I'm not sure what you mean by this. To be US-flagged the ship must be primarily built in the US, owned by a US company, and primarily crewed by US citizens or permanent residents. That's why nearly all cruise ships serving US ports are foreign-flagged.
My comment was about changing the Passenger Vessel Services Act (PVSA) of 1886 (and that portion of the PVSA that carried into the Jones Act). Happycamper was talking about flagging/crewing/building requirements according to the Jones act. We were talking about two different things (or two different sections of the same law, I guess), so I was saying the other things don't apply to the solution I was proposing.
Yeah, most probably just want a tropical beach. I know I don't care much whether it's Cozumel or Nassau, and that's probably true of the Mexican Riviera as well (I haven't been..yet). But Alaska is certainly all about the destination and as much as I love Vancouver, it would be a lot more convenient if I could sail out of Seattle instead (and I don't want to have to stop in Victoria just "because").
Presidential Order... If it snubbed Canada and generated more tourism dollars here, I'm not sure congress or special interests would be needed, in this new world order.
Yeah, it sucks. I was always told we had a free market where businesses competed to earn my dollars by delivering better products and driving prices lower, but brother/sister/non-binary-sibling, I was wrong.
When we sailed to Alaska on the Wonder in 2012, it was the one year she sailed out of Seattle. The year before it was Vancouver and flights from Philly were terrrible. So when we saw Seattle, we jumped on it. Non stop flights make it so much faster & easier. I do recall reading that the port times are not as good when sailing from Seattle though. Also we had to stop in Victoria to satisfy the foreign port requirement.
Somehow DCL forgot about that law in 2012 when the Magic first sailed out of NYC. They offered several weekends over the summer of 2 night cruises to nowhere. My inner nerd loves the map channel so I watched it to see where we'd go. We went to approximately the same latitude as Virginia Beach and turned around.
I wonder how they got away with that!
Here is an explanation (https://cruiseline.com/advice/how-to-book/choose-a-destination/cruise-to-nowhere). In 2012, the law wasn't being enforced.
I also like Victoria as a port. It might get old if you do annual Alaska cruises, but it's a nice city.
When there is a stop on a 7 day Alaska cruise out of Seattle, they have to leave Ketchikan around noon in order to get to Victoria by evening the next day. So, it is either loose Ketchikan or another stop. I prefer Juneau (co-op and other local galleries) and Sitka or Skagway over Ketchikan for myself and my priorities.
Actually, I find it the opposite. Victoria is something we can do every year for a three day weekend and never get tired of it. The more times we go to the Alaska ports, the more often we find that we just want to stay on the ship after a quick walk around to stretch the legs. Sitka is probably the one port we spend the most time in. BUT we have no need to do things like whale watching (saw an Orca pod while on a ferry in the sound last week!) or go to a raptor center (Bald Eagle nest in our neighborhood) or do most of the things that might seem more exotic to people from elsewhere. Victoria, however, that's like going to a European city and we only get to do that once a decade or so.
