Alaskan cruise tour june 7-jun 17- 2012

[scapel]

ALASKAN CRUISE TOUR June 5, 2012- June 19, 2012

 

We arrived at the Anchorage Airport and checked in to the Susitna Place B&B located in 727 N Street Anchorage, AK 99501, Tel. No. 1-907-274-3344 where we spent two nights. The night of our arrival we ate at Simon & Seifort's 420 L St within walking distance of the Susitna Place. This was our third trip to eat at Simon & Seaforts and is still good. The Host of Susitna Place, Linda did a very good job. The property is small and requires long advanced reservations. Most expensive room is $195/dy but there are less expensive options. The B&B has a most magnificent view of the Cook inlet and on a good day one can see Mt. McKinley in the distance. The breakfast was very good both days.

 

On the morning of June 6, 2012 we rented a car from Hertz (pre-arranged) located at 414 K street within walking distance of Susitna place. Linda the owner of Susitna said it would be cheaper to take a cab to her place and rent the car the next day since the rental company had to add an airport charge. We motored to Whittier, AK to take our pre-arrange tour of Prince William Sound to Surprise Glacier. One has to get a copy of the tunnel schedule from Bear creek to Whittier and go through the tunnel to Whittier in order to decrease waiting time.

Not much to see in Whittier, but our cruise with Major Marine tours was very good. Prince William Sound touring concentrates more on glacier viewing though we had some otters and seals and Kenai concentrates more on wild life viewing.

After the Glacier tour in Prince William Sound, we ate at the Seven Glaciers Restaurant near the Alyeska resort within 25 miles on the way back to Anchorage. By pre-arranged reservations we obtained the free ride on the tram. The food was excellent and the view was magnificent.

 

On Thursday June 7, 2012 we checked out of Susitna Place $436.80 for the two nights and brought our luggage to the Westmark Anchorage hotel at 729 west 5th Ave and had our luggage stored until check in. We obtained our information for the beginning of our cruise tour the next day.

We then toured around Anchorage and visited Wal Mart where I fell asleep while waiting on the group. We visited a knife shop bought some knives and had a nice lunch at the Midnight Sun Brewery http://midnightsunbrewing.com/. It was a little difficult to find, but the Garmin helped. We checked into the Westmark Anchorage Hotel at 729 West 6th ave Thursday evening and turned in the Hertz Car which was in walking distance to the Westmark Hotel. Westmark Anchorage was a vey comfortable clean hotel, just as the one in Fairbanks in 1996 was. That evening we walked to the Bangkok Thai Restaurant on 4th Ave which was just so-so. Thai Food is just like any other. There is excellent and then so-so.

 

Friday June 8th we took the train to Denali as part of our package tour with pre-assigned seats for our group of four together. Drinks and food were pay as you go or run a tab which we did. After checking into our McKinley Chalets room in the Canyon Lodge section, we went to the front and met our tour guide for the pre-arranged pre-paid White Water Rapid tour. We were given dry suits to put on and we did need them since we did get some of the Glacier Facials as they are called, but it was fun. We did the Class I-II rapids with only a touch of III. No helmets were required on this class of rapids. The guide was demonstrating how to pull someone back in the boat if they fell out. She used me to demonstrate. She had me kneel down on the bank nest to the raft. The protocol calls for pushing the subject down in the water to have the life preserver give some buoyancy and help with some force to get the subject out of the water. She gave me one hard jerk and pulled me in the boat on top of her. Knocked my glasses and my buddy was laughing so hard he almost didn't get the picture of me laying on top of this little girl of about 120 lbs who had just pulled me off the bank into the raft. I was laughing so hard I couldn't get off her so I just layed there.

Since I had forgotten my water proof bag for my video camera, I bought a waterproof still camera. On the way to the raft launch site we saw a bear on the side of the road the guide took a picture of the bear with the water proof camera. After the raft trip we ate at the pizza house that night which was across the street from the McKinley chalet.

 

 

The next day Saturday June, 9 we did the package included long tour through Denali National Park. We had taken advice to buy a lunch since the furnished lunch was not much. This cost about $16/p but across the street is a Subway where we could have purchased a meal much cheaper and probably better. I thought the advice to purchase some extra food for this long tour was worth following. We saw lots of wild life including a Lynx. Binoculars are needed for adequate viewing. We ate in the McKinley Chalet restaurant this night.

