Help! Which flight/glacier landing in Denali?

[cruisin619]

We are looking to book a flight tour with glacier landing during our Princess Cruisetour in June. We have it narrowed down to two:

 

1) Mt. McKinley Glacier Landing by Airplane

499 per person, Leaves from the entrance of Denali

 

 

2) Talkeetna Ruth Glacier Landing by Airplane

379 per person, Leaves from Talkeetna

 

 

Which flights have you taken? Which do you recommend? Thank you so much for any information!!

[cruisin619]

So after a little more searching, we discovered the first flight is based out of the Fly Denali company while the second flight is from Talkeetna Air Taxi. They both get 5/5 star reviews on trip advisor.com, and seem comparable for air time (100 minutes, 90 minutes respectively). Not sure what any major differences are besides price point?

[mapleleaves]

The difference I see is that #1 leaves from Denali NP and #2 leaves from Talkeetna. Where would this flight fit best into your itinerary and other activities?

 

Flightseeing is the most popular excursion in Talkeetna. It is actually the starting point for mountain climbing expeditions due to it's proximity to the mtn. You'll find a list of flightseeing vendors in the town web site:

http://www.talkeetnachamber.org/

 

We attempted the flight twice but were weathered out. I wasn't interested in a glacier landing just the scenic flight, so I chose whichever company had a discount coupon in the Alaska Toursaver book.

 

If the glacier landing is a priority you might want to find out how long each company spends ON the glacier and how much time flying around the mtn.

 

Quite a few folks have mentioned their flight in trip reports. Did you look thru the trip reports in the STICKY above? Reply #45 has them listed by cruiseline.

The reports will give you a good idea of their experience and also which vendor they used.

[frugaltravel]

Since you mentioned Princess, I assume you are on a Princess cruisetour. There is a lot less to do/see near Talkeetna and from the McKinley Princess Lodge than there is in Denali. So generally it is best to do the flightseeing in Talkeetna. Also, since the Ruth Glacier is closer to Talkeetna, and there is more competition from there, the prices are a bit lower. Both companies have great reputations. You might find it slightly cheaper (or maybe not) to book directly vs. through Princess.

[Taters]

I'm going to just chime in here... K2 Aviation in Talkeetna is a wonderful company. You might want to look into their offerings for glacier landings and flight seeing.

 

Enjoy Alaska! There's no other place like it.

[peachycruiser]

We went with Talkeetna Air Taxi in 2012 and recommend them highly. However that is the only time we have done a glacier landing. We were supposed to fly up to Ruth Glacier but due to weather issues, did not get to go until 5:30 pm, still plenty of light. We had almost given up on going. We kept in touch with them by cell during the day while we hung out in the town of Talkeetna. I was nervous about going in a small plane, but after we were airborne, the trip was awesome. The take-off, landing, flight were all very smooth, better than the commercial jets. I believe our pilot was Brad. I'll have to say, we did not stay long on the glacier, just time enough to take pix and walk around a bit...maybe 15-30 min at most. Talkeetna Air Taxi prices were better than the others and I researched their reputation, which was virtually flawless.

[moviefan2010]

I loved the flight by K2 Aviation which Princess was using two years ago. I should have booked directly from K2 to save money and they had lots of flights. K2 has several different McKinley landing spots and we were lucky enough to land next to the base camp for starting McKinley climbs

 

The photo with me is Mt. Forester (spelling?). McKinley is way down a valley since climbers start about 18 miles away but you get great views of it during the flight.

 

 

 

 

Sent using the Cruise Critic forums app

[tmitchell82]

We are looking to book a flight tour with glacier landing during our Princess Cruisetour in June. We have it narrowed down to two:

 

1) Mt. McKinley Glacier Landing by Airplane

499 per person, Leaves from the entrance of Denali

 

 

2) Talkeetna Ruth Glacier Landing by Airplane

379 per person, Leaves from Talkeetna

 

 

Which flights have you taken? Which do you recommend? Thank you so much for any information!!

 

We did the McKinley Glacier Landing by Airplane through Princess back in 2012. We flew out of Healy on a turbo Otter (plane holding about 10 people) We landed on the Ruth Glacier. Weather was great the day we flew, but weather is the biggest factor in how the flight goes. Expensive, yes, but IMHO it was well worth it. You can watch some of the flight on the link below.

 

 

I think that any flight where you get to land on a glacier in Denali is worth it. Definitely one of the best experiences I had in Alaska.

 

Tim