2nGlenn

The cruise terminals are on the south side of Juneau while the stuff you want to do like the Mendenhall glacier is north of town. However, so are the whale watching ports. It is a 20 minute drive each way between the two and the excursion from the cruise has a bus taking you each way. I guess you could Uber but not entirely sure the rates or availability. Not sure how cranky the cruise folks get when you take the bus just one way.

Juneau sruise terminal location:

https://goo.gl/maps/RXp8HWpm63x

Mendenhall Glacier visitors center:

https://goo.gl/maps/uX7f43HHh452

We got on our whale watch in Auke Bay. Good chance you would get yours here too:

https://goo.gl/maps/3d8ErH93Ug72

The reservation itinerary I found in my mailbox said "KB6 / Denali Explorer" This link appears to be it. You can navigate to the 2019 versions from there.

https://www.princesscruises.fr/en/cruise-tours/alaska/denali-explorer-tour-k-2018

We did a very similar trip in August arriving in Fairbanks on the last flight of the day. It is still light then! But I am confused as to when you start on board the ship. Fairbanks is very far away from Whittier where you catch the boat - hundreds of miles away. We did the land and sea tour with a week on land and a week at sea. So I am assuming you are going to do the same thing.

It was a great trip! We flew from PHL to MSP to FAI on day 1. Long day of flights. We arrived but my wife's bag did not. :o:eek: So what did we do? Got an Uber and headed to Wal Mart. The Uber cost more than the clothes and they were the exact same t-shirts at the exact same prices we saw in shops in port in Skagway and Ketchikan. Cool shirts especially for a wal mart. Don't think the t-shirt shops have pants and underwear and toiletries though at 11:30pm.

We then went on a river boat and gold panning excursion the next day. (my wife in her new clothes from Wal Mart). It was a ton of fun. Saw a great native american village and a talk from a dog sled camp. After that we went to pan for gold. And yes we found some. $50 later they are in earrings. So fun though. I can see how people got gold fever. Wife's bag arrived that day too. It took a side detour to Seattle courtesy of Delta. Their app allows you to track your bag now too. Hope you don;t have to use it.

Our tour then led us to the Denali lodge with tours of the park and we did a whitewater river excursion and the silly musical show. We hiked (waked really as the path was paved) back from the Denali visitor center to the hotel too. I wished we started the walk the one way and rented bikes.

Then we transferred to the south side of the park to Mckinley Lodge. Weather turned on us so it rained a day. Next day we went to Talkeetna (an hour bus drive each way) and saw the town, ate at the Roadhouse, bought some cool aurora picture in a shop, and went to the ranger station and museum where the ranger gave a great talk about how they climb Denali.

From McKinley we went via train to Whittier and the ship. We arrived right before disembarking for the cruise. Slight line at the port but maybe 10 minutes. So away we went.

In Vancouver we just had one day. The tour from the cruise line of Stanley park was not nearly long enough and since you have two days, go see Butchart Gardens. Dump your bags at the hotel and Uber around where you need to go.

We were on Princess and did the whale watch in Juneau that had a salmon bake combo. The tour was via Alaska Travel Adventures which has these blue boats powered by jets vs props so they got out to the whales quicker and the props will not hurt any whales. The people were great on there too. We saw six different whales on our trip.

And the salmon bake afterwards was absolutely yummy. Salmon cooked over a fire with that nice smoky flavor. Yum yum!

Since whales are high on your list, the whale watch and salmon bake combo excursion in Juneau was one of our favorites. We saw six different humpback whales. But you are coming in May so you may want to research if the whales have made their way to Alaska yet - I think they have but can't say as I was there in August. They tend to hang out with their food sources.

I would suggest doing the longer tour in Denali. We went on the shorter one and wished we had taken the longer one. We did do a whitewater rafting excursion while at the Denali lodge and was a blast! Our departure time on the river was 6:30pm and it was light the whole three hour trip. So be sure to account for the sunrise and sunset times as you go further north. I liked the Denali lodge better than McKinley lodge and Fairbanks.

Fairbanks riverboat tour and panning for gold was a very long but satisfying day too.

We did not do a flight on to a glacier. So I can't recommend any trips there.

Verizon service was pretty good for our land portion of the cruise as well. Inside Denali park the cell reception drops a bit. But at the major places on land, Verizon was just great with 4G grade service. At sea is at sea however. Skagway, Juneau, and Ketchikan ports of call all had service in town.

My inlaws that traveled with us have some other phone company and it was not nearly as good coverage.

We did a land tour this year going southward from Fairbanks with stops in Denali Lodge and McKinley Lodge via Princess.

If I had to do it over again, I would overweight time in Denali Lodge (northern of the two near Healy). I would also do the very long day bus tour in the park as it goes many more miles (yet just a very small fraction of the park). We took the 6 hour tour bus which was god, but left us wanting for more park time. There are even places to stay pretty deep in the park, so you may want to look at those options, but it may interfere with some cruise based land tour package.

At the Denali lodge, we got lucky and stayed in the newer building A that had views overlooking the park and the river. Try and get this if you can as the other buildings do not have nearly as nice a view. Denali lodge is a sprawling complex with some elevation and a row of shops across the street. There are bike rentals, groceries, liquor, cheaper eats, various adventure-type excursions (zip lines, rafting, ATV tours, etc) as well in that row of shops. I wish I knew about the bike rental place before taking the bus from the lodge to the Denali park visitors center. If I get back, I know what I am doing for a day! There are some easy paths around the visitors center as well that an additional day or two would have been good to explore further too. We walked back from the park visitor center to the Denali lodge. Nice 1.5 mile walk or so.

The best part of the Denali lodge is the deck overlooking the river and bordering the park. I could soak that up for days on end. Spend some time there!

McKinley lodge is picturesque but far from town and activities. So if you lie walking right to where you want to go, Denali Lodge offers more things close by. McKinley lodge has some pretty spectacular views as well, but we had some clouds and rain there. It is nice, has a game room, a big deck overlooking the mountains, but many more buildings.