Klondike Highway excursion AND White Pass Summit train ride ?

We are going on a group cruise and are booked on the White Pass Summit train ride. I'd also like to see the Klondike Highway, and I notice that Princess has an excursion. It is $40, 1.5 hours long, and has photo stops. They travel the Klondike Highway via mini bus. This would still allow us plenty of time to see town, which is very important to me. But is it redundant if we are also going round trip on the train on the same day? Your thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

Yes, it is redundant. Why not just book a combo tour? The other thing to know, if this is only back and forth to the summit. You are missing a whole lot of scenery compared to an Emerald Lake trip. (only 1./3 the distance).

Depending on your port time and having a long day, it is darn simple and easy to "see town" in an hour. You may want to rethink about giving that priority?

Thanks, Budget Queen. By combo, I assume you mean train one way and vehicle the other. We are not able to do that because we are traveling in a group who have all decided to do this train tour together. It is actually the only tour the whole group is doing. But I have heard such great things about traveling along the highway, as well as traveling along by train, I wondered about doing both on the same day. So I will check further into going to Emerald Lake, as you suggested, but I didn't see that listed as a Princess tour. I am open to booking tours with other vendors, and appreciate your suggestion to check into that.

So there are some people who are only doing the round trip train? And you have to be together? Then there is a significant compromise for those who want to include Emerald Lake. Frankly, I would never bother with just a White Pass/Fraser round trip road trip. It's so insignificant, with a few stops- hardly worth it. And if the turn around is only the Pass- which some are- then even less desirable with missing Tormented Valley.

Why not just do an early or late port time train, then rent yourself a car and drive yourself??? You can accomplish a whole lot more compared to any tour. IF you have an evening departure , you can easily do an Emerald Lake drive. Round trip, Emerald Lake tour buses will only allow you to take a partial journey evening train that leaves around 4:30p IF you have the port time to allow it???

The Summit bus ride is a waste of time.

Thanks, Budget Queen. By combo, I assume you mean train one way and vehicle the other. We are not able to do that because we are traveling in a group who have all decided to do this train tour together. It is actually the only tour the whole group is doing. But I have heard such great things about traveling along the highway, as well as traveling along by train, I wondered about doing both on the same day. So I will check further into going to Emerald Lake, as you suggested, but I didn't see that listed as a Princess tour. I am open to booking tours with other vendors, and appreciate your suggestion to check into that.

Can the whole group do a combo tour? You could have a mini-van to yourself with Chilkoot tours.

Mike Heney, "The Irish Prince" "Give me enough snoose and dynamite and I'll build a railroad to Hell" is one of my heros, as he built the Copper River and Northwestern Railway, full gauge railroad, which began in my hometown, Cordova, Alaska. But before he did that he built the Yukon-White Pass Railroad-narrow gauge.

So, whenever I get to Skagway I have to take Heney's train at least to the pass and back. We have done that a number of times. The first time we had spent about a week driving around and touring the Yukon. We stayed one night at Whitehorse then early the next morn headed down the highway to Skagway. The first order of business before booking into our hotel there was to make reservations for the next morn up to the pass.

I'm not familiar with the longer rides on the train, but by all means go as far as you can if possible. At least to and from the pass, the train ride is much more scenic than the highway.

Such a busy time of year, so it’s taken me awhile to respond, but I really do appreciate everybody’s input!

Budget Queen – We do actually have the 4:30 pm White Pass round trip train booked, so I will look into renting a car and driving ourselves to Emerald Lake, or a tour to do that. We are in port 6 am to 8:15 pm. More investigation is necessary, but thanks for the suggestion and help.

CaribbeanIsland – thank you for your opinion.

Casey12 – The whole group is doing the White Pass round trip train ride. That’s what the majority decided on (highly recommended by our travel agent), and I don’t want to mess with that. That’s why I am just trying to figure out how my husband and I can possibly do more sightseeing in the area, while still having time to see town, and then spending a nice time with our friends on the train.

Kennicott – My husband is a train buff, too, so he can’t wait. It’s so interesting to me that some people find the train boring, and some people can do it multiple times and still find it fascinating.

Thanks all!

While the White Pass train ride is definitely highly recommended and scenic - it is the same scenery up as it is down. I have seen people fall asleep on the way back. By doing the combo tour with a company such as Chilkoot, you get the scenery from the train one way and a different perspective from a van the other direction. You may want to propose this for the group. It is sort of the best of both worlds. I doubt your TA has done this or may have recommended it also.

Thank you, Coral. That's probably what I would choose if life were all about me, haha.

I agree 100% that the view past the turn-around is not to be missed. If you do end up renting a car, there is a short hike to Reid Falls above the cemetery that is stunning, and a cutoff of the highway that will take you to an overlook if you want to take a picture of the ships in port.

Thank you, Love2Relax! That's good information that I will investigate further (as soon as I get through the hustle and bustle of Christmas!).