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Planning first cruise to Alaska


NCteacherlovescruising
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My husband has always wanted to cruise to Alaska, so after all our Caribbean cruises were finally planning one for Alaska for summer 2022. Which ports are best?  We’d also like to maybe include a land and sea package. Like go up a week early and see Alaska by land then cruise home, or do some cruise lines include this? If that’s even a good plan. If this would be our only trip what are must sees?

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9 minutes ago, NCteacherlovescruising said:

I found a Celebrity cruise I liked out of Seward.l, but it’s only 7 nights. Would that be close to anything if we flew in there early to do land prior to sailing?

 

Most Alaska cruises are 7 day cruises.  Doing a land tour before the cruise is highly recommended by most cruisers.  Whether Celebrity offers that, I don't know, but I would be surprised if they did not.  Seward is a very pleasant town from which to sail and deserves some time for a visit in its own right.  

 

My choice for Alaskan ports would be Juneau,  Ketchikan,  Skagway, and Sitka in that order.  Be sure to include at least one glacier visit on your itinerary.  Glacier Bay is the most popular with tourists, but Hubbard Glacier is my favorite.  

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I'm not familiar with the others, but Princess and Holland America offer "cruisetours" with 2 to 4 days on land in Alaska before/after your cruise (depending on direction). I looked into them and found them not to my liking - it seemed way too much time was spent in transit for the time you actually get at each destination. I'd want a week on land in Alaska, and for that you'll need to plan on your own. (If you want to see Denali, I figure I'd need to spend 3 or 4 days there just to get one day of decent weather, and even then it's a gamble.)

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DIY on land. Rent a car and head to Denali, the Kenai peninsula, spend time in Anchorage, go to the gold mine in Hatcher Pass, etc. 

 

Book the cruise and plan your route afterward. With the internet, finding the perfect lodging, sights not to miss, etc. should be easier by far then when we did our land trip in 1995. Highly recommend North Face Lodge in the heart of Denali, expensive but in line with what you would pay for a cruise ship land tour.

 

Our land trip surpassed our r/t Seattle cruise on NCL, but we are considering cruising to Alaska again this Sept. hoping to enjoy different adventures in the ports.

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All of the cruise lines offer cruise tours.  Celebrity contracts (or at least did pre-Covid) with Premier Alaska for their land tours.  But I also feel that folks are better off doing a DIY land trip versus any of the cruise line cruise tours.

 

Regarding Seward, the closest commercial airport is Anchorge.  While Seward has a small airstrip there is no commercial service.  And Seward is located in the Kenai Fjords National Park.  

 

I bumped up the very useful thread called something like 2019 Useful Resources compiled by "maple leaves."  It should still be on page 1 of this forum.  Complete list of helpful websites.

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Almost all the Alaska cruises are 7 days in length - exception those at the beginning and end

of the season with ship positioning cruises. With these early ones starting at San Francisco

or even Los Angeles and visiting 2-3 ports before ending at Vancouver or Seattle to start the

season. I have taken a 10 day end of season cruise from Vancouver to San Francisco.

But the regular norm is 7 days round trip out of Seattle and 7 day one-way Vancouver-Seward

and v-v.

 

Land tours can be constructed on both ends of the cruises.

There are the more personal recommended DIY doing things you want to do and

then there are the cruise line sponsored ones.

Land tours by the cruise lines can begin in Fairbanks visiting Denali Park and other facilities

using motor coach (THE BUS) and portions of the Alaska RR (Very highly recommended).

These tours eventually arrive at the ports of Whittier or Seward to board your cruise ship.

 

NOTE:  I prefer the land tour before the cruise - reason the first part of the trip will not be so

relaxing as you are living out of a suitcase from night to night and moving daily to a new

overnight lodging place - FINALLY you get on the ship and can relax getting away from all

that pack-unpack movement stuff.  If you do take the cruise first prepare yourself for a

relaxing time and then an unsettling experience of an another different place to lodge each night.

DIY exception here.

 

Whichever way you put your travel package together - you are going to have to plan an

airline flight to get to and from Alaska (Canada - next year).

Flights to:

 

Anchorage

Seattle

Fairbanks

Vancouver 

 

Some of the land tour events:

 

Denali park (bus) ride 60 miles into the park (OUTSTANDING)

Paddle boat ride Fairbanks

Wild Life Conservation Park (near Portage)

Alaska Sled dog kennel 

Overnight at Alyeska resort tram ride to the top of a mountain

Ride portions of the Alaska Railroad if not all of it

 

Just some of the events and NOT all these are on one land tour.

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14 minutes ago, don't-use-real-name said:

Almost all the Alaska cruises are 7 days in length - exception those at the beginning and end

of the season with ship positioning cruises. With these early ones starting at San Francisco

or even Los Angeles and visiting 2-3 ports before ending at Vancouver or Seattle to start the

season. I have taken a 10 day end of season cruise from Vancouver to San Francisco.