 

On Sunday June 10-we then boarded a 9-10 hour bus trip from Denali to Seward to board the Statendam. Our driver Grandma Jones talked the entire way and had us play games trying to make the long trip as entertaining as possible. Some earphones with one’s own music did come in handy. We had several stops along the way and a nice lunch stop at the Settlers Bay Lodge in Wasilla, AK. Didn't see Sara Palin, but my wife got a picture next to a life size poster. Our bus driver informed us the Wal-Mart in Wasilla, AK has the distinction of selling more duct tape than any other Wal-Mart in the world.

For travelling this area, I think a family could easily make all these arrangements themselves and use private transportation. They could return a rental car in Anchorage and take the train to Seward, but I’m not sure of the mechanics of handling the luggage from the car to the train and from the train to the ship. Returning a rental vehicle in Seward I have been told increases the fee but I have not checked on the price.

We boarded the Statendam Sunday June 10 and sailed at 8:00 PM.

We had a nice deluxe suite with plenty of room. The doors to the veranda were the best I have seen. They were swing doors but when you pushed them open they stayed open. When you wanted to close them you just pulled them so far and hydraulics gently closed them the rest of the way. No accidental locking of the door.

 

Monday June 11 we sailed College Fjord.

 

Tuesday June 12 we Sailed Glacier Bay and had an 8 hour tour of Glacier Bay from the Statendam with some commentary. A park ranger was also on the bow with binoculars logging various sightings.

This was my 4th cruise to Alaska and my fifth trip to Alaska, but the first through Glacier Bay. I think it compares to the Chilean Fjords, but my wife disagreed. We did not see any whales, but some folks did.

 

On Wednesday June 13 we arrived in Haines at 6:30 AM We had booked a flight with Drake Olsen but when I called him he said he was sick and couldn’t fly. We certainly didn’t want to be in a small plane with someone with an Upper respiratory Infection. He gave us the phone number of Paul and Amy with Mountain Flying Service 1-907-766-3007 who took us almost immediately and gave us a flight that was magnificent. We flew in the passes to view glaciers up close. We saw a moose swimming in the water as we landed. This flight was less expensive than Drake. Amy took us back to the ship after we walked around Haines. We would definitely recommend Mountain Flying Service. We had lunch on the ship and were picked up at the ship by Robert of Joe Ordonez Rainbow Glacier Adventures 907-766-3576 at $95/p plus Tax for 4 hours. Robert was an interesting young man who had lived in a tree house for some time and loved it. He was our guide for this trip. We viewed Bears black and gizzly and Eagles and fish hatcheries and got a nice informative tour. He commented on two women that were too close to some bears with their car and standing outside of the car. He warned them as did another person passing by. Warnings were not taken and the two women continued to be less safe. The bears are so fast that if they decided they could have you in their grasp before you got back in the car. If the bears kill the human the bear gets killed, and it wasn't his fault. We sailed out of Haines at 9:00 PM. I think the late departure was because of a 2 hour ferry ride between Haines and Skagway and many people went to Skagway on tours. We were interested in seeing wild life and toured Haines. The ferry fare was about $62 RT to Skagway and if you add that to a tour it gets up in the dollars.

 

Thursday June 14, we arrived in Juneau at 8:00 AM. This was my third trip to Juneau and the weather was always cloudy so I had never been up the Mt. Roberts Tram. It was cloudy this day also, but we went anyhow. The ticket is good all day so if it cleared up we could go back up. It never did clear up. There was some scenery but no view of the harbor after going half way up. There was a very nice family of musicians that performed. They were Branson, MO quality entertainers. Our friends did a zipline and we met after for a snack and drink at the Red Dog saloon, which was crowded as always on ship days. We sailed at 6:00 PM. We had a reservation that same night in the Pinnacle Specialty dining for the Le Cirque night aboard the Statendam at $39/person extra. The meal was very good but the poached lobster was terrible. It was way overcooked and tough. We had some Lobster in the regular dining room which was quite good. The food on the ship was mostly good and the service was very good. The Ship workers all had a very good attitude toward passengers that one could easily see, they really seemed to care.

 

On Friday June 15 we docked Ketchikan at 11:00 AM. We had made a reservation with Sea Wind Aviation with a 50% deposit for a trip through the Misty Fjords with a pickup at 12:30 PM from the ship dock. Seawind Aviation at 1-877-225-1203 or 1-907-225-1206

Sea Wind Aviation is owned and operated by Steve and Lesley Kamn. Lesley had called me on the ship via my cell phone to let me know that we should fly as soon as we docked rather than at the previous arranged time because of some high winds moving in. I was able to contact two other parties on the ship to let them know we were to fly early because of weather. Someone else stated they had a rather bumpy flight. Ours was smooth. Steve was our pilot and mentioned that he had started his business in 2003 the year of our previous Misty Fjords flight.

