Tendering Ports

[sadiecat]

We will be taking our first trip to Alaska in April/May of 2018. I figure it doesn't do any harm to start gathering information. Our destinations include Juneau, Skagway, Glacier Bay, Ketchikan, Victoria/British Columbia. I am curious to know if any of these ports are tender. Can someone give me this information?

[NeedToCruise911]

I cannot tell you about Glacier Bay, but I've been to the other ports, and none of them are tendered stops.

 

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[fishfire]

Glacier Bay is a scenic cruising sea day, unless you book an excursion. The excursion is a smaller boat so you can see more of the bay and get closer to the glaciers. You board the boat just like you would a tender. The ship will dock at all of the other ports.

 

 

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[bUU]

Glacier Bay is a scenic cruising sea day, unless you book an excursion. The excursion is a smaller boat so you can see more of the bay and get closer to the glaciers. You board the boat just like you would a tender.

Which cruise lines run excursions at Glacier Bay?

[CruiserBruce]

Any port can be a tender port, depending on how many ships are in. Juneau, particularly, has been a tender port at times recently, due to more ships than dock space, and at one point, due to a damaged dock area.

[NancyIL]

Glacier Bay is a scenic cruising sea day, unless you book an excursion. The excursion is a smaller boat so you can see more of the bay and get closer to the glaciers. You board the boat just like you would a tender. The ship will dock at all of the other ports.

 

 

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I don't recall reading about small boat excursions from cruise ships in Glacier Bay. However, that is a popular excursion in Tracy Arm Fjord.

[xlxo]

and at one point, due to a damaged dock area.

if you are referring to the Celebrity incident... that was in Ketchikan.

 

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[Tapi]

We docked in Juneau but one ship had to tender due to limited docking space. We were also docked in Ketchikan and Victoria. We didn't visit Skagway

 

 

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[CruiserBruce]

if you are referring to the Celebrity incident... that was in Ketchikan.

 

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My error. But the point is, any port can be a tender port if the number of ships exceeds the port capacity. Usually the cruise line's schedule for that cruise will indicate if a port is a tender port or not, unless it is a last minute change due to something like the Celebrity incident.

[donaldsc]

Go onto the cruise company WEB sites using Google to find out that information. Easy to do.

 

DON

[bUU]

I don't recall reading about small boat excursions from cruise ships in Glacier Bay.

Me neither and I think it was something I hope that I would have noticed during my recent research.

[sadiecat]

Thanks everyone for your replies.

[TheCalicoCat]

I don't believe (I can be wrong) that any of the ports are all tenders all the time any more. Icy Strait Point built a dock in 2015 or 2016.

 

But if there are a lot of ships in port, one or more may have to tender.

 

I do not believe that there are any excursions off the mass market cruise ships in Glacier Bay. (Some of the very small National Geographic, UnCruise, etc. may be different. Again, I could be wrong. Our ship just had scenic sailing in Glacier Bay & I looked at "all" of the cruise lines when researching Alaska prior to our first AK cruise.)

[Pushka]

Juneau is a tender port for us next year. And not a lot of time in Juneau either.

[Coral]

 

I do not believe that there are any excursions off the mass market cruise ships in Glacier Bay. (Some of the very small National Geographic, UnCruise, etc. may be different. Again, I could be wrong. Our ship just had scenic sailing in Glacier Bay & I looked at "all" of the cruise lines when researching Alaska prior to our first AK cruise.)

 

There was a report of Un-cruise where they kayaked in Glacier Bay!

 

Definitely not offered on mainstream lines.

[Coral]

We will be taking our first trip to Alaska in April/May of 2018. I figure it doesn't do any harm to start gathering information. Our destinations include Juneau, Skagway, Glacier Bay, Ketchikan, Victoria/British Columbia. I am curious to know if any of these ports are tender. Can someone give me this information?

 

If you are going in April - you most likely will not need to tender as most ships are not up in Alaska yet. Ships tender when there are too many ships in port that day.

[TheAccidentalCruiser]

For 2017, this site lists the ships scheduled* in each port of call on a given day and where they are scheduled* to be docked. You got to the page for your POC, find your date, and you should see your ship listed.

 

This just came out a couple of weeks ago, so I'd guess the 2018 version will be available in mid-January 2018. In the meantime, if you can find a ship from your cruise line in the same port on the same day of the year, that should give you a pretty good guess.

 

Most POCs will have a little three-letter (or two-, or one-, or a number) code after the ship name. That's the Berth Code, and there's a link back on the page you selected your port from. For instances, in Skagway under the "SKG" Port Code, you might see "BRD," which means the ship is scheduled* to be at the Broadway Dock. If it says "anchor" or "anchorage" or "tender," you can assume you'll be tendering.

 

*I keep saying "scheduled" for a reason. These things can change at any minute, based on the wildly variable wind, weather and & tides of the Pacific NW and SE Alaska. In April, you can probably bet on at least one delay or disruption of some kind due to weather. In the worst case, they sometimes have to skip a port entirely, but it's more likely to be a last minute schedule change.

 

Not to to second-guess the Celebrity incident mentioned above, but wiping out a berth like that is just the sort of thing a captain might be trying to avoid by anchoring and making the passengers tender.