Explora III

Chef’s Kitchen on deck 5 is the hands-on counterpart to The Chef’s Table — twelve seats, a working kitchen, and a format built for people who want to learn something rather than just be served. Technique sessions, market-driven menus, and the chance to ask the questions you’d never get to ask in a dining room.

Emporium Marketplace on deck 11 is the ship’s market-hall venue and, at 367 seats across indoor and terrace, the biggest room aboard. Open kitchens, cooked-to-order stations, and a spread that changes through the day. This is where you’ll eat most often without planning to — breakfast before an early tender, a long lazy lunch after one. The terrace tables are worth the extra thirty seconds of walking.

Marble & Co. Grill is the steakhouse — deck 5, 82 seats, dry-aged cuts, and the full supporting cast of sides and sauces you’d want from a proper grill room. On most luxury ships the steakhouse is the one that costs extra. Here it doesn’t. That’s a meaningfully different math when you’re deciding where to eat on night four.

Ten seats. That’s the entire room. The Chef’s Table by Explora Journeys is a 25-square-meter private dining experience on deck 5, exclusive to Explora III and her sister, where the chef cooks in front of you and explains what you’re eating as you eat it. Ten seats across a seven-night sailing means the math is not in your favor — reserve the moment you board, not the moment you get hungry.

Astern Lounge faces aft on deck 5 — 76 seats, 260 square meters, and a wall of glass looking back at the wake. Quieter than the forward lounges and better for a long afternoon with a book. On sailaway evenings it’s the room with the best view of the island you’re leaving.

Astern Pool & Bar is 470 square meters of open deck at the stern of deck 5, with 126 seats and a heated pool. Because it faces aft, it’s the spot for sailaway — you watch the port shrink on the horizon with a drink in hand. Fully outdoor, no glass between you and the evening.

Atoll Pool & Bar on deck 10 is the ship’s mid-deck outdoor pool — 620 square meters, 130 seats, fully open to the sky. This is the daytime pool, the one that fills up on sea days and empties out when the ship is in port. Loungers, a bar, and the arithmetic of 461 suites against this much deck space working firmly in your favor.

The Cigar Lounge on deck 11 is a 72-square-meter outdoor space with 24 seats and a proper humidor. Open-air by design, which solves the problem cigar lounges usually have, and positioned so the view does as much work as the smoke.

Crema Café on deck 5 handles the coffee, and handles it properly — 520 square meters with 80 indoor seats and 27 on the terrace, serving specialty espresso, pastries, and the mid-afternoon gelato that becomes a habit somewhere around day three. Specialty coffees are included in the fare, which means there’s no reason not to make this your morning routine.

Explora Lounge on deck 11 is the big panoramic room — 750 square meters, 129 indoor seats and 60 more on the terrace, with views in most directions. It handles cocktails, live music, and the slow drift of an evening that started at six and somehow became eleven.

Helios Pool & Bar on deck 12 is adults-only — 84 seats, fully outdoor, and the reason parents on this ship look so relaxed. Sun, quiet, and a bar that’s never more than a few steps away. If you’re traveling with kids, this is your pressure-release valve; if you’re not, it’s simply the calmest deck aboard.

Journeys Lounge is the ship’s largest indoor social space — 192 seats on deck 4, hosting live music, destination talks, and the general business of a room where people gather before dinner and stay longer than they meant to. It’s the default answer to “where should we meet?”

The Malt Whisky Bar on deck 11 seats 32 and takes its subject seriously — a curated selection of single malts, blends, and the sort of pours that reward asking the bartender what they’d recommend. Small, dark, and exactly right after dinner.

Med Yacht Club is Explora III’s Mediterranean dining room on deck 4 — coastal Italian, Greek, and Spanish cooking served in a bright, relaxed space that seats 190 including the bar and lounge. Think grilled fish, good olive oil, and the kind of menu that assumes you’d rather eat well than eat formally. Fully included, like nearly everything else aboard.

