This is one of those times where it’s entirely justified. Our local government (USA) is saying one thing about foreign lands, but reality is observably different. There’s no way to accomplish this kind of journalism without traveling to the place the administration is lying about.

There are very few dedicated passenger liners left in the world that aren't luxury travel cruises. The only one I'm aware of that has a US route only goes across the atlantic from NY to the UK.

The only sea based options to get to China from the US would be to try to get passage on a cargo ship going the same way, or charter a small vessel for the voyage, which would likely cost thousands.

It would be nice to tax plane travel heavily, and then subsidize sail travel to make that more viable, along with mandatory consecutive monthly vacation time for all jobs, like the EU has.