Luxury Cruise Ship Offers Working Science Laboratory
The Viking Octantis offers much more than your traditional luxury cruise line.
Along with a menu of enticing features including a sushi bar and 24/7 room service, heated floored guest suites with balconies, a cocktail piano lounge, a Nordic spa equipped with a snow room, a cold bucket, two saunas, and an open-air jacuzzi, the ship also offers a working science laboratory.
At the lab, guests can learn about active research projects in partnership with the University of Cambridge, Akvaplan-Niva, a Norwegian research institute, The Cornell Lab of Ornithology, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), to name a few.
Passengers can also hear from marine biologists, photographers, field research scientists, and other onboard staff, and sign up for interactive hands-on laboratory experiences.
Some activities include helping the team prepare bait for underwater cameras, in order to document the local wildlife or count microplastics found in water samples.
In addition to the lab, there is also a lecture hall, an in-ship marina with sightseeing boats that can launch off the back of the ship, kayaks, two submarines, and a wildlife exhibition that is chartered and monitored daily on an interactive map.
The vessel, evocative of Scandinavian design, is 665 feet long with six passenger decks and has 189 double-occupancy rooms for 378 guests.
The Antarctic expedition is approximately $12,000 per person, and the Great Lakes option is roughly $6,000 per person.