The Nautilus Club on deck 11 is the ship’s supervised space for younger guests, with separate areas for juniors and teens across 118 square meters. It’s intimate rather than sprawling — Explora is a refined, adults-leaning product that accommodates children well, not a big-ship family resort. That suits families with teens and older kids beautifully. Ask your ABC Trips advisor about minimum ages and what’s running on your specific sailing.

Shore Club on 11 sits inside The Conservatory under the retractable glass roof — 22 seats, relaxed daytime dining, and the best weather in the world regardless of what’s actually happening outside. When the roof is open it’s an outdoor restaurant; when it isn’t, it still feels like one. Exclusive to Explora III and her sister ship, and included in the fare.

Sky Bar on 14 is exactly what the name says — 200 square meters, 47 seats, fully outdoor, on the highest deck of the ship. Nothing above you but sky, nothing around you but horizon. It’s small, which is the point, and it’s the best light on the ship about forty minutes before sunset.

The Conservatory Pool & Bar is the ship’s signature space — 1,350 square meters on deck 11 with a heated pool under a retractable glass roof and 232 seats. Roof open on a warm afternoon, roof closed when the weather turns, and the pool works either way. It’s the amenity that makes Explora III genuinely all-season, and it’s where you’ll end up when the deck is too breezy but you still want to be outside.

The Lobby and Lobby Bar anchor deck 4 — a 60-seat bar in a double-height space that functions as the ship’s crossroads. Everyone passes through, which makes it the most reliable place to run into people you’ve been meaning to run into. Unlimited beverages means nobody’s checking a tab.

Five heated whirlpools are scattered across the ship — two indoors on deck 11 and three outdoors on decks 12 and 14. The outdoor ones on 14 are the move at night: hot water, cold air, and a sky with nothing between you and it.

The fitness offering is genuinely broad for a ship this size: a 147-square-meter Fitness Centre and a separate 50-square-meter studio on deck 5, open-air fitness up on 14, a 262-meter running track on deck 12, and a sports court. Group wellness and fitness activities are included in the fare. In-suite fitness equipment is available if you’d rather not share.

Ocean Wellness — The Spa runs 726 square meters on deck 5, and access to the thermal area is included in your fare. That means the steam room, the Finnish sauna, the salt cave, the experience shower, the ice fall, the hydrotherapy pool, and the heated marble loungers are all just there, every day, at no extra charge. Treatments, the Beauty Studio, and Barber Corner are available on top. The heated marble loungers will ruin you for ordinary furniture; consider yourself warned.

The Casino on deck 4 is small by design — 41 seats, 90 square meters. Explora isn’t a casino ship and doesn’t pretend to be, but if you want a hand of something after dinner, it’s there and it’s civilized.

Anthology is the ship’s guest-chef venue on deck 5, where a rotating roster of internationally recognized chefs takes over the kitchen for a season and builds a tasting menu around their own cooking. It seats 92 across indoor and terrace tables, and it is the one restaurant aboard that carries a surcharge — which tells you something about the caliber of who’s cooking. Book it early; it’s the reservation that goes first.

Fil Rouge is the ship’s main dining room and the closest thing Explora III has to a classic grand restaurant — 198 seats on deck 4, serving contemporary European cooking across breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Open seating, no assigned tables, no rushing to make a fixed hour. Elegant without being stuffy, which is more or less the whole Explora thesis in one room.

Galleria d’Arte on deck 5 is the ship’s art gallery — a rotating program of works you can browse, discuss, and occasionally take home. A quiet space that rewards a slow walk-through on a sea day.

Sakura brings Pan-Asian cooking to deck 5 with 104 seats split between an intimate indoor room and a much larger terrace — 82 of those seats are outdoors, which makes this the best dinner on the ship on a warm Caribbean evening. Sushi, robata, curries, and a bar program that takes the pairings seriously. Included in the fare.

