most remote, richly populated with indigenous and unique wildlife and passionately protected locations on Earth. This privilege to be able to offer Silversea’s famous levels of service and luxury while exploring one of the most fascinating and coveted parts of the planet is in our view an absolute essential bucket list adventure. There’s simply nothing else like it and nowhere else like it, anywhere.
They have butlers
Many cruise lines offer a ‘butler service’, usually accompanying their top level suites on board larger ships. We’ve had mixed experiences with these butlers on other cruise lines and we conclude that in our experience, Silversea offer butlers that are not just glorified stateroom attendants, but actual fully trained professionals, who offer an enhanced level of service and a ‘nothing is too much trouble’ attitude towards anything you may ask of them. They really do make your voyage that little bit more special and memorable, and for us, they set Silversea above the rest with their skilfulness, friendliness and care.
The food
Where do we start with the food? Well, we can talk all about the fabulous choice of restaurants on board serving the broadest variety of exceptional cuisine, all prepared to a standard you’d expect from any fine dining establishment on land, and because it’s all open seating you can go where you want, when you want and you’ll always be guaranteed not to wait for a table. Indoors, outdoors, fast food, artistic food or slow, relaxed food. The choice is yours to make and you’ll struggle to get around every venue on a single voyage because you’ll probably find your favourite and will want to return time and time again. For more of Silversea’s mouthwatering offerings take a look at our ever popular Silver Spirit Dining Guide.
If that wasn’t enough Silversea have recently launched a new culinary initiative - Sea and Land Taste, or S.A.L.T. For short. This unique program puts you at the heart of local cuisines of the destinations you visit. Though we have never experienced this on one of our Silversea cruises we look forward to reporting on this exciting and unique experience in detail when we get the opportunity to try the S.A.L.T. Programme out for ourselves some time soon.
The ship sizes
Silversea don’t do large ships. Silversea don’t do crowded ships. Silversea ships are by comparison to your average cruise ship, small but incredibly spacious. Its fleet of ten ships (including Silver Dawn which is still under construction) range from the tiny 100 passenger capacity Silver Origin to the 608 guest Silver Spirit. The new ships Muse, Moon and Dawn hold just under 600 guests and with 411 crew and offer unrivalled levels of personal service. Once you’ve experienced this size of ship, and this much space per guest, you’ll struggle to return to those overcrowded, overly busy mega ships. Heck, you might even struggle to return home. I know we do!
The newness of the fleet
Silversea’s fleet has not stopped growing and improving almost since the birth of the company in 1994. This investment has accelerated in the past few years with not only three new ships, the Silver Muse and Silver Moon with Silver Dawn on the way next year, but with the thorough renovation of their older ships - the so called ‘Musification’ of the fleet to a much more modern ultra luxury standard. Silver Spirit was even chopped in half and lengthened during her musification to provide yet more space for her 608 passengers. We’ve yet to experience the new sisters Muse and Moon (Moon has only just been handed over and has yet to sail it’s maiden voyage), but we’re so excited by what we’ve seen and can’t wait to give them the old ‘Visit With Us’ treatment, hopefully very soon.
The Arts Cafe
There’s always one venue on any ship that instantly becomes your favourite, and on Silversea for us it’s the Arts Cafe. This little corner of the ship is a comfy and delicious venue you’ll return to probably several times a day. It offers speciality teas and coffees and a selection of small plates that change throughout the day to offer breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea, evening bites and naughty after dinner treats. The walls here are adorned with colourful and thought provoking artwork and the shelves filled with coffee table books you’ll want to flip through while sipping on your creamy cappuccino. You can even sit outside for a spectacular wake view as you’re enjoying the bottomless beverages and a crafty plateful of irresistible bites.
It’s all inclusive!
There’s two words that we never grow tired of, ‘all inclusive’, and Silversea provide wines, spirits, cocktails, soft drinks, teas, coffees and bottled water both in suite and from every bar of the ship. Gourmet dining is a given including full in-suite course by course butler service, gratuities all round and if on expedition, all the adventure you can handle. Pre and Post hotels, where needed, transfers to the ship, on board unlimited wifi, even champagne and caviar are all worry free and all included too. You don’t even have to show your room card - you just ask, and they bring. It’s a fabulous, stress free and delicious experience. There are premium dining venues too (some of these may attract a small supplementary charge), should you wish to go beyond the exceptional into even finer territory, and while that’s not necessary, we’d highly recommend you do if you want to add yet another level to your culinary experience. News just in is that from 2022, shore excursions and air travel are also included. Whoa!
The best pizza at sea!
Yes, other cruise lines may make the claim of having the ‘best pizza at sea’ and believe me, we’ve tried some and they’re not, but Silversea’s Italian heritage undeniably trumps them all. The outdoor Spaccanapoli trattoria is named after the iconic street in Naples where pizzas were first conceived and once tasted, we challenge anyone on board to resist coming here almost daily for the authentic and utterly delicious pizzas they serve. Paired with a crisp cold beer or a nice Italian white, Spacconapoli’s deliciously doughy delights are fatal for the waistline.
The suites
There aren’t such dreadfully ordinary things such as ‘cabins’ on board a Silversea ship. Every guest room is a suite and 90% come with it’s own generous verandah, and all come with marbled bathrooms and counter tops and linens, pillows and mattresses of exceptional comfort and of the finest quality. There’s not a single inside room on a Silversea ship and all come with that aforementioned excellent butler service and lot’s of little details that make your living quarters a cut above anything you’ve probably experienced before.
The Attention to detail
Lastly, what makes ultra luxury, well, ultra luxury is not just the exquisite food, exceptional service, generous suite sizes and amount of space per guest in the public areas. It’s also the attention to detail, from the splendidly put together pre-boarding pack you receive, to the real cloth napkins served with your canapés, the little drinks place mats made not from paper but from delicately woven cotton, the thought provoking artwork, the smart and stylish staff uniforms, the cutlery, crockery and glassware. It’s not the ‘devil’ in the detail, it’s the little morsels of heaven in the detail. It’s quite easy to miss a lot of it if you’re not paying particular attention, but they’re there nonetheless and we love them.
We hope you’ve enjoyed our rundown of some of the the little things we love about Silversea. You can read more about our sponsored trip to the Galapagos here, our sponsored Caribbean cruise here and our ship visit on the Silver Wind here.
If you are interested in booking a cruise with these or any other luxury cruise lines then we would recommend contacting a connoisseur at our trusted cruise partners Panache cruises - please mention that you have been referred to them through Visit With Us.
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