After our flight through Misty Fjords we did a very good land tour with David of the David & Kat cab tour operation. 1-907-254-7286. <tours@ketchikantaxicabtours.com> After our flight Lesley brought us to Annabelle’s Restaurant (very good food) and told David to pick us up there, giving us one hour to eat. This scheduling worked perfectly with help from Lesley giving just enough time to finish the rather wonderful Dungeness crab. David was very good and I would recommend him. The Cab was $74/hour and one could split this up depending on how many passengers. We did $200 worth a little under 3 hours.

On Saturday June 16,we had a day at sea which was most enjoyable even though we had a few hours of a little rough weather.

While aboard the Statendam we had a most enjoyable computer teacher name Techster Tom or Tom the Techster that gave several lectures on using Window Live Photo Gallery. Also HAL as opposed to Celebrity allows use of the computers to manipulate pictures and upload from cards and download to travel drives.

 

On Sunday June 17 we arrived at 7:00 AM in Vancouver and got our luggage to the Pan Pacific Hotel without a cab since it is on the dock. We upgraded our room so we could check in early and then departed for the Capilano Suspension Bridge with free transportation from Canada Place. This is one of the recommended places to visit in Vancouver and we thoroughly enjoyed it. We ate dinner that night at the Steamworks Brewing Company (very good food and service) in Gas Town. Other local recommendations we had received were for Al Porto for Italian and the Water Street Cafe in Gastown.

On Monday June 18 we ate a most wonderful breakfast at Scoozis Restaurant at 445 Howe St.

The deep dish omelets are the best at this Greek Restaurant. We had eaten there in 2003.

For the day we toured Grouse mountain (free transportation from Canada Place) and saw some bears in captivity, saw an entertaining lumber jack show and went up the Eye in the sky which is a windmill generating electricity. Weather was poor visibility this day. There was a nice bird demonstration of a buzzard, eagle and some owls that flew by training from post to post.

 

For our last night, we took a recommendation to eat at Joe Fortes Seafood & Chops 777 Thurlow Street (604) 669-1940--This restaurant was absolutely wonderful, but expensive --About $177/couple.with tip and drinks.

I had six raw oysters, six fried in panko bread crumbs, and six Rockfeller style with a white hollandaise sauce on top. The raw oysters in Louisiana are better. The only ones they had this day were from the Fanning company.

I like the system in Vancouver where they bring the machine for your credit card to your table and you swipe it. I was told that this is a country wide system in Canada. It certainly is safer in that your credit card does not leave your sight.

The next morning early we checked out of the Pan Pacific hotel at $651 for two days and flew home in about 10 hours travel time. This included the extra $30/dy for the upgrade.

[kamac56]

Wow very explicit review, thank you. Enjoyed reading it and being brought back to my land cruise tour a few years back. Thanks again and it sounds like you had a really good time!

[shrimpboat123]

I very much enjoyed your review. We'll be doing a Cruisetour in June 2013 which includes the same cruise itinerary as you took on the Statendam. Can you tell me what the formal nights were on the cruise?

[Keith1010]

Thanks for sharing this trip report with us.

 

Keith

[KruisinKath]

Aw come on, now...you HAVE to post the pic of you in the raft!!

[scapel]

I very much enjoyed your review. We'll be doing a Cruisetour in June 2013 which includes the same cruise itinerary as you took on the Statendam. Can you tell me what the formal nights were on the cruise?

 

Thank you for your kind words. We had two formal nights on the cruise. Usually on cruises the second night is a formal night and then they pick another one usually two nights before departure. They dinners were were nice.

I hoped the report would make it easier for people to make private arrangements for diffferent tirps in the ports. It was particularly nice of Lesley with Sea Wind aviation to bring us to a very nice restaurant and then contact our guy for the land tour around Ketchikan. The Annabel Restaurant was very good. I also liked the effort she made contacting us for earlier departure to prevent a rough plane ride in the wind. Apparently some others that flew later with someone else had a rough ride. The rental car out of Anchorage was $55/day but they charged an extra $26 to put two drivers on it. I think that is wrong siince my USAA insurance covers any driver that I designate to drive my vehicle. One might check this and contest this.

