alaska

[Donalds_best_pal]

Hi,

We might be trying a alaskan cruise in 06. Having so much trouble deciding on what to do. We are looking at cruise tours on Princess. 7 night Coral Princess cruise and then 4 night land tour. Then celebrity looks nice also. Then we also looked at roundtrip cruises on Radience of the Seas. Looks like a great ship. Might have slightly more for families but all the others are suppose to be good to for families. Any opinions anyone? Only princess cruise goes to glacier bay out of all our choices. I just really dont now. Let me know your advice

Matt

 

[lookingforward]

We sailed in Alaska in 2003. I would not recommend RCCL (we sailed them) because they do not have the best ice glacier routes. Stick with Princess or Holland America. They have the very best glacier routes. Seems the glaciers are very fragile and only a small number of cruise ship sailings are allowed through. Holland America is the old veteran in Alaska and has the best rights to those sailings. They also seem to have (along with Princess) the best land tours. I think Crystal is a good line too but I am not sure about their Glacier sailings. Crystal allows kids to sail FREE in Alaska so if you have kids check them out!
Y ou are going to LOVE Alaska. It was quite simply a once in a lifetime experience. My kids flew over the Misty Fjords and landed on a lake 4000 feet high, caught a 25 pound Alaskan King Salmon, saw bears, eagles, otters, etc. What a trip!

 

[tvguy]

We went on HAL'S Amsterdam to Alaska, took that cruise 18 months before our cruise on the Magic. You won't be disappointed. HAL truly is the best line for Alaska, not that the others aren't great, but HAL has been doing it longer, and frankly is much more like Disney from a service standpoint.
Check out the Inside Passage route......we sailed right up to the Glaciers.

 

[perdidobay]

Although we didn't go on a cruise, DH and I drove around Alaska 2 years ago and stayed in some of the Princess cruise lines resorts. They are very very very nice. If you have time to add a ground tour to your cruise I would highly recommend Princess.

 

[bbowers]

DH and I are planning the same thing with a Sept sailing in 2006. We are also trying to decide between Princess, HAL, and Celebrity - will get quotes on all and go from there.

We are planning to do about 6 days land but we are going to plan it ourselves and NOT do a std tour. None of the tours was exactly what I wanted to cover, and I think DH and I will be more comfortable doing it on our own, staying in the places WE want to stay (like some B&B's, for example). You can book any of the activities a land tour covers on your own, and sometimes have more options for times that way.

We also want to see the Sci-Fi Hall of Fame in Seattle at the end of our trip, so we're scheduling flights around that. (Found out that even though most cruises leave from Vancouver, it's MUCH cheaper to fly into Seattle and rent a car one-way, at least for us.)

 

[fireplug]

We did Alaska in 2004. We did 6 days on land and 7 on the Coral. We were enthralled. It is an incredible place to visit. I have included a link to some of our 1100 pics we took. We stayed at Princesses lodges and as stated above they are gorgeous. We are planning a return trip in about 4-5 years.We were there in their fall color season and had great weather. Hope you decide to go it is a trip to remember!


http://smccabe.photosite.com/Week1/ Land portion

http://smccabe.photosite.com/Alaska2004Cruise/


Steve

 

[perdidobay]

Beautiful photos! Thanks for sharing.. it brought back great memories.

 

[sopandbass]

We did the Inside Passage only (roundtrip from and to Vancouver) in 2002 with Princess. The ship we were on has since been retired from the Alaska intineraries but I heard that some ships - I don't know if they're Princess or other lines - now have covered pools so you could go swimming. There were pools on our ship but after we left Vancouver, it was really too cold to swim and we're from Michigan so we're pretty immune to a little chilliness. Just something to think about.

 

[Donalds_best_pal]

Thanks for the replies. RCCL ship looks nice online but like from what I have heard it doesnt have the best glacier routes. The coral looks very nice and has good route and you can then do the land tour.
Fireplug, were there many kids onboard? Did you have kids? I am hearing there are more kids on princess during Alaska Cruies. We will have a 16 year old and 7 year old. I will check out the pictures you posted right now.

Thanks Guys,
Matt

 

[TammyC]

Would love more info about which cruise line is best for kids in Alaska. We hope to go in a couple of years, when our DS will be 6. We probably will do a 7 day cruise only. DH doesn't like long vacations. Thanks for any advice.

Tammy

 

[fireplug]

VERY FEW kids on board. but we went during school. I only saw 3 -4 little ones and a dozen or so teens. We did not take our kids ( they were 26, 23 at the time) and did not pay much attention but there were a LOT of seniors on our ship.

It had a covered pool and we went swimming a few times. NO ONE else there we had the hot tubs and pools to ourselves.


Steve

 

[Donalds_best_pal]

Thanks for reply fireplug. I am told there are quite a bit of kids on when school is out. We get out early may here. We might just wait until middle to end of june so there are more kids.

matt

 

[Miss Eeyore]

The brand new sister ships, the Diamond and the Sapphire Princesses, sail round trip from Seattle. It was grand. They have solarium pools....big ones...that you can use on chilly days. The itrinerary was awesome. We have also sailed one way to Anchorage on Celebrity, and that was great for adults and teens too.

 

[jazstar87]

I went on the sapphire last year the ship to me didn't have the "wow" factor, but Alaska did we went in tracy arm but remeber during august the ice melt and it wasn't like the glaciers are all on the mountian but they are in the water, many ice burgs though.

 

[Donalds_best_pal]

Diamond looks nice but supposedly route isnt as good because it goes out of seattle. Celebrity looks nice at of vancouver to. Having so much trouble deciding. We wanted to do land tour afterwards but people are saying we should not with kids. Also want to do Glacier Bay since I heard its the best but only Princess and HAL go there.

Matt

 

[BeeSkip]

Regarding Alaska, We went to Alaska this past summer. We did a 12 night cruisetour through RCCL Vision of the Seas. The trip was fabulous...the cruise part and the tour (land package) part. I was worried about the ship RCCl because my kids are really into Disney cruises and I thought thye would not find RCCL up to Disney standards. The kids loved the Vision and the programs that they had. They loved RCC and they Loved Alaska. There were plenty of families and kids on board. We did the Vision because it had the one way southbound cruise and enabled us to do the land package first. The tour part was incredible, very organized, easy and would do it again in a heart beat. If you are going to Alaska, ask yourself what exactly you want to do and see, then choose a ship on intinery basis. I found the ports of call and the glacier viewing on our cruise spectacular. Alaska is wonderful!!!

Bee