Questions for Alaska Cruisetour

[IhnSjn123]

My husband and I are trying to book an Alaska trip for 14-17 days, with about 8 or 9 nights being on land and the rest on the cruise ship. We will most likely book with Princess or HAL,  unless someone can convince us otherwise. 🙂 We won't have kids with us and we're retired, so we won't be using Carnival, RC or Disney. We also absolutely love the evening shows so we won't be booking on the smaller lines like Viking and Regent. We really like Celebrity but I don't see a cruise long enough for what we want ( I cant see where they go through glacier bay either so....).  I'm having trouble deciding on a few things and wonder what y'all think........If we use Princess or HAL, does anyone know if they have decent bedding in their cabins? We both have somewhat bad backs and a bad mattress will ruin our next day. I know it's not the Ritz, but I'd hope they are at least decent beds. Also, did anyone find the Denali tour through the park to be too short or too long? I'm not sure if we want to do the classic 5 hour tour or upgrade to the 8 hour trip. Last question......it sounds as if the railway that takes us from one city to the next is used by all tour companies, not just the cruise line I will be traveling with. Was that your experience? Meaning, my Princess group for example would also travel with those using HAL and Celebrity, etc.  I'm open to any opinions and truly appreciate your help. Oh, and I'm curious to know if someone just planned their own tour and pieced it all tighter themselves. If so, was it worth it and would you do it again? This may be my only time to travel to Alaska so Im really trying to make it as good as I can.                                                                            

[AKStafford]

The cruise lines do a great job with the cruise in Southeast Alaska. But in my opinion their land tours are lacking. I drove bus for them for two years and it often felt like people were just being herded from spot to spot. I think a better route is to book a rental car and put together your own great trip. You can see what you want to see on your own schedule. There's nothing offered on a cruisetour that can't be booked independently.

[Crew News]

23 hours ago, IhnSjn123 said:

........If we use Princess or HAL, does anyone know if they have decent bedding in their cabins? We both have somewhat bad backs and a bad mattress will ruin our next day. I know it's not the Ritz, but I'd hope they are at least decent beds. Also, did anyone find the Denali tour through the park to be too short or too long? I'm not sure if we want to do the classic 5 hour tour or upgrade to the 8 hour trip. Last question......it sounds as if the railway that takes us from one city to the next is used by all tour companies, not just the cruise line I will be traveling with. Was that your experience? Meaning, my Princess group for example would also travel with those using HAL and Celebrity, etc.  I'm open to any opinions and truly appreciate your help. Oh, and I'm curious to know if someone just planned their own tour and pieced it all tighter themselves. If so, was it worth it and would you do it again? This may be my only time to travel to Alaska so Im really trying to make it as good as I can.                                                                            

Welcome to Cruise Critic.

 

Holland America beds are the best beds that i have experienced.  They are supportive and comfortable. 

 

Alaska tours through the cruise lines are now limited to just 43 miles due to a rock slide closing the road.  The Denali bus makes a number of restroom stops as well as stops when wildlife is spotted.  The time passes quickly when you are watching the wildlife.  I also strongly recommend a flight with landing up in the Denali mountains.

 

 

Same train for all cruise lines but separate cars.  You will travel with those with whom you started the tour portion of your cruisetour.

 

As a hobby photographer, Denali was a feast for wildlife.  A grizzly bear and cub passed only a few feet from my bus and never looked up at all of the cameras at the bus windows.

 

Here is a link to the photo reviews (menus, restaurants, excursions, train, etc) that I have taken on my trips with HAL cruisetours to Denali:

Denali Cruisetours

 

[GTJ]

8 hours ago, AKStafford said:

I drove bus for [the cruise lines] for two years and it often felt like people were just being herded from spot to spot. I think a better route is to book a rental car and put together your own great trip. You can see what you want to see on your own schedule. There's nothing offered on a cruisetour that can't be booked independently.

Did you drive for Premier Alaska Tours, Royal Hyway Tours, or both? Any noticeable differences between the two, other than HAP Alaska directly controlling more things themselves (e.g., hotels)? My take, not having had as much daily experience as you, is that the work is fairly similar to most regular-route carriers (e.g., Greyhound Lines, Jefferson Lines), having a regular schedule routinely transporting passengers from A to B, and other passengers from B to A, arguably "herding" the passengers each day. The differences, I imagine, are having to do much baggage handling, beautiful landscape, and having fewer difficult or disruptive passengers compared to the regular-route carriers. But not like driving a charter, or one of the periodic tours, that many carriers operate, where it is a unique trip each time. Rather, a routine job, though one where being upbeat with passengers each day makes it better for all. Do you concur with my perception?

Edited February 11, 2023 by GTJ

[AKStafford]

2 hours ago, GTJ said:

Did you drive for Premier Alaska Tours, Royal Hyway Tours, or both?

