Denali Natural History Tour vs Tundra Tour

[hmcrn]

We are taking a Pre Cruise Tour through Princess Cruiseline.  The offered tour is the Natural History tour.  However it is my understanding that we can change this to the Tundra tour on our own.  Should we do this?  

With the road closed at mile 43, I wasn't sure if it would be worth changing to the Tundra tour.  

It sounds like the Natural history tour focuses more on the history of the park and the Tundra tour focuses on the wildlife?

Thank you in advance for all tips and information!

[Paula_MacFan]

I recommend switching. We are literally sitting in the airport now traveling home from our 15 day cruisetour. We upgraded to the TWT and were glad we did. Our tour took almost 6 hours and we saw grizzly, caribou, fox, sheep, moose, and birds. We had a great guide and a wonderful day. We saw the turn around point for the history tour and ours went miles/hours longer. 

 

Edit to say you can have your TA or Princess rep make the upgrade for you and charge the difference. The tour picks up right from the lodge so it's very handy. At the end you have the option to stay at the park visitor center or return to the Princess lodge.

Edited June 8 by Paula_MacFan

[karylrocks]

Definitely change the tundra tour! It was much more interesting seeing the changes in the landscape and learning so much about the land and the animals.

[hmcrn]

Sounds like a plan!  

Thank you @Paula_MacFan and @karylrocks!

 

@Paula_MacFan - How many days of the tour portion did you do?  On Princess? 

Did you do the tour before or after the cruise?  I would love to know any other specifics that we may need! Thanks in advance!

 

[Paula_MacFan]

21 hours ago, hmcrn said:

 

@Paula_MacFan - How many days of the tour portion did you do?  On Princess? 

Did you do the tour before or after the cruise?  I would love to know any other specifics that we may need! Thanks in advance!

 

We did a 7 day land tour prior to the 7 day cruise on Princess.  We added on an extra day in the beginning to allow for our late evening flight and to acclimate to the time difference.  We were very glad we did this, as the first official day of the tour was long with all day excursions.  Having that extra day allowed us to get rested up.  Our land tour was 3 nights in Fairbanks, 2 nights in Denali, 1 night at McKinley, and 2 nights Kenai.  We enjoyed all the lodges and the excursions we chose.  We are very independent travelers and chose the 'Off the Beaten Path' option which included one all day excursion in Fairbanks, the Denali Natural History Tour which we upgraded to the Tundra Wilderness Tour, and transfers to and from the airport.  I know some people here on CC recommend doing the land tour on your own to save money, but I did the math and everything we got in the package was comparable in price to doing it on our own.  Transportation costs are high and car rentals on your own can be very costly.  We found the Princess package to fit our needs and didn't cost much more than doing it on our own, and they took care of everything.  Princess has the lodge system and luggage movement down to an art.

 

Also I would advise booking everything as early as you can.  We booked a couple years ago and I priced everything close to the cruise and it would have cost us $5,928 more if we had booked closer to sailing.  That was flights, excursions, etc, which all went up in price. 

 

We did the land tour first which I recommend so you can relax on the cruise afterwards.  We chose the southbound cruise and enjoyed that very much.  

 

There is lots of information here on CC and other sources.  I recommend doing lots of reading and research.

 

Our top excursions and activities were 1) Denali Tundra Wilderness Tour, 2) Kenai Fjords National Park boat tour (all day), 3) DIY Jeep rental in Skagway (this was our 2nd time doing this, really enjoy it), and 4) the all day Riverboat Discovery/Gold Dredge excursion included in Fairbanks.  We did other things too but those were our favorites.  

 

All the Princess lodges were nice in their own way, but we liked the Kenai lodge the best.  It's the smallest and most remote, but each unit it like its own cabin with a wood burning stove and cut wood.  Our unit was larger and had 2 separate rooms, with an outdoor porch.  

 

Good luck in your planning 🙂 

[CCJack]

4 hours ago, Paula_MacFan said:

I know some people here on CC recommend doing the land tour on your own to save money, but I did the math and everything we got in the package was comparable in price to doing it on our own.

