Anyone Recently Return From Copper River Cruisetour?

[alaskandreamer]

Hi,

 

We are gearing up for our Princess Copper River Cruisetour. We will be leaving on Monday July 26th. We can't wait!!!!

Is there anybody out there that just recently returned from this tour that would like to share their experiences?

What did you see? How were the lodges? How was the Denali road trip etc? I'd love to hear what you experienced. I'm sure it will only add to our upcoming excitement and anticipation.

 

Thanks for sharing!!!!!

[CuriousBill]

Hello,

 

We just returned Sunday from our Princess Copper River Cruisetour. I must say, the whole trip was wonderful and the Copper River portion was very nice. In fact, I would say the Copper River lodge was the one we enjoyed most. The lodge is fairly small (compared to the Denali lodge), the staff there was very welcoming, friendly and accomodating! The trip via coach from the Denali to Copper River was pleasant (and not as bad as you might think) with several stops along the way for lunch, breaks and a particularly notable wildlife sighting (we saw a moose grazing in a lake!). In fact, this was the only leg of our trip where we saw moose at all (three different times). Our coach driver was very knowledgable and made the ride enjoyable. The lodge has very nice views of the mountaintains in Wrangell - St Elias National Park and luckily (for us) our weather was outstanding!

 

We had one snafu which I think actually turned out better for us. We had pre-booked the Fly/Drive to Kennicott/McCarthy excursion. Two days before (while we were still at the Denali lodge), the Copper River Tour desk called and told us that somehow Princess had overbooked that excursion. They offered us an altenative when I called them back which was the fly/fly excursion both ways to Kennicott/McCarthy. I was initially reluctant to change since I had spent a significant amount of time researching our excursions. They convinced me that the tours were similar enough that there would be very little downside and, in retrospect I think this was true. The upside for us was that we spent 3 hours less on the road (supposedly rough) which was not a bad thing since the distances you need to travel in Alaska to see what we wanted to see are vast.

 

If you don't get/want to go to Kennicott, some other folks we spoke to had great success in their salmon fishing attempts.

 

Hope you enjoy your trip as much as we did! Our two duaghters (15 & 13) didn't want to come home! Let me know if you would like any more details.

[alaskandreamer]

CuriousBill,

 

Thanks so much for the info!

I'd love to hear more. Any details you want to share would be great.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like there are a lot of people that have taken the Copper River cruisetour. Either that or they just don't want to share there experiences.

We picked the tour because we wanted to see more of Alaska than just Denali. So I'm hoping we made a good choice.

If you can give us any details on the long Denali highway ride and the ride from Valdez to Copper River I would appreciate it. I heard they are areas on the tour that get very little promotion but are extremely beautiful and the scenery is outstanding.

I look forward to hearing more! Thanks for taking the time to respond.

[1st Cruisers]

Curious Bill,

We are also doing the above tour in August. I have read on this board about bringing snacks and water on the long bus rides--did you find that you needed to do this? Did you take the Tundra Wilderness Tour at Denali? Any information or tips that you could give us would be much appreciated. Thank you for your time.

[NancyIL]

My husband and I spent 2 nights in Kennicott on our first Alaska land trip (on our own post-cruise), and that was the highlight. I would highly recommend doing the fly/drive or fly/fly excursion, as mentioned by CuriousBill.

[CuriousBill]

CuriousBill,

 

Thanks so much for the info!

I'd love to hear more. Any details you want to share would be great.

Unfortunately, it doesn't seem like there are a lot of people that have taken the Copper River cruisetour. Either that or they just don't want to share there experiences.

We picked the tour because we wanted to see more of Alaska than just Denali. So I'm hoping we made a good choice.

If you can give us any details on the long Denali highway ride and the ride from Valdez to Copper River I would appreciate it. I heard they are areas on the tour that get very little promotion but are extremely beautiful and the scenery is outstanding.

I look forward to hearing more! Thanks for taking the time to respond.

 

We chose the Copper River Tour for the same reasons, we wanted to see as much of Alaska as possible (including the National Parks) without duplicating anything or retracing our steps. IMHO you made a great choice! During my research, I did find a few (but not many) posts of others who did the Copper River cruisetour.

 

The rider was long but very scenic. There is an opportunity to see at least 3 different mountain ranges if the weater is good, which it was for us. Princess had snacks (bagged chips and cookies) on the coach as well as water. I believe we lest Denali around 8:00 and got to Copper River around 4:30?

 

We stopped at least twice (if not three times) for breaks (once at a store in Paxson) plus an additional time for lunch (about an hour) at the Maclaren Roadhouse.

