How cheap can you get Alaska in June?

[odyzander]

Curious as to getting an alaska cruise on the cheap. Thinking lowest cabin available and do not care about route as much. Traveling to Vancouver in June for a wedding and thinking if we could get a roundtrip cruise in a low price range it would be a good way to see the Northwest. All the ferrys and hotels in BC are $$ Roundtrip Vancouver trip right now is low but would want to get it down a couple hundred.

 

I know early booking is best but are last minute deals possible/decent? We are used to traveling on Disney Cruise Line, so are familar with the early booking thing but I though that on other cruise lines they run the last minute specials? Am I way off base?

[mapleleaves]

Last yr Princess had an inside cabin Whittier -Vancouver for only $349. It was advertised in early May. HAL had a similar price the previous yr.

 

Every cruise line has a web site and a Specials/Hot Deals page .... all you can do is watch the sites diligently for a RT deal out of Vancouver.

[biker1972]

Round trips from Vancouver are limited. Princess RT from Vancouver is really a b2b and won't be cheap since it will be 14 days. HAL offers some that include Glacier Bay. RCI only does Vancouver/Seward 7 day cruises using Radiance of the Seas. Celebrity Century has 5 RT trips in June. Oceania has no RT from Vancouver in your time frame and wouldn't be cheap anyway. Disney Wonder will be doing 4 RT in June from Vancouver. If you include Seattle you will have more options. Transportation from Vancouver to Seattle is not very expensive so you should include trips starting there if you are looking for inexpensive Alaskan cruises. First you need to get dates in mind that work for you then find the sailings to watch for discounted rates. Final payments for June cruises are beginning in the next 2 or 3 weeks so people are deciding to fully commit or not.

[thinfool]

Good luck...."cheap" and "Alaska cruise" don't play well together.

[Mercruiser]

Last summer, my wife and I went on the 7-night, July 21, Golden Princess, Alaska - Inside Passage w/Glacier Bay, round-trip Seattle. We had an ocean view guarantee, for $600 pp. I could have booked an inside for about $50 less pp. There were cheaper cruises available ($500 pp), but we wanted to see Glacier Bay.

 

There are two major ways to get a cheaper cruise if your sailing date is fixed, as is your case with a wedding to attend.

 

1) Book a last-minute special. By last-minute, I mean less than 60 days from the cruise date. This is what we did last summer. After final deposits are due and all bookings are non-refundable, the cruise lines discount the remaining cabins to fill the ship. As mentioned earlier, the Seattle round-trips are cheaper and more plentiful than Vancouver round-trips.

 

2) Book a Vancouver - Alaska cruise, e.g. Vancouver - Seward or Wittier or reverse. These are often discounted even more the the round trips - and they are a better cruise IMHO because they spend more time in Alaska. I am guessing these are heavily discounted because its more expensive for most people to book last minute air fare for the Anchorage to lower-48 flight. In contrast, there are plenty of people living in the Northwest who can take advantage of last minute round trips by driving to Seattle or Vancouver ports (like us!).

[Putterdude]

Princess usually has a dump of cabins for the early spring in the next 30 days then again in late May to mid June there is often another dump for late August and into September. So it is a matter of watching.

[ellbelle]

Assuming you want RT Vancouver so you do not have the crazy air.

 

Here are the 7 day RT for June out of Vancouver

 

Holland America- Amsterdam, Volendam, Zuiderdam

Celebrity- Century

Disney- Wonder

 

14 day RT:

Holland America- Statendam, Zaandam

Princess- Sapphire, Coral, Diamond, Island

NCL - Sun

 

Look at the sailing dates that work with your wedding, may help narrow down what deals to look for. Like others have said the one way cruises can have some great deals but then you have to deal with the air.

[vbmom87]

You should be able to get a deal at the last minute on one of the cruises out of Vancouver. My daughter is on a June 12th cruise out of Vancouver and her final payment is due around March 27th-28th I believe. After that is when the prices may drop if the ship has a lot of vacancies. If the ship is quite full, the prices could go up. However, since you have flexibility in cruiselines and ships, I would say you have a good chance of finding a deal after the final payment dates have come and gone. Good luck!!! Just know that when purchasing after final payment you do have to pay in full. Just don't necessarily expect that $349. It is wise on your part to take advantage of being in Vancouver since you already paid the airfare to get there.