But the regular norm is 7 days round trip out of Seattle and 7 day one-way Vancouver-Seward

and v-v.

 

The 7-day cruises might be applicable to mega ships, but not necessarily to smaller ships, which have a much greater variety of cruises.

 

In addition to the 7-day Vancouver to Seward, I can think of many additional cruise options from Vancouver, both R/T with a variety of days from 7 to 14, and 1-way cruises to a variety of ports and length of cruise. You can also get 1-way cruises to Seward lasting 10 and 11 days.

 

Of all Vancouver cruises, the percentage that are 7-day to/from Seward is well below 50%.

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21 hours ago, rkacruiser said:

 

Most Alaska cruises are 7 day cruises.  Doing a land tour before the cruise is highly recommended by most cruisers.  Whether Celebrity offers that, I don't know, but I would be surprised if they did not.  Seward is a very pleasant town from which to sail and deserves some time for a visit in its own right.  

 

My choice for Alaskan ports would be Juneau,  Ketchikan,  Skagway, and Sitka in that order.  Be sure to include at least one glacier visit on your itinerary.  Glacier Bay is the most popular with tourists, but Hubbard Glacier is my favorite.  

Thanks!  I did find land and sea options with Celebrity.  The only port not on the itinerary I'm looking at is Sitka.  It does include Hubbard Glacier.

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15 hours ago, Northern Aurora said:

All of the cruise lines offer cruise tours.  Celebrity contracts (or at least did pre-Covid) with Premier Alaska for their land tours.  But I also feel that folks are better off doing a DIY land trip versus any of the cruise line cruise tours.

 

Regarding Seward, the closest commercial airport is Anchorge.  While Seward has a small airstrip there is no commercial service.  And Seward is located in the Kenai Fjords National Park.  

 

I bumped up the very useful thread called something like 2019 Useful Resources compiled by "maple leaves."  It should still be on page 1 of this forum.  Complete list of helpful websites.

 

Thank you!  I will be sure to check it out!

 

15 hours ago, don't-use-real-name said:

Almost all the Alaska cruises are 7 days in length - exception those at the beginning and end

of the season with ship positioning cruises. With these early ones starting at San Francisco

or even Los Angeles and visiting 2-3 ports before ending at Vancouver or Seattle to start the

season. I have taken a 10 day end of season cruise from Vancouver to San Francisco.

But the regular norm is 7 days round trip out of Seattle and 7 day one-way Vancouver-Seward

and v-v.

 

Land tours can be constructed on both ends of the cruises.

There are the more personal recommended DIY doing things you want to do and

then there are the cruise line sponsored ones.

Land tours by the cruise lines can begin in Fairbanks visiting Denali Park and other facilities

using motor coach (THE BUS) and portions of the Alaska RR (Very highly recommended).

These tours eventually arrive at the ports of Whittier or Seward to board your cruise ship.

 

NOTE:  I prefer the land tour before the cruise - reason the first part of the trip will not be so

relaxing as you are living out of a suitcase from night to night and moving daily to a new

overnight lodging place - FINALLY you get on the ship and can relax getting away from all

that pack-unpack movement stuff.  If you do take the cruise first prepare yourself for a

relaxing time and then an unsettling experience of an another different place to lodge each night.

DIY exception here.

 

Whichever way you put your travel package together - you are going to have to plan an

airline flight to get to and from Alaska (Canada - next year).

Flights to:

 

Anchorage

Seattle

Fairbanks

Vancouver 

 

Some of the land tour events:

 

Denali park (bus) ride 60 miles into the park (OUTSTANDING)

Paddle boat ride Fairbanks

Wild Life Conservation Park (near Portage)

Alaska Sled dog kennel 

Overnight at Alyeska resort tram ride to the top of a mountain

Ride portions of the Alaska Railroad if not all of it

 

Just some of the events and NOT all these are on one land tour.

Thanks for all the information!  This is so different than planning a Caribbean cruise!

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The land stuff I love in Alaska are not included on a cruise line tour. Anchorage is great, I love the Kenai. Denali is ok, but not my favorite. One of those places to check off the box, but now I’ve done it, that was good enough and don’t want to do it again, especially for the cost. 
 

do the cruise out of Seward. Seward is a great little town. Stop at girdwood. And again, the Kenai peninsula is just fantastic. 
 

If it was me, I’d skip Denali and spend a few days in the Kenai. 

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57 minutes ago, rsldonk said:

The land stuff I love in Alaska are not included on a cruise line tour. Anchorage is great, I love the Kenai. Denali is ok, but not my favorite. One of those places to check off the box, but now I’ve done it, that was good enough and don’t want to do it again, especially for the cost. 
 

do the cruise out of Seward. Seward is a great little town. Stop at girdwood. And again, the Kenai peninsula is just fantastic. 
 

