Celebrity Eclipse: Mendenhall Glacier Canoe Paddle and Trek. Footwear?

[Mandy1021]

The celebrity tour mentions that hiking boots are not included and then goes on to say waterproof shoes are preferred. My husband and I canoe at home and often wear a water shoe...We head on our cruise in a couple weeks (July 3rd)- Are our feet going to be too cold? We have plans earlier in the week to do a whale watching tour (not through Celebrity) and our tour guide said just a plain walking shoe would be fine for that and to wear layers everywhere else so now I'm just worrying about what I should be packing. 

 

Has anyone ever done the tour (or something similar) that can offer some insight? 

 

Any help would be appreciated :). 

[Anita Latte]

I suppose it depends on your cold tolerance. Mendenhall water is glacier fed and it is COLD. I only touched it when we hiked down to Nugget Falls...Brrrrr.

[Charmedone619]

I just took this tour. The group provided you with knee high rain boots with a slight grip on them.  You can wear hiking boots if you want, but several parts of the trek require walking through water. 
 

I didn’t find the boots offered great support, but I appreciated the knee high waterproof to keep me dry.  I didn’t find that my feet were cold at all.  
 

I don’t think I can give the tour company name out, but if you Google the name of the excursion, the company will come up and they outline all that they provide for your trip. They give you rain pants and jacket, rain boots, a dry pack, a filled water bottle to keep, a snack bag with lots of snacks, and a floatation vest. 
 

For what it’s worth, the excursion was great, but they will not walk you directly onto the glacier because it is no longer safe.  You do get very close to the glacier though and it was quite a fun, but strenuous, trek. 
 

I can answer any other questions if you have them! 

[Mandy1021]

Double posted due to my poor internet connection. My apologies 

Edited June 23, 2022 by Mandy1021

[Mandy1021]

12 hours ago, Charmedone619 said:

I just took this tour. The group provided you with knee high rain boots with a slight grip on them.  You can wear hiking boots if you want, but several parts of the trek require walking through water. 
 

I didn’t find the boots offered great support, but I appreciated the knee high waterproof to keep me dry.  I didn’t find that my feet were cold at all.  
 

I don’t think I can give the tour company name out, but if you Google the name of the excursion, the company will come up and they outline all that they provide for your trip. They give you rain pants and jacket, rain boots, a dry pack, a filled water bottle to keep, a snack bag with lots of snacks, and a floatation vest. 
 

For what it’s worth, the excursion was great, but they will not walk you directly onto the glacier because it is no longer safe.  You do get very close to the glacier though and it was quite a fun, but strenuous, trek. 
 

I can answer any other questions if you have them! 

Thank you for your quick reply, this was just the answer I was looking for! I did google it and saw a company pop up but because the List of what they included was slightly different than the description on Celebrity's site I wasn't sure if they were the same company or not. 

 

 

 

I normally wear barefoot shoes so I'm not thrilled to wear uncomfortable rain boots but I'd rather not have wet feet. Was it very cold when you went? 

 

 

 

Unrelated but did you also visit Ketchikan by chance? Nothing has jumped out at us as an excursion to do. Might just walk around the small town at this point. 

 

 

[SueMo]

I did a raft trip once on the Mendenhall and trust me, you don't want to get wet!  I did and I was shivering from the ice cold glacier water!  Wear the boots!

[Charmedone619]

The brand of boots that I got were Bogs, but they had a few different ones they were using.  They weren’t uncomfortable, I just like to have more ankle support when I go over rocky terrain and they don’t have that at all. 
 

We did go to Ketchikan.  On advice of the speaker onboard we headed to the Rainbird Trail, which I would highly recommend.  There are three points of access for the trailhead, but if you want to walk there from the port, look for Schoenbar Road.  You follow up an extremely steep hill and once at the top, follow the trail signs to the left that take you up to the trail.  You will see a set of stairs off of the road.  It took about 20-30 min to get there from the ship. 
 