 

The road from Copper River to Valdez is also very scenic, especially the second half. The road parallels the pipeline (which you can also see from Copper River lodge property) and passes glaciers and waterfalls.

 

Enjoy your trip!

[CuriousBill]

Curious Bill,

We are also doing the above tour in August. I have read on this board about bringing snacks and water on the long bus rides--did you find that you needed to do this? Did you take the Tundra Wilderness Tour at Denali? Any information or tips that you could give us would be much appreciated. Thank you for your time.

 

 

See my previous post about the snacks and water which Princess supplies on the Denali to Copper River leg of the trip. The train from the McKinley lodge to Denali has drinks available and lunch for purchase.

 

Yes, we did the Tundra Wilderness Tour (morning) and enjoyed it immensely. Once again, we had beautiful weather, saw tons of wildlife and magnificent views of Denali. Hope you are as lucky as we were! This is an opportunity where you might want to bring a snack and/or supplement the box lunch supplied on the tour which is meager.

 

Enjoy your trip!!

[bus184]

Hello,

 

We just returned Sunday from our Princess Copper River Cruisetour. I must say, the whole trip was wonderful and the Copper River portion was very nice. In fact, I would say the Copper River lodge was the one we enjoyed most. The lodge is fairly small (compared to the Denali lodge), the staff there was very welcoming, friendly and accomodating! The trip via coach from the Denali to Copper River was pleasant (and not as bad as you might think) with several stops along the way for lunch, breaks and a particularly notable wildlife sighting (we saw a moose grazing in a lake!). In fact, this was the only leg of our trip where we saw moose at all (three different times). Our coach driver was very knowledgable and made the ride enjoyable. The lodge has very nice views of the mountaintains in Wrangell - St Elias National Park and luckily (for us) our weather was outstanding!

 

We had one snafu which I think actually turned out better for us. We had pre-booked the Fly/Drive to Kennicott/McCarthy excursion. Two days before (while we were still at the Denali lodge), the Copper River Tour desk called and told us that somehow Princess had overbooked that excursion. They offered us an altenative when I called them back which was the fly/fly excursion both ways to Kennicott/McCarthy. I was initially reluctant to change since I had spent a significant amount of time researching our excursions. They convinced me that the tours were similar enough that there would be very little downside and, in retrospect I think this was true. The upside for us was that we spent 3 hours less on the road (supposedly rough) which was not a bad thing since the distances you need to travel in Alaska to see what we wanted to see are vast.

 

If you don't get/want to go to Kennicott, some other folks we spoke to had great success in their salmon fishing attempts.

 

Hope you enjoy your trip as much as we did! Our two duaghters (15 & 13) didn't want to come home! Let me know if you would like any more details.

 

We are doing this tour in August. Ihave a couple of questions. Is the catamaran from Valdez to Whittier the same or similar as the PWS tour? Was there any commentary and going around the glaciers or just a straight quick trip to Whittier? Also what did you do for the afternoon and evening in Anchorage before the land segment?

[Texas Tillie]

We are doing this tour in August. Ihave a couple of questions. Is the catamaran from Valdez to Whittier the same or similar as the PWS tour? Was there any commentary and going around the glaciers or just a straight quick trip to Whittier? Also what did you do for the afternoon and evening in Anchorage before the land segment?

 

I'll jump in here - did this cruisetour in 2008 and really liked it. The cat from Valdez to Whittier is a "fast ferry" - out in the open water, no commentary. The scenery is nice - but you don't get close to the land at all. I didn't get to the hotel until about 6 PM (which was 9 PM at home) after travelling all day - so I didn't do anything!:p

[CuriousBill]

We are doing this tour in August. Ihave a couple of questions. Is the catamaran from Valdez to Whittier the same or similar as the PWS tour? Was there any commentary and going around the glaciers or just a straight quick trip to Whittier? Also what did you do for the afternoon and evening in Anchorage before the land segment?

 

I agree with Texas Tillie, it is a "fast ferry" and is designed to be transportation from point A to point B. There was "minor" commentary from the crew in that they pointed out an area of icebergs we were passing which were released from a nearby glacier and one of the crew ran into the passnger area to point out a humpback whale they spotted. I was actually lucky enough to get a photo of this whale breaching from the ferry but it travels at about 30-35 knots so you have to really keep a keen eye for the sights.

 

We did not do the PWS Tour but from what I understand they are two completely different things.

 

As far as Anchorage, we got into Anchorage a extra day before the first day Princess puts you up there. The afternoon of our arrival, we rented bikes and rode the Tony Knowles coastal trail which we enjoyed. The second day we rented a car and drove along Turnagain arm, did some hiking and ended up at Portage Glacier before returningto Anchorage.