 

PAST CRUISES: 1.Stella Oceanis 1975 South America, 2. Stella Oceanus

1977 Black Sea and Crimean Peninsula. 3. Mermoz 1979 Med. Rome,Sicily,and Nice,Malta. 4. SS Freeport to Gulf Mexico. 5.Vistafjord to Caribbean 1981. 6. Sagafjord to Alaska 1983. 7. Stella Solaris to Aegean, Israel and Egypt 1984. 8. Mississippi Queen out of New Orleans. 9. Nantucket Clipper out of Boston 10. Fairsky to Caribbean 1987. 11. Royal Odyssey Med.& Dubrovnik 9/1988. 12. Carnivalle to Bahamas 1990. 13. Crown Odyssey to Eastern South America 1991. 14.Monarch of the Seas Eastern Caribbean 1995. 15 Royal Odyssey (Old Royal Viking Sea) Panama Canal 1995. 16 Egypt-Nile River Cruise 1996.

17. Splendour of the Seas- Fjords of Norway 1997. 18 Sun Viking –Orient Cruise 1997.

19. Renaissance R-4 Barcelona-Lisbon 1999. 20. Paradise- Caribbean 1999.

21. Millennium to Baltic Capitals 2000. 22. Summit to Caribbean 2001.

23. Constellation –Fjords of Norway 2002. 24.Horizon –Mexico 2003. 25. Infinity to Alaska 2003. 26. Holiday to Mexico 2003. 27. Infinity -South America Cape Horn 2004. 28. Constellation- Transatlantic 2004. 29.Legend of Seas- Western Caribbean 2005.

30. Millennium- Panama Canal 2006. 31. Rhapsody of Seas- Western Caribbean 2006. 32. Constellation- New England/Canada 2006. 33.Millennium-Caribbean 2007. 34.Voyager of the Seas- Caribbean 35.Mercury- South Pacific 2007. 36. Mariner of Seas-Mexican Riviera 2/09. 37. Summit to Southern Caribbean. 4/09. 38. Amadeus Symphony- Rhine River Basel-Amsterdam 6/09 combined with Switzerland Trip.

39.Antarctica on Prof. Multanovskiy 2009 40.Voyager of the Seas out of Galveston Jan 2010

41. Silver Whisper New York to Bermuda October 2010. 42.Silver Shadow Seoul Korea to Anchorage,AK May 2011

43. Silver Cloud to the Caribbean,Jan 2012 44. Statendam to Alaska June 2012

[scapel]

Aw come on, now...you HAVE to post the pic of you in the raft!!

 

I'll put a few pictures up somewhere.

[erewhon]

Thank you for your review and helpful information.

[scapel]

https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=F6FE23A6E5A9EC3F!1362&authkey=!AOkr4UwLzyj376o

 

This link should bring up pictures on sky drive.

[spongebobshayne]

Great review! We are also staying at the Pan Pacific in August prior to our NB Alaska cruise on the Coral. Could you tell me about your upgrade and what type of room you had. Thanks again for the review.

[scapel]

Great review! We are also staying at the Pan Pacific in August prior to our NB Alaska cruise on the Coral. Could you tell me about your upgrade and what type of room you had. Thanks again for the review.

 

When we went to check in early and really just store our luggage since we got off the cruise before 9:00 AM they offerred us a so called upgrade for $30/day. The room was fine and overlooked the water and you could see Grouse mountain from the window. I don't know what the other room was going to be, but to get an early check in for $30/dy was ok with us.

[scapel]

https://skydrive.live.com/redir?resid=F6FE23A6E5A9EC3F!1362&authkey=!AOkr4UwLzyj376o

 

This link should bring up pictures on sky drive.

I can't get the link to work on my computer. It says the computer is blocking it and when I click ok to load all I get is where the pictures should be. Will try to check on it.

[raylene5]

Wow! What an adventure you two had! I think I need a nap after reading about all of the things you did :) Thanks for the excellent review!

[scapel]

Great review! We are also staying at the Pan Pacific in August prior to our NB Alaska cruise on the Coral. Could you tell me about your upgrade and what type of room you had. Thanks again for the review.

 

Well you saw the final price for two days including the upgrade. That gives you something to shoot at. That was for room only. No extra charges at all.

There is a free shuttle to Capilano Bridge and to Grouse Mtn from Canada Place, and if you are young and in good shape you could do both in a day. Just start early and proportion your time. The free bus however has a last departure of around 5:00 PM from Grouse Mtn.and if it is full you have to get your own way home. Another option is the $9/day transportaton pass for busses and ferries. The fare back from Grouse MTn I'm not sure of, but it is not $9/p. Maybe more like $2.50/p but don't quote me. We would have liked to have stayed longer and eaten there, but didn't have time and then catch the free bus. Joe Fortes made up for that. What a meal!!