If it was me, I’d skip Denali and spend a few days in the Kenai. 

 

My most recent Alaska trip was the Summer, 2019 where I made my first visits to Denali and to Kenai Fjords National Park.  I enjoyed both.  Both were different.  Denali has a different "feel" about it than does Kenai.  If I had to choose between the two for another visit, I think I agree with you and choose another visit to Kenai Fjords.  

 

Other than seeing the wildlife that we saw--and the Mountain, of course--at Denali, I enjoyed maybe the most getting out the community itself, driving North to Healy and experiencing a "different Alaska" than Anchorage or Seward.  

 

Your comment that "Anchorage is great":  I agree.  Far too many visitors to Alaska think of it as "just another city", but, it offers opportunities for a visitor that I have found to be interesting and worthy of my time to experience.  

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1 hour ago, rsldonk said:

The land stuff I love in Alaska are not included on a cruise line tour. Anchorage is great, I love the Kenai. Denali is ok, but not my favorite. One of those places to check off the box, but now I’ve done it, that was good enough and don’t want to do it again, especially for the cost. 
 

do the cruise out of Seward. Seward is a great little town. Stop at girdwood. And again, the Kenai peninsula is just fantastic. 
 

If it was me, I’d skip Denali and spend a few days in the Kenai. 

With it being our first time there, we'd like to do the easy route and just go with the cruisetour package.

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6 minutes ago, NCteacherlovescruising said:

With it being our first time there, we'd like to do the easy route and just go with the cruisetour package.

 

There is nothing wrong with your thinking.  Letting someone else "take the lead" in handling the "details" of a tourist area until one "understands the lay of the land" is what I have done on many occasions in different parts of the world.  DIY is great if one is comfortable with that and has some knowledge/understanding of what one is getting into for that area.  

Edited by rkacruiser
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3 hours ago, NCteacherlovescruising said:

With it being our first time there, we'd like to do the easy route and just go with the cruisetour package.

That’s a perfectly acceptable route. That’s why those packages exist. One of the big draws for me to Alaska is fishing and a cruise tour is not a good way to do that. But everyone has their preferences. 
 

I think my favorite Alaska experience was last summer doing a float trip, fishing on the upper Kasilof river. It was absolutely beautiful and worth the trip without catching fish. Add to that we limited out for the day which made it even better. 

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Unlike others, I prefer the cruise first portion first for Holland America (HAL) cruisetours.  The cruise portion in Alaska is mostly early mornings and full days on excursions with much reduced sleep time.  The land portion is lots of sitting on buses and trains, partial-day excursions, and lots of sleep opportunities.  I arrange all of my land tours to end in Anchorage since getting flights out of Fairbanks during the day are difficult. 

 

HAL logistics folks are masters of luggage, accommodations, tickets, transportation, and keeping all informed.  The land portion of a cruisetour allows only one piece of luggage and small carry-on item (purse, small backpack, etc).  Only on the cruise portion will you have all of your luggage and HAL does a great job of marrying you with your luggage.

 

As a photographer, Denali was amazing for wildlife opportunities and glacier landings in the mountain snow.  I used the HAL meal plan once but not on my following land tours.  To be cost effective, I had to eat the most expensive items on the menu and eat every course.  McKinley Resort food prices were decent and the portions huge.

 

The top photo was taken about 15 feet from my bus window as a sow and cub strolled down the road beside the bus.

 

https://www.rogerjett-photography.com/here/wp-content/gallery/brown-bears/FILE049-2-2.jpg

 

https://www.rogerjett-photography.com/here/wp-content/gallery/caribou/P6100509.jpg

 

https://www.rogerjett-photography.com/here/wp-content/gallery/fly-denali/P6110576.jpg

 

https://www.rogerjett-photography.com/here/wp-content/gallery/denali-park/P6100451-Edit.jpg

 

https://www.rogerjett-photography.com/here/wp-content/gallery/denali-park/P6100446-Edit.jpg

 

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20 hours ago, rsldonk said:

The land stuff I love in Alaska are not included on a cruise line tour. Anchorage is great, I love the Kenai. Denali is ok, but not my favorite. One of those places to check off the box, but now I’ve done it, that was good enough and don’t want to do it again, especially for the cost. 
 

do the cruise out of Seward. Seward is a great little town. Stop at girdwood. And again, the Kenai peninsula is just fantastic. 
 

If it was me, I’d skip Denali and spend a few days in the Kenai. 

Totally agree with you. Have never done a cruise but have been going up there for 25+ years fishing. Have seen things not seen on cruises. Will be there from 6/21 to 8/5 this year fishing again.

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Just now, diesel1973 said:

Totally agree with you. Have never done a cruise but have been going up there for 25+ years fishing. Have seen things not seen on cruises. Will be there from 6/21 to 8/5 this year fishing again.

I only get a week, so 7/21 to 7/28

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