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Hubard Glacier Viewing


Italy52
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Did they say why they cancelled it. I was looking forward to your review. We have it booked for our cruise later this summer.

 

 

My best bet is booking numbers. This is a very expensive operation, having a boat out here. I doubt they are keeping staff and the boat at Yakutat unless they are running every day. May be coming out of Hoonah on the no cruise ship days??? as example.

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It appears to me that this is a first for Allan Marine Tours. They are a large very respected Sitka family who have been running successful catamaran tours for years in Southeast, primarily out of Sitka, Juneau and Ketchikan. They build most of their large fleet of vessels themselves in their own Sitka shipyard. Looks like Princess is helping them pioneer a new excursion, opening up the same for other major's guests. I'm still puzzled at how this is going to work. It won't be the first time that a Princess excursion didn't pan out, that I'm familiar with. The narrative for Princess excursion YAI-660 indicates this is a three hour excursion with a pickup from the cruise ship out at the mouth of Yakutat Bay. This means that the cruise ship is going to have to stop, open the a lower gangway door and transfer those taking the excursion to the smaller vessel. I'm still inclined to believe that if they try this they are going to have to transfer the guests back to the cruise ship up by the glacier at the end of the excursion, probably about the time it is about ready to sail west back down and out of Yakutat Bay. Princess schedules five hours from the time they enter to the time they depart Yakutat Bay.

 

It is a long way from Sitka or an Icy Straight port like Hoonah or Glacier Bay up to Yakutat, like a 500 mile roundtrip, most of which is open ocean running in the North Pacific. It will be most interesting to see if Allan Marine tries to shuttle a boat that distance just to engage in periodic excursions up at Yakutat Bay.

 

For years, Yakutat Charter Boat Company has been booking tours from Yakutat up to the glacier and back. Mainly catering to airline passengers who get off the daily south bound Alaska Airlines' flight and then get back on the north bound. Here is part of a report from a newspaper reporter who took one of these: "later in the week I took a charter boat to see several of the glaciers. It's about a four-hour trip from Yakutat's small-boat harbor to the snout of Hubbard Glacier and back, with plenty of time along the way to admire porpoises, harbor seals and otters floating idly on their backs." So maybe Allan Marine can do this all during the big Princess ship's six hours in the Bay. Bet they take more than three hours though if they run all the way back to the mouth before dropping guests off.

Edited by kennicott
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My best bet is booking numbers. This is a very expensive operation, having a boat out here. I doubt they are keeping staff and the boat at Yakutat unless they are running every day. May be coming out of Hoonah on the no cruise ship days??? as example.

 

 

 

They said Allen Marine had operational issues and canceled this excursion. You might be right. Maybe not enough signed up pre cruise and they didn’t want to risk numbers on onboard sales. Still, canceling six days out was disappointing. Agree with those saying to wait for some good trip reports. Right now, getting off in Ketchikan.

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We just arrived in Seward and that was the only disappointment of our cruise (operational issues for Allen Marine). The captain of the Millennium got very close to Hubbard Glacier. The weather all week was in the 60s everywhere with only 30 minutes of rain in Ketchikan. Of course, as we exit our ship, it will rain (not hard) in Seward this weekend, but hopefully our Kenai Fjords cruise today and our kayaking tomorrow (already moved from 8 am to 7 am) won't be impacted greatly.

 

I think everyone should play it by ear on the Allen Marine excursion to Hubbard Glacier. Once they get it figured out, it should be a great excursion.

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  • 4 weeks later...
I can't imagine a cruise line touting brown bear viewing opportunity from the deck of a cruise ship while sailing up and back on Yakutat Bay and Disenchantment Bay in order to view the face of Hubbard.

<snip>

I made one more swing around the barge but as I did, out of one boxcars, with its door open, came a very large brown bear. I slowly eased the throttle open again and continued on my way.