I agree, we did the RCCL cruise tour and enjoyed it very much.   I enjoyed the company of the other passengers and commentary from the guide and driver.   Others may like to drive themselves and may enjoy a DIY more.   DIY definitely would give you more flexibility, but I liked the cruisetour.

 

I would definitely upgrade to wilderness tour (now called tundra??).   I can't speak for Princess but for RCCL this would not have required you to upgrade before you left.  Our guide on the bus asked who wanted to upgrade (and strongly suggested everyone upgrade, which everyone did).  

 

The Denali shuttle bus also goes as far as the wilderness tour, but we found that our wilderness bus would stop by a Grizzly bear, as an example, for quite a while to observe.   The shuttle would also stop next to us to see the same bear but would not stay more than a minute or two, I suspect they have a schedule to keep.

 

Have fun...

 

[goofygame]

10 hours ago, CCJack said:

I agree, we did the RCCL cruise tour and enjoyed it very much.   I enjoyed the company of the other passengers and commentary from the guide and driver.   Others may like to drive themselves and may enjoy a DIY more.   DIY definitely would give you more flexibility, but I liked the cruisetour.

 

I would definitely upgrade to wilderness tour (now called tundra??).   I can't speak for Princess but for RCCL this would not have required you to upgrade before you left.  Our guide on the bus asked who wanted to upgrade (and strongly suggested everyone upgrade, which everyone did).  

 

The Denali shuttle bus also goes as far as the wilderness tour, but we found that our wilderness bus would stop by a Grizzly bear, as an example, for quite a while to observe.   The shuttle would also stop next to us to see the same bear but would not stay more than a minute or two, I suspect they have a schedule to keep.

 

Have fun...

 

Which Cruise Tour did you do with Royal?  And how did you upgrade before you left?  We are going the end of August and are finding the information on the Cruise Tour to be a bit lacking.    

[CCJack]

5 hours ago, goofygame said:

Which Cruise Tour did you do with Royal?  And how did you upgrade before you left?  We are going the end of August and are finding the information on the Cruise Tour to be a bit lacking.    

We did the 5 day post cruise.   My only complaint was the lack of information before hand, practically nothing.   Ours was post cruise, and on ship the guest services could tell us nothing about the land trip.  However, once we boarded the buses, the tours were well organized and they explained everything.   I don't recall how we upgraded the Denali tour but we did and I know others did after they were on the bus.  We took few excursions on the land tour and mostly did day hikes on our own.  

 

Alyeska was the nicest resort of the trip (it is a ski resort) we never left the property hiking around the woods and taking their free tram up the mountain.

 

Talkeetna is a quirky little town.  The cruislines will put you up at lodging outside of town a few miles.   Our lodge had beautiful views facing Denali.  You could sign up for a 4 am wakeup call - they would call you if Denali clouds cleared up and the peak was visible.  We signed up but didn't get called, it was not visible.  It may be  difficult to see the peak anytime on your trip due to clouds at that altitude.  A lot of people take big excursions by plane or helicopter from Talkeetna to see Denali.  We did not but I am sure they are beautiful excursions. 

 

At Denali RCCL put us up at a lodge a couple miles from the park entrance.  Princess lodges are closer to the entrance.  However, we again did some hiking using trailheads near our lodge (outside of the park), when we were not on the wilderness tour inside the park.

 

There is a lot of travel time involved, but these tours give you a chance to see a completely different part of Alaska then what you will see on the cruise.  

 

 

 

[chakram420]

Anyone looking into taking cruise offered land tour for Denali, make sure you review their itinerary. If Tundra Wilderness is your preference, ensure it's listed. And make sure that cruise line doesn't change it arbitrary to Natural History tour. It happened to me with NCL as I booked specific land tour as Tundra was listed and now when checked in - it's changed to Natural History tour. And I have to pay again if need Tundra. 

From what I have read - Tundra is definitely better than natural history tour. More mileage into the park, while not much difference in time. (43 miles v/s 16 miles) 

Yes, East Fork Transit option at much lower cost is available, but you also need to book it in advance.