[scapel]

Aw come on, now...you HAVE to post the pic of you in the raft!!

 

Kathy,

Did this link work?

 

 

 

https://skydrive.live.com/?cid=f6fe23a6e5a9ec3f

[vbmom87]

Very interesting review to read. Thanks for sharing. Sounds like you had a wonderful time. It is nice to read about other vendors not normally mentioned on this forum.

 

Was College Fjords on your original itinerary? When I was looking at HAL itineraries earlier this season, I did not see College Fjords listed on one way itineraries; just Glacier Bay.

[scapel]

Very interesting review to read. Thanks for sharing. Sounds like you had a wonderful time. It is nice to read about other vendors not normally mentioned on this forum.

 

Was College Fjords on your original itinerary? When I was looking at HAL itineraries earlier this season, I did not see College Fjords listed on one way itineraries; just Glacier Bay.

 

Yes it was, but we had some rough weather with poor visibility that day. First full day at sea.

[KruisinKath]

The link works! :D Great photos! Looks like you were having a wonderful time!

[spongebobshayne]

Well you saw the final price for two days including the upgrade. That gives you something to shoot at. That was for room only. No extra charges at all.

There is a free shuttle to Capilano Bridge and to Grouse Mtn from Canada Place, and if you are young and in good shape you could do both in a day. Just start early and proportion your time. The free bus however has a last departure of around 5:00 PM from Grouse Mtn.and if it is full you have to get your own way home. Another option is the $9/day transportaton pass for busses and ferries. The fare back from Grouse MTn I'm not sure of, but it is not $9/p. Maybe more like $2.50/p but don't quote me. We would have liked to have stayed longer and eaten there, but didn't have time and then catch the free bus. Joe Fortes made up for that. What a meal!!

Thank you for the information about the room and the free shuttle bus to Grouse Mtn. We have plans to visit the Aquarium and Capilano Bridge. Really looking forward to staying at the Pan Pacific after reading all the excellent reviews here on CC. We have booked a Premiere Corner King for two nights for 652.00 CD through the hotel. Hopefully we will see the Coral Princess when she comes into the harbour from our room.

[murphy4]

thanks for the great review. I plan on referring to your land portion when planning my May 2013 DIY land tour.

[scapel]

Paul of the Mountain Flyiing service in Haines took us on short notice since Drake was sick and couldn't fly. He had to hurry and get us done because he had another group in Skagway. If anyone wants to use Mountain Flying Service you might check if they have a flight out of Skagway, you could fly with Paul from Haines and do a nice tour and then land in Skagway and take the fast ferry back to Haines to board your ship. We had previously made a tentative arrangement with Joe Ordonez for a tour after our flight. If one could plan this sort of thing it might work. I am not sure of the one way fast ferry fee. I think the RT was about $62/p but we didn't have time to do that.

I can assure you that Amy could help you arrange that ahead of time if they had a booking out of Skagway. It would be easier on Paul also I think.

[T42-24T]

Thanks so much for the great review and pictures. It makes me excited for our upcoming cruise. We're staying at the PanPacific after our Celebrity cruise in Jun. Hopefully we'll be able to check in early too. Unfortunately we'll only have one day/night in Vancouver. What would you advise as a "don't miss" for first time Vancouver tourists?

[scapel]

Thanks so much for the great review and pictures. It makes me excited for our upcoming cruise. We're staying at the PanPacific after our Celebrity cruise in Jun. Hopefully we'll be able to check in early too. Unfortunately we'll only have one day/night in Vancouver. What would you advise as a "don't miss" for first time Vancouver tourists?

 

Do Capilano Bridge and Grouse Mtn . Take the bus from Canada Place.

[mkaro]

A wonderful review. You mentioned getting an extra lunch for the Denali Park trip. Where do you get them and what is in it?

[scapel]

A wonderful review. You mentioned getting an extra lunch for the Denali Park trip. Where do you get them and what is in it?

 

I went down and ordered from the hotel dining room the night before for early pickup the next morning.This was at the recommendation of a previous cruiser. I think there is a nice Subway across the street from the Denali inn that we stayed. Not sure what time they open. That Denali tour has a lunch with it, but it wasn't much. We were glad we had brought the extra. It is quite a long tour to just have that small amount of lunch. We were glad we had the extra lunch, but wish we would have just used Subway across the street. The eating place across from the Denali Lodge inn is also a nice place to eat. The Denali Lodge restaurang was very nice but more expensive as one would expect.