 

Wow, great story! I loved reading it, thank you. We just booked the Wilderness Explorer tour yesterday, for our August 2019 cruise, with Celebrity's almost 20% discount from their flash sale. Hoping for a great trip.

 

Best wishes!

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Hoping someone who took the glacier tour reports back soon... I would really like to know how many steps are on the boat. Wife has bad knees... wants to go, but looking for some first hand reports. THANKS!!!!!

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Hi Sam.Seattle. We are booked for the tour on our Cruisetour with Celebrity Millennium August 10th 2018 sailing. Hopefully they’ll have all the kinks worked out and we can take the tour. Will report back here if and when it happens. Seems like a lot of people are sitting on the edge of their seats wanting to hear about the tour. Can’t wait!

P.S. we’re going to Seattle a few days before flying to Alaska for our Cruisetour. Any MUST DO’s in Seattle while we’re there?

 

 

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Hi Sam.Seattle. We are booked for the tour on our Cruisetour with Celebrity Millennium August 10th 2018 sailing. Hopefully they’ll have all the kinks worked out and we can take the tour. Will report back here if and when it happens. Seems like a lot of people are sitting on the edge of their seats wanting to hear about the tour. Can’t wait!

P.S. we’re going to Seattle a few days before flying to Alaska for our Cruisetour. Any MUST DO’s in Seattle while we’re there?

 

 

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We are on the Aug 3 and Aug 10 Milennium sailings! Looking forward to meeting you.

 

What to do in Seattle? That is tough... Do you want an active experience or road trip?

 

Ballard Locks and salmon ladder

Downtown Waterfront when a cruise ship is in port.

Our ferry system has lots of options for day trips over to the Peninsula.

 

Feel free to email to chat privately.

 

Richard

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  • 2 weeks later...

$@/:$)#* Just received an email from Celebrity that the Hubbard Glacier excursion (the small boat excursion) has been cancelled for the August 10th sailing. Oh well, maybe next cruise to Alaska. Hopefully we’ll have good weather and can get close to the glacier. Recent reviews show the ships are getting pretty close this year.

 

 

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We just arrived in Seward and that was the only disappointment of our cruise (operational issues for Allen Marine). The captain of the Millennium got very close to Hubbard Glacier. The weather all week was in the 60s everywhere with only 30 minutes of rain in Ketchikan. Of course, as we exit our ship, it will rain (not hard) in Seward this weekend, but hopefully our Kenai Fjords cruise today and our kayaking tomorrow (already moved from 8 am to 7 am) won't be impacted greatly.

 

I think everyone should play it by ear on the Allen Marine excursion to Hubbard Glacier. Once they get it figured out, it should be a great excursion.

 

 

 

Dang, we are on the August 3 sailing on the millennium. Our tour was canceled! Just got the email notice today.

 

 

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$@/:$)#* Just received an email from Celebrity that the Hubbard Glacier excursion (the small boat excursion) has been cancelled for the August 10th sailing. Oh well, maybe next cruise to Alaska. Hopefully we’ll have good weather and can get close to the glacier. Recent reviews show the ships are getting pretty close this year.

 

 

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On our recent cruise on Millennium we were at Hubbard Glacier on June 30th. Although the weather wasn’t the best, we got within a half mile of the Glacier. They announced it was the closest Captain Nikolaus had gotten (not sure if they meant this year or ever) to it. I think because it was overcast we got better pictures than if it was sunny and we saw a lot of calving. It was a pretty amazing experience.

 

 

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On our recent cruise on Millennium we were at Hubbard Glacier on June 30th. Although the weather wasn’t the best, we got within a half mile of the Glacier. They announced it was the closest Captain Nikolaus had gotten (not sure if they meant this year or ever) to it. I think because it was overcast we got better pictures than if it was sunny and we saw a lot of calving. It was a pretty amazing experience.

 

 

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We were on the Millennium in May. On May 19th, we got within 1/2 mile of Hubbard Glacier. Lots of calving. What a wonderful experience to behold.

