Alaska: Did you dock in town, or need to shuttle?

[dcsam]

We have narrowed down our choices to either the Regatta or Holland America Eurodam. I know Holland America has great docks spaces - typically right in town. We’ve cruised the same itinerary with HAL before.   Curious about the areas Regatta docks.  Can anybody share their experience with this?  
Thank you

[Sarnia 432]

Which ports?

[AMHuntFerry]

You can see exactly who is scheduled at each dock at https://claalaska.com/

The 2023 and 2024 schedules for each location are posted. You'll probably need the berth code and ship code docs at the top of the schedule page to make sense of the schedules.

Oceania does not get fantastic spots unless they are somewhere small like Wrangell.

Have fun!

[dcsam]

Thank you! 
The ports vary according to sailing date, which we haven’t decided yet.  But most itineraries include Ketchikan, Juneau.  One that interests me the most includes Skagway.  
   Off subject, but it seems there was quite a bit of availability a couple weeks ago, and now many dates are waitlisted.  Guess we should decide sooner than later. 
Thanks again!

[PSR]

In Ketchikan, the NCL re-built dock is outside of town and you have to take a shuttle that takes about 15-20 min. I think. I have been to Ketchikan on the Regatta, but did not take the shuttle, since I have been to the town many times. I just stayed at the dock (there is a shopping mini-mall) and did not do any shore excursions, either. For the rest of the ports there was no tendering but the docking locations were not as handy as HAL has (we have been on HAL many times). In Juneau we were at the 2nd furthermost away dock ( "Franklin", I believe) about 2 miles walking from downtown Juneau, but nearer the mountain tram than HAL docks. As mentioned above, you can check out the docking spots on the claalaska site, which is pretty accurate.

[dcsam]

PSR,

Like you, we’ve cruised with HAL to Alaska many times.  But this would be a first for Oceania.  If you were to do Alaska again, which line would you book with?

[PSR]

Well, we're going from LA to Alaska-Vancouver on Oceania in May, and HAL on a b2b Vancouver-Whittier-Vancouver in September, so I guess we like them both! We live in California and as we get older it's getting harder to fly long distances. We've been to Europe and South America on HAL, but now we're staying closer to home.🙂

[DOJO466]

9 hours ago, PSR said:

Well, we're going from LA to Alaska-Vancouver on Oceania in May, and HAL on a b2b Vancouver-Whittier-Vancouver in September, so I guess we like them both! We live in California and as we get older it's getting harder to fly long distances. We've been to Europe and South America on HAL, but now we're staying closer to home.🙂

welcome, I am on your sailing. Check us out on Roll Call, not very active at all.

In Juneau we are docked at Franklin 2 mile walk. 

for Ketchikan, we are in West Cove  new docks. 7 miles from Ketchikan eek. I hope there is a shuttle.

[LuAnn]

13 hours ago, PSR said:

Well, we're going from LA to Alaska-Vancouver on Oceania in May, and HAL on a b2b Vancouver-Whittier-Vancouver in September, so I guess we like them both! We live in California and as we get older it's getting harder to fly long distances. We've been to Europe and South America on HAL, but now we're staying closer to home.🙂

I'm on your sailing as well. Where are you coming from in CA? Any chance it's San Diego? 🙂

[AMHuntFerry]

11 hours ago, DOJO466 said:

welcome, I am on your sailing. Check us out on Roll Call, not very active at all.

In Juneau we are docked at Franklin 2 mile walk. 

for Ketchikan, we are in West Cove  new docks. 7 miles from Ketchikan eek. I hope there is a shuttle.

There is a free shuttle into town that drops off at one of the cruise ship berths (2?). I think it is about 20 minutes one way. Be sure to know when the last shuttle leaves as it's something like 1.5 hours before departure.

[PSR]

On 2/28/2023 at 2:39 PM, LuAnn said:

I'm on your sailing as well. Where are you coming from in CA? Any chance it's San Diego? 🙂

 

Nice city, but no. We live in Northern California near Sacramento.