Stellar Lineup Of Academicians and Pulitzer Winning Authors to Co-Host Upcoming Small Ship Cruises

Small ship, expedition cruise expert AdventureSmith Explorations announces a stellar lineup of academicians, Pulitzer Prize-winning authors, travel writers and professional photographers as experts in residence for upcoming cruises as far-flung as Antarctica and Borneo.

“Choosing a cruise with a guest expert adds a level of fascination and learning beyond what you’d find on an ordinary cruise,” explains Todd Smith, AdventureSmith founder and director. “These professionals can offer a deeper understanding of a particular topic or add a global perspective to the regional experience. An important part of travel is gaining a deeper awareness and understanding of a destination and small ship cruises with onboard experts can help accomplish this.” Smith suggests booking one of these special departures well in advance as they sell out quickly:

Antarctic Explorer: Jonathan Shackleton (cousin of Sir Ernest Shackleton) and Falcon Scott (grandson of Robert Falcon Scott) will be guest lecturers aboard the 189-passenger Ocean Diamond Feb.9-19, 2013 from Ushuaia ,Argentina.

Land of the Ice Bears: Arctic Svalbard: Jared Diamond, Pulitzer Prize-winning author and professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles will travel aboard the 148-passenger National Geographic Explorer June 21-July 1, 2013. He is the author of Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed and the widely acclaimed Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, which won him a Pulitzer Prize as well as Britain's 1998 Rhone-Poulenc Science Book Prize. He is a founding member of the board of the Society of Conservation Biology and a member of the board of directors of World Wildlife Fund/USA and Conservation International.

National Geographic The White Continent: Ed Larson, who won the Pulitzer Prize for Empire of Ice, travels aboard the National Geographic Explorer to Antarctica Feb. 5, 2013 and Feb. 5, 2014 . A Pepperdine University professor, his latest book was published in May 2011, An Empire of Ice: Scott, Shackleton, and the Heroic Age of Antarctic Science. He places the famed voyages of Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, his British rivals Robert Scott and Ernest Shackleton, and others in a larger scientific, social, and geopolitical context in this terrific new history, much enlivened by his own Antarctic travels.

Ancient Sites, Rain Forests & Coral Reefs: Sandra Noble, executive director of the Foundation for the Advancement of Mesoamerican Studies, Inc. joins guests on the 138-passenger Yorktown Jan. 26-Feb. 2, 2013 for a tour of the natural and archaeological wonders of Belize and Guatemala. On a Feb. 2-9 departure she will be joined by Sandra Brooke, director of Coral Conservation at the Marine Conservation Institute. For the Feb. 16-23 departure the guest speakers are Stephen Whittington, director of theMuseum of Anthropology and adjunct associate professor at Wake Forest University, and Susan Perkins, an associate curator in the Division of Invertebrate Zoology and the Sackler Institute for Comparative Genomics at the American Museum of Natural History.

Baja’s Bounty: Ellen Barone joins a March 16, 2013 departure aboard the 86-passenger Safari Endeavour. She is nationally recognized travel writer and photographer. Giovanni Malagrino shares insights on a March 30, 2013 departure. He is a full professor in the Marine Biology Department at University of Baja California Sur, La Paz and devotes his time to Coastal Zone Management.

Hawaiian Seascapes: Peter West Carey, a Seattle-based professional photographer, is aboard the 36-passenger Safari Explorer for a cruise beginning April 6, 2013. Patient and resourceful with a wide range of brands, equipment and techniques, he loves to help others learn first-hand how to bring back stunning images that tell the true story of the exciting journey they have experienced.

Alaska Unleashed: Amy Gulick is aboard the 60-passenger Wilderness Adventurer for a June 8, 2013 departure. She is an award-winning nature photographer and writer, and a founding Fellow of the International League of Conservation Photographers. Joe Upton is aboard for an Aug. 10, 2013 sailing and will share his experience as an author. His many books and illustrated maps, including Journey’s Through the Inside Passage and The Coastal Companion, have shared the wonder of The North with Alaska visitors since 1993. In 2009 Upton teamed up with Alaska commercial fisherman and filmmaker Dan Kowalski to produce The Alaska Story Project, a collection of videos about places up and down the Alaska and BC coasts.

Camp Leakey Borneo will feature Dr. Birute Galdikas on board the 100-passenger Orion II for the October 25, 2013 departure. Scientist, conservationist, educator: for almost four decades Dr. Biruté Mary Galdikas has studied and worked closely with the orangutans of Indonesian Borneo in their natural habitat, and is today the world’s foremost authority on the orangutan.