Since 1991, Quark Expeditions has specialized in expedition cruising to the Arctic and Antarctica, in ships with ice-strengthened hulls or in icebreakers. Polar travelers will enjoy unparalleled technical expertise, leadership and passion for expedition trips to the Arctic and Antarctica. Our first voyage - The Transpolar Bridge Cruise - began July 27, 1991, in Murmansk, Russia. The ship was the nuclear powered icebreaker Sovetskiy Soyuz, an older sister of 50 Years of Victory. She sailed across the top of the world via Franz Josef Land, the North Pole, the New Siberian Islands, the Wrangel Island area and the Chukotka Peninsula. That first group of adventurers disembarked in Provideniya. Our second adventure began in that same city on August 18, 1991. The Northeast Passage Cruise followed the northern coast of Russia, making landings in Chukotka, visiting Pevek, the Lena River Delta and the Severnaya Zemlya Islands, disembarking in Murmansk. We have the largest and most diverse fleet of adventure ships in the Antarctic and Arctic. Travelers choose from more departures and a greater variety of itineraries than is available anywhere else. Within the fleet is the only helicopter-equipped, polar-class icebreaker outfitted for expeditions in Antarctic waters - Kapitan Khlebnikov, and the only nuclear-powered icebreaker - 50 Years of Victory - sailing to the North Pole. Every ship is equipped with Zodiacs - inflatable landing craft - for shore transfers and ocean-level cruising.