I drove for Holland America. This would've been 2001/2002. The first year was doing 16 to 20 hour days 2 to 3 times a week doing ship transfers between Seward and Anchorage. If you had driving hours left, you might pick up a Portage Tour or a Denali run. The second season I got to pick a few weeks of being with a cruisetour group over several days in a row.

[Coral]

If the cruise line tour has Natural History tour - you can often upgrade to the Tundra tour assuming you have enough time in the park. Currently they are repairing the road in Denali due to the rock slide:

 

https://www.nps.gov/dena/planyourvisit/conditions.htm

 

Some park operations are currently altered due to the Pretty Rocks Landslide. The closure of the Denali Park Road at Mile 43 is expected to remain in place through summer 2024, while the Polychrome Area Plan is implemented.

The details below supersede all other trip-planning information. If you encounter discrepancies between other parts of our website and this information, go with what you see below.

 

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Beds are so subjective and it also depends on where it is on the life cycle of getting replaced. I find both beds on Princess and HAL to be comfortable. Princess used to have awful beds but they had changed vendors with their new beds before COVID - now their beds are fine: 

 

https://www.princess.com/ships-and-experience/princess-luxury-bed/ 

 

I would also consider you look at doing a land tour yourself. Lots of options. I do like spending time in Seward, AK. 

 

The railroad itself is the same. Cruise lines have their own cars in Alaska.

Edited February 11, 2023 by Coral

[ibfishing2]

I did the Land/cruise on Royal Caribbean and Holland.  I believe Holland to be the best. 

Regardless of which cruise line you choose, Do the Land portion first.  Then relax on the cruise.

[Coral]

5 hours ago, ibfishing2 said:

I did the Land/cruise on Royal Caribbean and Holland.  I believe Holland to be the best. 

Regardless of which cruise line you choose, Do the Land portion first.  Then relax on the cruise.

Though IMO - I am never relaxing on my cruise. I have tours booked all day and am on deck all day during glacier days.

[ibfishing2]

My 1st land / sea, I did cruise 1st.  Had a relaxing cruise and then experienced the rush- rush of the land portion.  I was so tired after my trip.  The next time I did the land (rush her, rush there) first and then went to ship.  What a difference.

[kickboxrca]

@ibfishing2 100% - we were exhausted at the end of our land tour ... and I can see why people are willing to pay more to do the cruise second!!!

 

Haha - that said, we would do it all again in a heartbeat.  And as for planning it on our own, yes, it is definitely doable, but it was super easy and convenient to just put out our bags and hop on the next leg - planes, trains, boats....

 

I can't imagine doing everything we did and then drive ourselves from place to place.  It was so nice to sit on the bus (or plane or train), and just listen to our bus driver and cruise tour guide talk about where we were going next and what we would do there.  The accommodations along the way were good (I would not say posh) - but definitely good - and quite posh for Alaska standards.  We ran into a couple of people doing the land tours on their own, and they definitely looked worse for the wear.

 

We did an 11 day cruise tour through AK/YK last summer.

[PHXscuba]

3 hours ago, kickboxrca said:

It was so nice to sit on the bus (or plane or train), and just listen to our bus driver and cruise tour guide talk about where we were going next and what we would do there.  ... We ran into a couple of people doing the land tours on their own, and they definitely looked worse for the wear.

 

THIS is why we are doing the cruisetour although I know I am perfectly capable of planning my own. If we drive ourselves I will do lots of worrying/navigating and my husband will do all the driving and he won't get to relax and enjoy.

 

PHXscuba

[donaldsc]

3 hours ago, PHXscuba said:

THIS is why we are doing the cruisetour although I know I am perfectly capable of planning my own. If we drive ourselves I will do lots of worrying/navigating and my husband will do all the driving and he won't get to relax and enjoy.

 

PHXscuba

 

Different strokes for different folks.  I would not want to be on a bus tour and not in control  of where I am going and where I am stopping and what tours shops I am not going to.  As far as driving - navigating is easy as I let Miz Garmin do the navigating and I enjoy driving more than sitting on the wrong side of the bus as we pass w/o stopping at a particularly interesting place or there is a moose or bear on the side of the road.   Also some of the really interesting visits we have made on a trip were when we were driving and we saw a sign pointing to a place or event that we didn't even was there until we turned off our planned route and went to it.

 

DON

[Kathscof]

10 hours ago, PHXscuba said:

THIS is why we are doing the cruisetour although I know I am perfectly capable of planning my own. If we drive ourselves I will do lots of worrying/navigating and my husband will do all the driving and he won't get to relax and enjoy.

 

PHXscuba

 

I know that the train doesn't go a lot of places, but for our 7 days before our cruise that we are doing on our own, it goes everywhere we need to be.  The only thing we have to worry about logistics/transportation is how to get to our hotels from the trains/tours....which is super easy 🙂 So, if CAN be done without a cruisetour 🙂