Noordam D1L Land & Sea Journey Live-ish Info

I am doing the opposite cruise starting in Vancouver on July 2nd. I would like to know how cold it is in Fairbanks, Denali and Anchorage. Also do we bring our own umbrella or is one supplied on the ship? I guess on the land portion you would need your own. Right? Hopefully we don't hit any rain. Ha ha.

You should plan to bring your own umbrella....a trip to Alaska without rain would be a miracle! The NOAA website I find has the most reliable weather reports.

Thanks for sharing.

Several days have passed since my last update and that is completely because we have been busy! AT&T service in ports and ship wi-fi have been great so it isn’t because of a lack of access.

The trip from Denali to Anchorage on the train was enjoyable; long but enjoyable. We are busy on this trip but there is an awful lot of sitting which has been a challenge for us at times. We were assigned to the Westmark Anchorage. We found it to be just as sad of a hotel as the Westmark Fairbanks. It was fine for a night and wasn’t dirty but it is just a tired property. If there is one thing I think HAL should focus on to improve the experience provided on the land tour, it would be to invest in a facelift for the Westmark properties. Besides being a sad looking property, the infrastructure was completely overwhelmed by the arrival of our tour bus. There are only 3 elevators and it took forever to get to our room. I had made reservations for dinner at the Glacier Brewhouse which is well-reviewed on TripAdvisor and right across the street from the hotel. The meal and service were good. It is not a bargain dining experience but I didn’t feel the prices were extreme. Remember that we are from Orlando and appreciate the tourist inflation factor.

We added the Kenai Fjords optional excursion to our transfer to Seward on Sunday. This meant that we skipped another train ride and boarded a bus for a 2.5 hours ride to Seward. The coach driver was awesome. He teaches Alaskan history in Seward and really provided a nice narrative on the ride. The fjord tour was also excellent. We were able to get amazingly close to a glacier, saw seals, whales, sea lions, otters, eagles… The ride was very bumpy even though the weather was great. The crew commented several times that we had amazing weather but several people on the cruise still experienced motion sickness. I think it is just the reality of crossing through small windows of open ocean getting to the different fjords and inlets. It was a great trip.

Kenai Fjords tour

We boarded the ship at about 6:30 pm. Check in lines were present. We were able to enter the Suite check in line so we had no waiting but there were probably 100 people in each of the land and train arrival lines. We were happy to find all of our luggage reunited with us. We are in a Neptune Suite so have access to complimentary laundry, dry cleaning, and pressing services. This was a life-saver for us and we sent a huge amount of laundry and pressing out Sunday evening. Everything was back to us by 8 am Monday morning except one pair of jeans which were found and returned to us on Tuesday. Our cabin steward made sure to let us know that this was not the normal turnaround time for laundry on the first day and my missing jeans were not found until Tuesday because that is when they finally got through the first day’s loads. Since then, all laundry has gone out in the morning and been returned in the evening with turn down service. We ate dinner at Canaletto. This was our first-time dining at this venue and we were pleasantly surprised. We were also tired and hungry.

Monday was a sea day and we rested. With our late arrival to the ship, we were unable to get the massage appointment times we wanted for Monday so we really did nothing but catch up on sleep and watch the seas go by.

Tuesday was Glacier Bay cruising. The scenery was amazing. We strapped our GoPro to the balcony railing and set it to capture time lapse photos every 30 seconds. We had a portable charger that we were able to use so we captured the entire trip into and out of Glacier Bay. The spliced slide show is amazing. I am sure there is some rule about strapping things to the railing but it was secure and we never left the room while the GoPro was running. We went to the bow for a few minutes at the beginning of the cruise but it was crowded and we had already been on several excursions that afforded us similar views. We spent almost all of the Glacier Bay time on our balcony and found those views to be rewarding. We had dinner at Pinnacle Grill and it was very good.

HAL ship exiting Glacier Bay as we entered

Wednesday, we spent the day in Haines. The Takshanuk Mountain Trail 4X4 excursion was great. It is a bumpy ride but the scenery was impressive. The Glacier Point Wilderness Safari in the afternoon was also great. I know I sound like a broken record, but all of our excursions have been amazing. The guides have been wonderful, the experiences have been exactly as described, and the scenery and experiences have exceeded all expectations.

Glacier Point Wilderness Safari

Thursday was spent in Juneau. This was the day of possible excursion disappointment for us. Whale watching was in the morning and we reserved the helicopter ride to mush sled dogs for the afternoon. We knew that the helicopter excursion was likely to be cancelled due to weather but we lucked out. Morning trips on this day were cancelled but we were able to go and it was great!

Whale tale

Dog sledding

Friday, today, was Ketchikan. We had a wonderful time on the Alaskan Fish Camp excursion. We again had a great guide. We all caught fish. We had a nicely prepared lunch which included the fish we caught. And we were back on the ship in plenty of time. We were supposed to leave Ketchikan at 6:00 pm and as I type this at 6:40, we are still in port. Not sure why…

Alaska Fish Camp excursion

Tomorrow is a sea day and we will be packing to disembark Sunday in Vancouver.

Here are a couple of experiences that address questions or observations that others have had. We upgraded the Explore 4 Signature Beverage package to the Elite package for $10/day/person on day 1 with no problem. The drink steward at Canaletto took care of that for us. We have never come close to consuming 15 beverages per day but we like to have expanded choices. We had the $200 internet credit that was a part of Explore 4. The package options available are 1000 minutes for $250 or maybe 500 minutes for $150. I will confirm that. We chose the 1000 minute package which had been plenty to keep us connected and our 14 year old happy with his Snapchat addiction and we paid the $50 difference. Our weather has been amazing the entire 2 weeks but we packed for everything and I am glad we did. We are from Florida and we used our base layers several times-especially every time we did something that included the word “glacier”. We used our rain gear. We used our hats and gloves. I was glad to have all our choices. For the most part, temperatures were in the 60’s during the day. The never-ending daylight in Denali gave us a run for our money from an adjustment perspective. The best advice I can give on the luggage packing thing is to use the “Land & Sea” information pdf that is on the HAL website. I just should have used the packing cubes that I bought for this trip and actually have with me. I never got around to sorting things at home and putting them in the cubes and that would have made things SO MUCH EASIER! Our portable charging sticks have been life savers several times-phones, GoPro, camera. I think we have used them every day we have been out and about.

Sent from my iPhone using Forums

Thank you for your trip reports and photos!

We will be doing this trip(minus 1 day in Denali) June 2018.

Can't wait. First cruise and first Alaska trip!

That is the tour we just completed. I will await your riverboat tour observations, being on the younger side of passengers. It set a bad start for my husband for the trip. He hated absolutely everything about it. I thought it was bad but wasn't as upset about it as he was.

May I ask what was so bad about it?

May I ask what was so bad about it?

It was just so hokey. Almost like a sales presentation for the family that runs the tour. Way more about them than Alaska. Really slow paced. Sitting in chairs like a bus station but outside (they have inside as well). The stop at the little display was fine. The kids worked hard to put on a good show. Just super scripted. It was crowded, herded, and just not our thing. We wish there had been two options for Fairbanks instead of just this.