Five days after New Year’s, the Silver Dawn was scheduled to set out from Fort Lauderdale on its 2026 World Cruise.
We were scheduled to do a Transatlantic crossing on a brand-new Silver Dawn in late 2021, but because of Covid construction delays, the ship did not make it into service until 2022 –and we wound up coming home across the Atlantic on Silver Dawn’s nearly identical sister, Silver Moon.
We loved Silver Moon, so we felt highly confident that we would be equally happy for a few months on Silver Dawn. And when we started studying Dawn’s 2026 World Cruise itinerary, the first three months appeared to be exactly what we were looking for.
After leaving Fort Lauderdale, Silver Dawn planned to slide down through the Panama Canal, then instead of heading up to Los Angeles, cruise south to an overnight in Lima (a GREAT city for foodies). From Peru, it was to head across the Pacific for an overnight stop at Easter Island (which we are looking forward to finally seeing. Much better than visiting Hawaii again!)
From Easter Island, Silver Dawn then sets off for island hopping in French Polynesia and the South Pacific (visiting a dozen islands – a couple fewer than Crystal), but it was planning only a two-day call in New Zealand before heading for Australia. We’ve spent quite a bit of time touring New Zealand, so for us, the short visit was perfect.
Best of all, Silver Dawn’s three-week (!) visit to Australia was to start with an overnight in Tasmania (another place we are eager to see) before sailing from Melbourne along the SOUTHERN coast of Australia to Adelaide and Perth, then cruising up the WESTERN side of Australia and along the remote coast of The Kimberley to conclude a three-week jaunt to Darwin.
Few world cruises take this clockwise-route around Australia, and we were very excited about the Aussie itinerary. Silver Dawn then crosses to Bali (another plus) before heading down for an overnight in Singapore. This first three months, in our view, was as good as it gets.
But after Singapore, Silver Dawn seemed to have more sea days than excitement, with overnights only in Cochin and Mumbai, India. Plus, a big minus for us – no stops were planned in the Emirates or Saudi Arabia en route to the Suez Canal.
The itinerary did include our “Bucket List” visits to Luxor (an overnight; good), Petra, and a passage through the Suez Canal.
But when Silver Dawn exits into the Mediterranean, it was scheduled to turn to starboard for calls at Tel Aviv (Ashdod) and Haifa. Given the current state of the Middle East, we were not sure we want to go sightseeing there at the moment, and a year before this cruise, we had trouble imaging a visit to Israel in 2026 was actually going to take place.
The final three weeks of Silver Dawn’s “World Cruise” took it west across the Mediterranean to Lisbon, and included a few stops in places we haven’t seen – Antalya, Turkey; Saranda, Albania; and La Goulette, Tunisia – but none that had us terribly excited.
So how does one net this out?
Well, the first half of the Silver Dawn’s World Cruise was just what we are looking for, but we found the second half a lot less exciting – and then there still was the Suez Canal question.
And even if we made it all the way to Lisbon, how were we going to get home?
On that worrisome note, we turned to the other options.