Four Seasons I: a first Greek season from Athens

Four Seasons I sailed from Athens on 5 April 2026, bound for Istanbul by way of Spetses, Folegandros, Santorini and Agios Nikólaos on Crete. The voyage lasted seven nights. It was the first Greek Isles voyage of the first ship Four Seasons has put to sea. She had been handed over at Ancona on 25 February and had made her maiden departure on 20 March. Her first season then settled in the Aegean.

From Ancona to the Aegean

Fincantieri, Ancona, built her. The shipyard delivered Four Seasons I on 25 February 2026 to Marc-Henry Cruise Holdings, joint owner and operator of Four Seasons Yachts. She measures 207 metres, 34,000 gross tons. She is the first vessel completed under the yard’s Navis Sapiens programme, an integrated digital system that uses artificial intelligence and real-time data to run the ship, out of the guests’ sight. Her maiden voyage followed on 20 March 2026, and by the first week of April she was in Greek water.

Aboard

Her suites number 95, none of them interior. Every suite faces the sea and has outdoor space of its own. The largest, the Funnel Suite, is 922 square metres across four levels, with floor-to-ceiling windows, inside the ship’s glass-enclosed funnel. The Loft Suite is 739 square metres, of which 408 are terrace. Four Seasons puts the ratio of guests to staff at 1 to 1.

Tillberg Design of Sweden designed the ship as a whole, Martin Brudnizki Design Studio designed the social spaces, and Prosper Assouline is creative director. There are 11 restaurants and lounges. L’Oceana Spa has a hammam (a steam bath), a thermal circuit, cryotherapy and infrared therapy. A marina platform opens at sea level across both sides of the hull. This is what the itineraries mean by a marina day, set off Folegandros on the outbound voyage and off Rineia on the return.

The Athens voyages

The Greek season was built as a pair of seven-night voyages that turned around at Athens. The first, Greek Isles featuring Santorini & Yalikavak, began at Athens and ended at Istanbul. It called at Spetses, spent a marina day off Folegandros, then called at Santorini, Agios Nikólaos on Crete, Yalikavak, Bodrum and Çeşme. The second, Greek Isles featuring Mykonos & Hydra, ran the other way, from Istanbul to Athens, by way of Göcek, Didim, Symi, a marina day off Rineia, Mykonos and Hydra. Together they made up 8 sailings across April and May 2026, leaving on the Sundays of 5, 12, 19 and 26 April and 3, 10, 17 and 24 May.

The timing was a choice. The Greek and Turkish voyages fell in April and May, before the summer season. That meant quieter harbours, villages not yet given over to visitors, and an Aegean still cool enough to walk in at noon. A yacht of 95 suites is small enough to keep that experience intact. The same fortnight in August would not allow it.

A chef from Athens

Two of the eight sailings carried a chef from the city where they turned around. Luca Piscazzi, of Pelagos at Four Seasons Astir Palace Hotel Athens, sailed as chef in residence on the Mykonos and Hydra voyage of 26 April to 3 May 2026. He stayed on for the Santorini and Yalikavak voyage of 3 to 10 May. He cooked at Sedna, the yacht’s main dining room, alongside her executive chef, Armando Ferman Toledo, and her chef de cuisine, Gerardo Acunzo.

Athens as a turnaround port

Athens has long been a place travellers pass through on the way to the islands. A turnaround port works differently. The city becomes the hinge of the journey, worth a few nights before boarding and a few after stepping off. A programme of eight sailings across two months is small by the standards of the cruise industry, and that is deliberate. A ship of 95 suites, sailing once a week, is a scale the Cyclades can absorb without strain.

A second Four Seasons ship is scheduled for delivery in 2027.

Who is this for

Four Seasons I suits travellers who want hotel service at the pace of a yacht, and who would rather see the islands in spring than in high summer. Some voyages fell over the Easter holiday, when the region keeps some of its most symbolic religious traditions. On deck, a small tiled plunge pool is set into the teak, ringed by a curved cream banquette, with potted orange trees and arched openings behind it. In the spa, a cedar sauna looks out to sea through a tall oval window.