The Cellar by Explora Journeys is a twelve-seat wine room on deck 5, exclusive to this ship and her sister — 66 square meters built for structured tastings, verticals, and the kind of conversation that happens when someone who really knows wine has a captive audience of twelve. Given that fine wines are already included everywhere else aboard, The Cellar is where you go for the bottles that aren’t.

Deck 4 carries the ship’s shopping — The Journey at 178 square meters as the anchor, plus Ocean Atelier, and boutiques from Rolex, Cartier, and Chopard. It’s a curated handful rather than a shopping arcade, which suits a ship that would rather you were outside.

The top of the penthouse tier, and the point at which the terrace becomes a room in its own right. Full living and dining areas, a substantial bathroom, and enough wardrobe space to unpack properly — which, on a seven-night sailing, is a genuine luxury rather than a listed amenity.

The largest accommodation on the ship, running up to 3,391 square feet with multiple rooms, multiple bathrooms, and a full-beam private terrace across the forward face of the vessel. It can also be combined with an adjoining Ocean Terrace Suite for parties that need the extra bedroom. The complete Ocean Residence benefit package applies, and there is exactly one of these.

There is one of these on the ship, and it was designed by Patricia Urquiola — the Spanish-Italian architect whose work sits in the permanent collections of MoMA and the Centre Pompidou. Multiple rooms, multiple bathrooms, a full-beam terrace, and an interior that is a design object in its own right rather than a suite with nice furniture. If it is available on your dates, it will not be for long.

Separate living and dining areas, a walk-in wardrobe with vanity, and a terrace built for lingering. Some Premier Penthouses sit aft on deck 6, which means your private terrace looks straight down the ship’s wake — the best view in the category and worth requesting specifically.

More of everything the Penthouse does well: a larger living area, a bigger terrace, and a bathroom that stops feeling like a ship’s bathroom entirely. A good landing spot for travelers who want genuine room to spread out without stepping into residence pricing.

Among the largest accommodations aboard short of the Owner’s Residences — expansive living and dining space, a bathroom that would be at home in a good hotel suite on land, and a terrace scaled to match. The full Ocean Residence benefit package applies.

The first of the Ocean Residences, and the one with the sheltered terrace — recessed into the hull rather than cantilevered off it, which means shade when you want it and calm when the ship is making way. Residences also unlock Explora’s additional tier of exclusive benefits beyond the standard inclusions.

Everything the Cove Residence offers, plus a whirlpool on your own sheltered terrace. There are five whirlpools scattered around the ship and they are all lovely, but none of them are twelve feet from your bed at eleven at night with nobody else in them. That is the entire pitch, and it is a good one.

The Penthouse is where the layout starts to separate — a distinct living area rather than one open room, so the person who wakes at six and the person who does not can coexist peacefully. Larger terrace, more storage, and the first tier of Explora’s enhanced suite service.

A proper apartment at sea — distinct living and dining areas, generous terrace, and the enhanced service tier that comes with every Ocean Residence. The kind of space where you would happily host four people for a drink before dinner rather than meeting them in a bar.

Serenity Residences run larger again, with the layout opening up across living, dining, and sleeping zones that genuinely function as separate rooms. Full Ocean Residence benefits apply. If you are traveling as two couples or a family who value not being on top of each other, this is the category to look at.

The Ocean Grand Terrace takes the Ocean Terrace layout and stretches the outdoor half of it. Same interior comforts, meaningfully more terrace — which on a Caribbean sailing is the square footage that actually gets used. If you are the sort who eats breakfast outside every morning, this is the upgrade that earns its money.

The entry category, and it is worth pausing on what “entry” means here: 377 square feet, floor-to-ceiling glass, and a private sun terrace with a dining table and loungers. On most ships this would be a mid-tier cabin. Walk-in wardrobe with a seated vanity, heated bathroom floors, espresso machine, and a minibar stocked to your preferences — all standard, all categories.