There is a particular kind of traveller for whom "world cruise" still means something closer to circumnavigation than vacation — 90 or even 109 nights at sea, strung together by a itinerary spanning continents rather than a coastline.
Cunard has built its identity around exactly that traveller for more than a century, and its 2027 World Voyages, unveiled this week, lean further into that tradition than almost anything the line has attempted in recent memory: two ships, two very different routes around the globe, and more than 590 curated shore experiences layered on top of them.
Both voyages depart Southampton on the same day, January 10, 2027 — a coincidence of scheduling that turns into something closer to a statement of intent. Queen Anne, Cunard's newest ship, sets off on her maiden voyage to South America, while Queen Victoria embarks on a full circumnavigation. Between them, the two itineraries cover an extraordinary range of geography: Rio Carnival and Machu Picchu on one route, Hong Kong, Sydney and Cape Town on the other, with dozens of maiden calls threaded through both.
Katie McAlister, Cunard's president, frames the 2027 program as a continuation of a tradition the line has spent more than a hundred years refining — extraordinary journeys aboard some of the most recognisable ships at sea. Her emphasis, in describing this particular season, falls less on the ships themselves than on what waits at the end of the gangway: itineraries built specifically to bring destinations to life, whether that means standing amid the ruins of Machu Picchu, feeling the energy of Rio Carnival firsthand, or simply taking in landscapes and cultures most travellers never get to experience so directly.
Queen Anne's assignment is, on paper, the more geographically concentrated of the two — a 90-night South America Discovery Voyage built around 15 maiden calls across the continent and seven UNESCO World Heritage Sites spread across Brazil, Chile, Peru, Uruguay and Argentina. The route doesn't confine itself purely to South America, either, working in maiden calls to Casablanca and Bridgetown, Barbados, alongside a stop in the Turks and Caicos Islands en route. The itinerary's marquee moment is timed with obvious intent: an overnight stay in Rio de Janeiro coinciding directly with Rio Carnival, arguably the single largest and most recognisable street festival on Earth. Cunard's shore program leans into that access rather than treating it as incidental, offering guests a spread of ways into the celebration — from elegant VIP Camarote suites overlooking the parade route to front-row viewing positions, both paired with premium food and drink service designed to make a chaotic, sensory-overload event feel considerably more manageable. Daylight hours in Rio bring the city's better-known landmarks into reach as well: Sugarloaf Mountain, offering sweeping views over Guanabara Bay, and Christ the Redeemer, one of the New Seven Wonders of the World, both worked into the shore program alongside the Carnival experiences.
Further up the coast, the voyage's most physically demanding highlight unfolds over four days rather than a single port call. Guests disembark in Arica, Chile, for an overland journey deep into Peru, rejoining the ship later in Callao after a route built around the region's dramatic landscapes and cultural depth. The trip culminates at Machu Picchu itself — the so-called Lost City of the Incas, and one of the most celebrated archaeological sites anywhere in the world — a genuine departure from the single-day shore excursion format that defines most cruise itineraries, and a clear signal of how far Cunard is willing to extend its shore programming when the destination warrants it. Buenos Aires rounds out the voyage's South American core with an overnight call built around the city's culinary and cultural identity: an authentic tango performance, Argentine wine tasting, a culinary walking tour through the city's neighbourhoods, and — in one of the program's more intimate offerings — a hosted dinner inside a local family's home, trading the polish of a curated restaurant experience for something considerably more personal.
Where Queen Anne's voyage concentrates on a single continent, Queen Victoria's 109-night World Voyage does the opposite, tracing a full circumnavigation with calls at Hong Kong, Sydney and Cape Town anchoring the route, overnight stays in New York, Los Angeles and Singapore, and maiden calls to Dakar, Durban and El Salvador. It is, in scope, a genuine trip around the planet — the Panama Canal's engineering spectacle bookending the turquoise water of Honolulu and Nouméa, with a cultural range stretching from West Africa to the South Pacific. In Hong Kong, the shore program splits between two very different registers of the city. A Grand Tour takes in the density and energy of one of Asia's most dynamic urban centres, working through the city's sights before settling into a Cantonese lunch, with a sunset harbour cruise offering a quieter counterpoint later in the day beneath the city's skyline. For guests wanting distance from the urban core, an alternative route crosses the world's longest two-deck suspension bridge to Lantau Island, where a two-mile stretch of sandy beach sits alongside two of the region's more significant cultural landmarks: the bronze Tian Tan Buddha and the historic Po Lin Monastery.
Sydney's shore program centres on one of the more physically striking excursions in the entire 2027 collection: an evening climb of the Sydney Harbour Bridge, timed to deliver 360-degree views across the harbour and skyline as the city's lights come up. For guests preferring to leave the city behind entirely, the program extends into the World Heritage-listed Blue Mountains — known for their ravines, towering cliffs and forested plateaux — or toward the Hunter Valley, Australia's oldest commercial wine-growing region, for a considerably more relaxed alternative to the bridge climb. Cape Town closes out the voyage's headline port calls with an overnight stay generous enough to actually do the city justice. Table Mountain's cable car delivers the obligatory panoramic view, but the shore program pushes further, into the Groot Constantia wine estate — South Africa's oldest wine farm — for tastings before continuing on to Hout Bay for a scenic cruise past the Cape fur seal colony on Duiker Island, set against some of the most dramatic coastline anywhere on the route.
What both itineraries share, beyond a shared departure date and a shared operator, is a willingness to build shore programming around genuine depth rather than the efficient, single-afternoon excursion model that defines most conventional cruising. A four-day overland journey to Machu Picchu, an overnight positioned specifically to coincide with Carnival, a dinner inside a stranger's home in Buenos Aires — none of these are the kind of thing a seven-night Caribbean sailing has the runway to attempt, and that, more than ship size or itinerary length alone, is what actually distinguishes a genuine World Voyage from an extended cruise. For the roughly three months guests spend aboard either ship, Cunard's bet for 2027 is that the depth of access at each stop matters rather more than the number of stops itself.
Gabriele Bassi
