Seattle vs Vancouver To Alaska

[RS79]

My wife and I are looking at Alaska cruises, and are comparing a Seattle roundtrip versus a Vancouver to Whittier routing. Other than the obvious issue with flights, what are the trade-offs between the two routings? We would appreciate any thoughts on this. Thanks.

[leiny]

We chose the Vancouver/Whittier trip for the itinerary plus we wanted to see Vancouver. On this trip you get to go to Glacier Bay and College Fjord to see all the glaciers plus it's the greatest opportunity to see whales, seals, etc. Would highly recommend it. I don't think the Seattle trip goes that far north.

 

We just returned and had wonderful weather.

[Atomica]

I'm biased because I live in (well, near) Vancouver - it's certainly the more scenic sailaway, and generally speaking sailings from Vancouver spend more time in the inside passage, whereas sailings from Seattle tend to head for the Pacific Ocean & cruise the west side of Vancouver Island instead.

[whale-watcher]

We are just back from a vancouver round trip sailing on the Tahitian...sailing north on the inside passage but south on the west side of vancouver island. True, the scenery was a little better on the east side of the island, but much of that passage takes place at night. The final leg of our outside passage southbound leg (through the strait of juan de fuca) was also rather scenic (when it wasn't fogged in we had nice views of the olympic mountains). We also had better bird and whale sightings on the west coast of the island, but also rougher seas.

If I were planning a 7 day itinerary I would still choose the one way routing because of glacier bay and college fjord, but I would sail the 14 day seattle round trip itinerary on the Pacific Princess without any hesitation (we are considering doing just that next year).

[Putterdude]

There is no question that the sailings are much more scenic as the ships sail a full Inside Passage route where as the sailings out of Seattle go up the west side of Vancouver Is. where the seas are rougher and you are out of sight of land.

[sunsetbeachgal]

You might want to consider doing the Inside Passage (Whittier to Vancouver) in the Southbound direction-the last day when you are at sea coming south into Vancouver is absolutely gorgeous all day long-amazing scenery. The trade-off is that you are in Glacier Bay the first day, very early, rather than in the afternoon if you are doing the cruise Northbound.

[robinsegg]

Northbound, the Coral entered Glacier Bay National Park at about 5:30 a.m. We weren't at the glaciers until later that morning, but around the entrance to the park was where to see whales, sea otters, etc.

[Colo Cruiser]

Seattle is a great option as the air availibility/cost to Anchorage/Vancouver may deter most from doing this. ;)

[malcliz]

I agree that the scenery on the last day before arriving at Vancouver is really breathtaking. We had a calm sunny day and the scenery looked wonderful, accompanied by 3 orcas and lots of porpoises while we had dinner!

[Putterdude]

Vancouver remains the largest port for Alaska cruises. Seattle's traffic is approximately 800,000 vs Vancouver's 960,000 pax. Seattle has 9 ships homeported there vs Vancouver's 15 (not including the smaller ships) and Seattle will have 211 cruise ship calls vs Vancouver's 275 calls.