After we hiked the trail we took a different road to get to the Totem Museum and then looped back into town (Creek Street) on the way to the ship.  It was a long distance to walk, but very doable if you are active.  

[Charmedone619]

If it’s not against thread rules, the name of the tour company was Above and Beyond Alaska and they are run very well. 

[TheValleyGirl]

12 hours ago, Charmedone619 said:

If it’s not against thread rules, the name of the tour company was Above and Beyond Alaska and they are run very well. 

Did you just take the ABAK tour this season? We did the Mendenhall Glacier Paddle & Trek with ABAK (via Princess) 5 years ago and it may be my favorite all-time excursion ever. But back in 2017, we were able to trek on the glacier and go through the awe-inspiring ice caves. We have it booked for our July cruise and I knew about the glacial retreat, but it sounds like global warming has taken a toll on tour accessibility. Our tour was very well organized and we felt safe -- my kids still remember the huge snack pack (yet one doesn't even remember being anchored to the edge of a tube). Did you feel like you were able to take in the full glacier experience? Really hoping 2017 wasn't our "once-in-a-lifetime" chance!

[Mandy1021]

On 6/23/2022 at 9:36 AM, SueMo said:

I did a raft trip once on the Mendenhall and trust me, you don't want to get wet!  I did and I was shivering from the ice cold glacier water!  Wear the boots!

Thank you, we will! 😊 

[Mandy1021]

On 6/23/2022 at 9:37 AM, Charmedone619 said:

The brand of boots that I got were Bogs, but they had a few different ones they were using.  They weren’t uncomfortable, I just like to have more ankle support when I go over rocky terrain and they don’t have that at all. 
 

We did go to Ketchikan.  On advice of the speaker onboard we headed to the Rainbird Trail, which I would highly recommend.  There are three points of access for the trailhead, but if you want to walk there from the port, look for Schoenbar Road.  You follow up an extremely steep hill and once at the top, follow the trail signs to the left that take you up to the trail.  You will see a set of stairs off of the road.  It took about 20-30 min to get there from the ship. 
 

After we hiked the trail we took a different road to get to the Totem Museum and then looped back into town (Creek Street) on the way to the ship.  It was a long distance to walk, but very doable if you are active.  

Good to know, thank you! 

 

Thank you for the suggestion! I have saved this post to my phone so I can reference it on our trip :) 

[Charmedone619]

On 6/23/2022 at 10:14 PM, TheValleyGirl said:

Did you just take the ABAK tour this season? We did the Mendenhall Glacier Paddle & Trek with ABAK (via Princess) 5 years ago and it may be my favorite all-time excursion ever. But back in 2017, we were able to trek on the glacier and go through the awe-inspiring ice caves. We have it booked for our July cruise and I knew about the glacial retreat, but it sounds like global warming has taken a toll on tour accessibility. Our tour was very well organized and we felt safe -- my kids still remember the huge snack pack (yet one doesn't even remember being anchored to the edge of a tube). Did you feel like you were able to take in the full glacier experience? Really hoping 2017 wasn't our "once-in-a-lifetime" chance!

I took it this week. Based on your picture, I would say that your last trip probably was your once in a lifetime chance.  We were able to get right up next to the glacier, but that was about it.  The trip was still amazing, but not the “on the glacier” experience I was hoping for.  They still have the huge snack pack and are very well organized and guided. 

[TheValleyGirl]

4 hours ago, Charmedone619 said:

I took it this week. Based on your picture, I would say that your last trip probably was your once in a lifetime chance.  We were able to get right up next to the glacier, but that was about it.  The trip was still amazing, but not the “on the glacier” experience I was hoping for.  They still have the huge snack pack and are very well organized and guided. 

Thank you for the feedback. We are considering alternate plans because we will be on Crown Princess and poor lady is struggling to keep her port times already with repairs long overdue. So at the very least, we will have a backup plan. It was an amazing excursion when we did it, maybe another year and earlier in the season we'll have better luck!