3 day land tour before or after 7 day cruise

[Sugar&Buddy]

Is land tour preferred before or after 7 day cruise?

[1025cruise]

I would want to do it before.

[Coral]

I would be very careful doing a 3 day land tour through a cruise line - you may want to say what it is and get opinions on it.

 

It maybe more desirable to just do Seward on your own or something else around the Anchorage area.

Edited October 19, 2022 by Coral

[oaktreerb]

@Coral gives good advice.  If this is your first trip to Alaska you may want to do the self guided land tour after the cruise.  That way you will be more familiar with what Alaska has to offer.  You could easily spend three days in the Seward/Anchorage area.  If you want to do a cruise tour do the land part first so you can relax on the ship.  One of the advantages of a land tour before cruising is that you will have friends from the tour on the ship.  

[CCJack]

before or after?  probably no wrong answer depends on your travel plans etc.  We wanted to spend a night or two in Vancouver before the cruise, so that makes it a Northbound cruise and by default our cruise tour after.   Vancouver is a great place to spend a pre cruise night.  These days I would never plan on flying into a city and board a cruise ship the same day, way too much can go wrong with airlines, luggage, etc.

 

We really enjoyed our 5 day cruise tour through RCCL (and typically we are DIYers, but I liked the cruise tour a lot.)

 

However, as the other two responses mention, if you are limited to 3 days I am not sure I would go to Denali.   One very long day drive, one day at park and on very long day back  likely.   In that case 3 days in the seward area may be a good DIY option as suggested.

[kayehall]

What was the 5-day tour thru RCCL?  We are RCCL Crown and Anchor but thinking of using Holland America/Princess for their expertise and knowledge of Alaska.  Did RCCL have interactive activities on board related to the area?  Did they have good viewing areas?  Did they go to the glaciers?  Thanks

[Cali Viajera]

I recommend the pre-cruise land tour. You get to relax after the hopping around on land. For us first timers, I liked the cruise's land tour. I didn't need to do any planning or worry about transportation etc. We arranged private excursions like Denali ATV. It depends on your comfort level.

[CCJack]

On 10/27/2022 at 2:24 PM, kayehall said:

What was the 5-day tour thru RCCL?  We are RCCL Crown and Anchor but thinking of using Holland America/Princess for their expertise and knowledge of Alaska.  Did RCCL have interactive activities on board related to the area?  Did they have good viewing areas?  Did they go to the glaciers?  Thanks

We took the 12 day (7 day cruise plus 5 day land) The land stops were  Aleyska, Denali, Talkeetna, Anchorage.   We enjoyed Aleyska resort as a stopover on the way to Denali.  It is a ski resort, but during the summer you can still take the tram up the mountain, and they have hiking trails around the property.   It is a very nice hotel, which is hard to find in Alaska.   Our Denali lodging was less plush but fine none the less.  I think Princess likely has the edge over RCCL for their Denali lodging.  However when we went (a couple years ago) RCCL had much nicer motor coaches than Princess.   This may have changed if Princess upgraded their coaches since then.   Talkeetna is an odd town.  Maybe it is an acquired taste, but that stop did not appeal so much to us.  

 

Overall we were very pleased with RCCL land tour.

Edited October 31, 2022 by CCJack