booking excursions

[ladyscot1]

Hi my hubby and I are going on our first ever tourcruise to Alaska in August 23rd. Will arrive a day early in Fairbanks as we want to do the flight to the Artic Circle. Have several other excursions we want to make throughout the tourcruise. Have been told we cant book until 120-90 days before the start. Is this a alaska rule or for the cruise ship. We will be on Island Princess. Would like some advice on booking our different excursions. From what Ive read Dave in Skagway is a must. Chilkook for the Skagway railway (hubby is a train buff) and what about the Taku Glacier Lodge trip - (if I can save enough money)

We also want to do a salmon fishing day, whats the boards advice.

thanks all for your help in advance lindsey

[timetravler]

That is a Princess rule, but what I have found is the booking seems to open up when you pay in full if it is close to the 120 day time. Mine is in May and the minute our cruise was paid for(a few weeks ago) the excursions opened up. Last year I paid about 130 days in advance and once again as soon as I paid in full, the excursions opened up. I have cruised 10 times with Princess and LOVE their cruises. Loved the white pass railroad and have done it twice. So this is a must do, especially if your a rail buff.

[alpal1993]

I have never been on Princess,but on our Celebrity cruisetour we booked independently for all our extra excursions on land portion.

[Texas Tillie]

Chilkoot Charters and Dyea Dave are both in Skagway. You'll need to pick one or the other. (I did the 7.5 hour with Chilkoot in 2008 and recommend them.) With the vendors that are not through Princess, I suggest you book as soon as you decide what you want to do. They do fill-up and you might miss your option to use one.

[Budget Queen]

With your interior Alaska, cruisetour portion, you need to have the itinerary- known, before you book anything independently. But once you have that, you are not going to be limited to "Princess" tours, which is what you are referring to with the "time" limitations. It has NOTHING to do with any independent- on your own bookings.

[Suzanne123]

Check to see if your excursions are already available. We are on the Coral Princess in August, and I have been able to reserve excursions for two weeks. (We're not paid in full.)

[AmazingJourneys]

Both Chilkoot Charters and DYEA Dave are both recommended highly on CC and Trip Advisor. Dave gives you the option of taking his Van both ways or train one way. You also have the option of taking the train from Skagway or back home from Chilkoot or Fraser. Dave said that the train from Chilkoot to Skagway would be a 6 hour ride and it is about 2 hours from Fraser to the ship.

 

The other difference between DYEA Dave and Chilkoot Charters is Dave has a much smaller Van capacity. Since it is a smaller van it would be more personal. I liked the idea of being able to stop wherever we wanted to take pictures and this is why I went with him. Either way, both Chilkoot Charters and DYEA Dave would be a great choice.

 

I suggest booking the independent tours early as suggested in a previous post, because they do book up early. My Princess excursions opened up about a month ago for a July 31st SB cruise on the Coral Princess and I'm not paid in full. I wait to pay in full until the last minute due to price drops. It is more diffiicult to get money back once it is paid in full. Not impossible, but more difficult.

[timetravler]

I just want to add that booking a shore excursion not with Princess is fine, but do your homework. My last Alaskan cruise I heard horror stories about a snorkelling/scuba excursion where they just left you alone on your own for 1/2 hour or more. Plus they saw nothing. But the shore excursion with Princess was so great, it was the talk of the whole ship afterwards. My daughter & son-in-law saw a octipus at least 5ft across(this is not a fake fish story) and had the time of their life. Some shore excursion we book through Princess and others we do on our own.

[ITMan]

Hi there, We are booked on the Sea Princess out of San Francisco on 10th August, the princess tours booking opened last week.

 

We have already booked privately Helicopter sled dog tour out of Juneau, this worked outa round $100 cheaper per head than equivalent cruise based tours.

 

AlsoI noticed when Ilooked last week some of the most popular chouces, helitours, flightseeing etc were already more than 50% booked out (though difficult to tell but they appeared to be!)

 

Hope this helps