Alaska Land-Sea Tour Hotels

[capenittany]

We have placed a deposit on a Land/Sea Tour for August 2016 and I'm now second guessing myself. What hotel does Royal Caribbean use for the nights in Denali? We have been told the hotel names for the nights in Anchorage, Talkeetna and Alyeska.

[Island Sunset]

We stayed at Grande Denali Lodge on our post cruisetour in May this year. On top of a hill with great views across Denali. Rooms are a bit tired but the main reception/bar/restaurant area is great.

[franl24fan]

I was on tour 6B in June. We stayed at the Denali Park Lodge, about 6 miles south of the park. Nice rooms in pretty surroundings. Biggest problem was that the doors opened out and folks had no consideration for others, letting them slam shut all night. There was a 20 square mile power outage at 5AM, no water, no toilets, no lights, no coffee in dining room. The tour director found it the power wasn't going to be back on until at least noon, so instead of a free morning we left at 8AM for Anchorage. So we had about 6 hours in our rooms. Same at most other hotels.

 

I would still recommend the cruise tours as a good way to see that part of Alaska, unless you can handle making your own hotel reservations, rental cars etc. Having said that, my greatest disappointment with the cruise tour was the lack of advance information as to hotels and the daily schedule. I selected the 6B tour based on the material RCI posted in the descriptions (which did not have hotel details), then when I checked in for the cruise tour and was given the daily schedule I discovered there were major changes. For example, the free afternoon in Fairbanks was eliminated, and although the activity they did was fine, I was not able to see a few things I had planned on doing that afternoon. In Anchorage the advance materials said "arrive early afternoon, have rest of afternoon and evening on own" Instead we were scheduled to arrive at 7:30PM (due to power outage we got there at 4:30PM). Everything in downtown was closed up. They also changed the hotels we were supposed to be in.

 

Also be aware that meals are not included, and the hotels do not even provide a free continental breakfast (to buy one was about $14). Since you are without transportation there is little choice of where to eat, and everything in Alaska is super expensive ($12 minimum for a sandwich, $20 for a dinner). I really enjoyed the four hours on the Alaska Railroad Dome car, it had it's own dining car below, expensive but very well done. The days are very long, bags out at 6AM, get to next hotel about 6PM, or later if you do the wilderness tour in Denali. Doing the land portion pre cruise is highly recommended.

 

So when you select a cruise tour and have a "must see" item, be aware you may or may not actually see it. Fortunately I chose to fly into Fairbanks 2 days early, rented a car & drove down to Denali for day before tour started, spent 4 hours in the park doing the visitor center, dog sled demo, hiked some paths. If I had not done that I would have been very disappointed since we got there on the train at noon, and had to be on the 8 hour wilderness tour at 1PM, back to lodge at 10:30PM.

 

The other thing I found odd about the cruise tour compared to other land tours I've taken with Road Scholar, was the lack of group unity. There was no welcome party, no name tags, no effort by tour director to suggest group dinners. Some couples paired off, but as a solo I had to work hard to be included. The quality of the tour director and bus driver was outstanding, they tried to make the long hours on the bus fun.

 

It is a very expensive vacation, but I considered it a once in a lifetime. You have to be flexible and go with the flow.