Lindblad: its own ships, and many chartered vessels
Start with what confuses everyone, comparison sites included. Lindblad operates its own ships, from sixteen to one hundred and forty-eight passengers, and the rest of the list is chartered from partners. Oberoi Philae and Sun Goddess work the Nile, Charaidew II the Brahmaputra, The Jahan the Mekong, the Delfin boats the Amazon, Lord of the Glens Scotland, and the two Sea Clouds are sailing ships. Aboard a chartered boat, the service is not delivered by Lindblad. That distinction changes the experience; it is not legal small print.
What we carry, measured
Several vessels on our list carry no dates, and those are precisely the chartered ones: a charter is negotiated season by season, so an absence with us says nothing about the vessel itself. The number of Lindblad departures currently on sale is shown at the top of this page.
The company that invented the trade
Founded in 1979 by Sven-Olof Lindblad. His father, Lars-Eric Lindblad, led the first tourist expedition to Antarctica in 1966, brought the first visitors to the Galápagos from 1967 and made the first tourist transit of the Northwest Passage in 1984. The word "expedition" comes from there, long before it became a selling point. The company has been listed on Nasdaq since July 2015, under the symbol LIND: its results are public and checkable.
The National Geographic alliance, in practice
It dates from 2004 and was extended to 2040 in November 2023. It is not a logo on a ship: it is naturalists, photographers and observation equipment aboard, and it is what fills your days. If you are looking for rest and evenings out, this is not the line for you — the programme starts early and it is dense.
Where the calendar actually goes
To the Galápagos and the Amazon, not the poles. National Geographic Delfina, National Geographic Endeavour II, National Geographic Gemini and National Geographic Islander II are among the most heavily scheduled. Antarctica and the Arctic are in the catalogue, but they weigh far less than the company's reputation suggests.
