Transfer From Anchorage

Looking to book August 26 Alaska cruise. Was wondering about the transfer from Anchorage to Seward. How long a trip and what type of coach. What other transport options are there.

Take a look at the Roll Call for this cruise in that forum. There are quite a few participants. It seems the consensus is the Seabourn transfer from the Captain Cook Hotel in Anchorage, by bus. I know there are several other options such as the train and there may be other bus companies or renting a car. I had looked into it several months ago and it seems there was an issue with what was working on what day, but we decided to take the pre-cruise excursion to Denali so we will be on the Seabourn transfer too.

I did the early morning train from Anchorage to Seward. We booked the first class seats as it has the glass domed carriage and it was a fun experience.

When we got to the train station we found there was a place to drop off our luggage for Seabourn and this was then transferred directly to the ship when the train arrived in Seward. A warning, it was quite chaotic as there was many people travelling on the train including passengers from Radiance of the Seas. Make sure you have your Seabourn paper tags attached to your bags because they don't have any and they want them attached. I did keep my carry-on because I had my laptop and DSLR and lens but there is not really a lot of room for it on the train itself. Better to have a backpack of some sort.

Included breakfast was reasonable but don't expect gourmet. There was drink service both alcoholic and non-alcoholic available. There was also a section out the back of the carriage that was open where you could take photos. Dress warmly if you are going to be out there for any length of time :).

We saw some eagles, sheep and startled a big moose out of a pond. I missed the eagle photo but got the moose and Dall Sheep.

I hope this helps if you are interested in the train option.

Julie