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$@/:$)#* Just received an email from Celebrity that the Hubbard Glacier excursion (the small boat excursion) has been cancelled for the August 10th sailing. Oh well, maybe next cruise to Alaska. Hopefully we’ll have good weather and can get close to the glacier. Recent reviews show the ships are getting pretty close this year.

 

 

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I have been gone - has anyone gone on this excursion yet?

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Coral, from everything I have seen, no. Welcome back, hope you had a nice vacation.

 

Too bad - this sounded promising. A friend is going on American Cruise Line this week and he said they have "an overnight in Glacier Bay" - I can't wait to hear about that.

 

I did have a great time. Norway is like Alaska on steroids though with different types of glaciers. Tons of fjords and huge waterfalls. The glaciers I saw were not as impressive but maybe they were elsewhere.

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Too bad - this sounded promising. A friend is going on American Cruise Line this week and he said they have "an overnight in Glacier Bay" - I can't wait to hear about that.

 

I did have a great time. Norway is like Alaska on steroids though with different types of glaciers. Tons of fjords and huge waterfalls. The glaciers I saw were not as impressive but maybe they were elsewhere.

 

Glad to hear you enjoyed Norway, I am sure it was filled with lots of beautiful memories.

 

American Cruise Line and Glacier Bay --- interesting.

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I did have a great time. Norway is like Alaska on steroids though with different types of glaciers. Tons of fjords and huge waterfalls. The glaciers I saw were not as impressive bmaybe they were elut sewhere.

 

That's been true for several years, Norway has no tide water glaciers left either. Alaska "wins" with glacier viewing. :) Did you happen to get to Honningsvag? I've gone there twice around the solstice, 3 days of daylight on those cruises.

Superior for glacier viewing is also the Chilean Fjords, add to the huge - plus- penguins. :)

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Did you happen to get to Honningsvag? I've gone there twice around the solstice, 3 days of daylight on those cruises.

 

Yes - I was there on June 30th. We had amazing weather except that day and in Trondheim (rain). Mostly 50's through out the trip. We still had 3 days of non-stop sunlight as our Princess Patters said "non-stop sun" or "sunset and sunrise at the same time".

 

Honningsvag was 40 degrees with 40 MPH winds. It was colder and even more windy in North Cape. And gray. I literally could not walk up all the way to the globe - the wind was just keeping me back.

 

Otherwise, amazing weather. Some days, it was just too sunny that my pictures were taken directly into the sun. We apparently had the best weather since mid-May. I will definitely return. Too many things I wanted to do, too little time. They pointed to some glaciers and I was like "that is a glacier" - it just looked like snow capped mountains. The waterfalls and fjords made up for it.

 

I tentatively have Buenos Aires to Santiago scheduled for Christmas 2019 with 4 days viewing (no landings) of Antarctica. I need to research it more before I fully commit.

 

Alaska definitely wins for glaciers. I wasn't sure if I missed where they were.

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I tentatively have Buenos Aires to Santiago scheduled for Christmas 2019 with 4 days viewing (no landings) of Antarctica. I need to research it more before I fully commit.

 

Alaska definitely wins for glaciers. I wasn't sure if I missed where they were.

 

Yes- do consider this, very under rated with in the US. :)

I don't find the Antarctica add on a good option for my preferences, but spend my winters going around the horn (11 times) . It's a superb itinerary- Great touring in every port (I go independent).

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Yes- do consider this, very under rated with in the US. :)

I don't find the Antarctica add on a good option for my preferences, but spend my winters going around the horn (11 times) . It's a superb itinerary- Great touring in every port (I go independent).

 

Thanks. I know very little about the area and hope to start researching it soon.

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  • 5 months later...
4 hours ago, Glaciers said:

I see Allen Marine just posted this evening about their Hubbard Glacier Tour on their Facebook Page for 2019 for cruise ship passengers.

 

I just took a look at our Princess Southbound itinerary and found that it was offered --- 2.5 hours at a price of $259.95 pp.

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