Cruise the Adriatic aboard the Sea Cloud II.
Discover centuries of conquest and commerce as you cruise the Adriatic. On this immersive journey from Dubrovnik to Naples, gain special access to museums and archeological sites, unearthing the legacies of ancient Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Venetian and Ottoman civilizations. Begin in Dubrovnik, where you’ll board the sumptuous Sea Cloud II, then depart for a stop in the Bay of Kotor, a UNESCO-recognized canyon.
Continue to Durrës, Albania, and tour historical sites such as the Roman Amphitheatre of Durrës and the Roman Baths. In Brindisi, Italy, marvel at the Roman Columns, with the option to take a guided tour of the 19th-century town of San Vito dei Normanni. After a day at sea, discover Sicily, where you may choose from visits to the Messina Cathedral, or the UNESCO-listed Mount Etna volcano. Enjoy access to the Archaeological Museum of Lipari, then continue to the port of Agropoli, where you will see three monumental Doric temples, as well as the Tomb of the Diver.
Highlights
- Board a private boat to Our Lady of the Rocks, the Adriatic’s only man-made island, where sailors deposited stones for centuries after finding a Madonna icon in 1452, and view the chapel’s collection of over 2,000 silver votive plaques.
- Explore the Roman Amphitheatre of Durrës with a private archaeologist, discovering the Balkans’ largest arena and its transformation into a Christian chapel with sixth-century mosaics, the only surviving wall mosaics of their kind in Albania.
- Walk across a wooden bridge to St. Mary’s Monastery on Zvërnec Island, a 13th-century Byzantine sanctuary in the Narta Lagoon that preserves the grave of Marigo Posio, who embroidered Albania’s first national flag.
- Enjoy a home-style Apulian lunch in Ostuni, La Città Bianca (The White City), where a local host will prepare traditional dishes in the medieval hilltop town known for its whitewashed buildings.
- Experience an after-hours visit to the Regional Museum of Messina for close encounters with Caravaggio’s The Adoration of the Shepherds and The Resurrection of Lazarus, painted during the artist’s Sicilian exile.
- Share a winery lunch on Mount Etna’s volcanic slopes, tasting wines from indigenous grapes and fresh buffalo mozzarella at Europe’s most active volcano, where eruptions have been documented for 2,700 years.
- Explore Paestum’s three Doric temples from 550–450 B.C.—among the best-preserved Greek temples in the world—and view the Tomb of the Diver with a curator, exploring the only surviving example of large-scale Greek wall painting from the Classical period.
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