Quark Expeditions · Polar Class 6 · 138 guests
Ocean Explorer
An X-Bow for the long crossings, fifteen Zodiacs from four doors, and a library two storeys high in the bow. Quark’s smaller ship for West Greenland and the Canadian Arctic.
Quark Expeditions
A bow built for the open sea.
The inverted Ulstein X-Bow cuts through a swell rather than climbing it, which is why Ocean Explorer is the Quark ship for the long crossings: the Davis Strait, the Labrador Sea, Baffin Bay. 138 guests, 105 crew, fifteen Zodiacs from four doors, and a library that rises two storeys in the bow. Small enough to anchor off a settlement of three hundred people. Steady enough that you will not notice the sea between them.
Fifteen Zodiacs, four doors
A sauna with windows
The two-storey library
The Observation Lounge
Ocean Explorer moments
She was drawn for the hours between landings as much as the landings: a library in the bow with the sea on three sides, two jacuzzis on the top deck, a sauna with a window on the ice.
Two storeys of light
The library fills the bow across two decks, glass from floor to ceiling. In the Davis Strait it is the best seat on the ship for whales; in the evening it is where the day’s photographs are edited.
Two storeys of light
The library fills the bow across two decks, glass from floor to ceiling. In the Davis Strait it is the best seat on the ship for whales; in the evening it is where the day’s photographs are edited.
Life on board
A day on Ocean Explorer is Quark’s classic pattern: a Zodiac cruise or landing in the morning, another in the afternoon, a kayak or a paddleboard for the guests who booked them, the polar plunge once per voyage. In between, a quiet ship with a library, a sauna and a crew of 105 for 138 guests.
A dry sauna with windows, two outdoor jacuzzis on the sun deck and a fitness studio. Quiet, and rarely more than a few guests at a time.
Almost every room with a veranda
Staterooms and suites
Seventy-seven staterooms and suites over four decks, nearly all of them with a private veranda, from a solo Studio to the Owner’s Suite at the stern. Clean Scandinavian lines, heated bathroom floors, and a window drawn for the sea rather than the corridor.
Studio Veranda Single
Solitude with a view: one bed, one generous balcony, entirely private. The smallest footprint aboard Ocean Explorer, and among its most coveted.
Studio Veranda Single
Solitude with a view: one bed, one generous balcony, entirely private. The smallest footprint aboard Ocean Explorer, and among its most coveted.
Ultramarine
An Infinity-class ship, built for the crossings
Ocean Explorer is one of SunStone’s Infinity-class expedition ships, designed by Ulstein in Norway and delivered in 2021. She is 104 metres and 8,228 tonnes, with Ice Class 1A and Polar Class 6 notation, Rolls-Royce engines, stabilisers that work at anchor as well as under way, and the inverted X-Bow that gives her a soft ride in a head sea. She carries fifteen Zodiacs and twelve kayaks, 138 guests in 77 staterooms and suites, and 105 crew. She joined the Quark fleet in 2024.
In the Arctic she sails West Greenland to the far north and Greenland to Newfoundland by way of Baffin Island and Labrador. Quark Expeditions positions her where the crossings are longest and the settlements smallest.
- 138 guests · 105 crew
- Polar Class 6 · 104 m
- 15 Zodiacs · 12 kayaks
The expedition
How a day off the ship is made
Quark calls them adventure options. Some are included, some are booked before you sail, and the expedition team decides each morning which the weather allows.
Launched from four sea-level doors at once. The whole ship is on the water in minutes, which means longer cruises along the ice and more landings per day.
Her Arctic season
Quark voyages in the Arctic
Ocean Explorer sails West Greenland to Qaanaaq and Greenland to Newfoundland, and her sister Ultramarine takes the Svalbard, Scotland and Northwest Passage routes with the helicopters. Tell us the month you have in mind and we tell you which sailing suits it, which cabin, and what we can do on the fare.
All expeditions
Good to know
Ocean Explorer, in practice
The questions we are asked most before guests choose this ship.
138 guests in 77 staterooms and suites, with 105 crew and an expedition team of around twenty. Four Zodiac doors put the whole ship on the water at once.
The inverted bow slices through a swell instead of riding over it, which reduces pitching and spray. On the Davis Strait and the Labrador Sea it is the difference between a crossing you notice and one you sleep through.
Her hull carries Ice Class 1A and Polar Class 6 notation, built for the summer ice of Greenland and the Canadian Arctic. Stabilisers steady her at anchor as well as under way.
All meals, wine and beer with dinner, the expedition programme, Zodiac cruises and landings, guided hikes, a parka to keep, boots to borrow and the charter flights listed on each voyage. Kayaking and paddleboarding are booked in advance.
Via Reykjavík, with the Quark charter to Nuuk or Kangerlussuaq onward, and home from Reykjavík or St John’s. We arrange the flights and the nights either side so the whole journey sits in one booking.
Made to measure
Tell us your Arctic, we build the rest
Every guest sails differently. Tell us what you are hoping for and who you are travelling with, and we shape the voyage aboard Ocean Explorer around it: the sailing, the stateroom, the flights from Australia, the nights in Reykjavík, and the offers we hold for Arctic Cruise guests. One specialist, from the first conversation until you are home.
The fleet
Other ships we sail
Each ship we work with has her own character and her own Arctic. Ultramarine is Quark’s helicopter ship for Svalbard and South Greenland; SH Diana and SH Vega are the Scandinavian sisters.
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