Planning 1st Alaska Cruise - Lots of Questions

[Disney1992]

My husband and I are planning (hoping) to take our first Alaska cruise next summer. We can only take a 7 day cruise with a day or two tacked on either end to allow for travel. We do want to cruise Glacier Bay, but I can't figure out which itiniery to take. What are the merits and disadvantages of taking either a Northbound/Southbound route or a round trip out of either Seattle or Vancouver?

 

Since we are very novice cruisers, only been on Disney, we are opting for Holland America to book our air, transfers, and hotel for the days we using for travel time. Has anyone else done this and how does it work?

 

Thanks so much!

[WindyCity]

We took our first cruise ever to Alaska on HAL's Zaandam. Our cruise was the Inner Passage from Vancouver and we loved every moment. The reason we chose the Inner Passage was because we did not know how we would handle the motion of the ship. We had no problems with motion sickness at all.

 

Since we were "neophytes" we also booked our air and post cruise hotel through HAL. It was more expensive, but we did not want anything to mess up our first cruise experience. We did pay the $50 deviation to get a non-stop flight and our hotel was right across from Canada Place. Since we had transfers from ship to hotel, we took the ride because they gave a tour of Vancouver with it and it was interesting to see. The bus even stopped a couple of times for passengers to get off and look around.

Hope you enjoy your cruise - no matter which itinerary you take!

[Krazy Kruizers]

:)

 

Lots of things to conside here.

We have taken several cruises to Alaska.

You mentioned taking either southbound or northbound. Big difference here. If you take northbound, then you will get off the ship in Seward and have to take either a bus or the train to Anchorage for a flight home. If you go southbound, then you will have to fly to Anchorage (maybe over-night there) and then take either the bus or train to Seward.

If you are limited on time vacation wise, you might consider either a round trip out of either Vancouver or Seattle. There are HAL ships that do those tours.

Glacier Bay is a favorite of ours.

Ned more help - just ask.

:)

[jstducky]

disney -

 

i've done two cruises to alaska with HAL now and am thinking about a third one next year. i've done the northbound route with the noordam back in 96 and i did the zaandam roundtrip out of vancouver last year.

 

my recommendation for someone who is only doing a 7 day cruise with only a day or two at the end would be to do a roundtrip on the zaandam. 7 day out of and back to vancouver. you stop at juneau, ketchican, and skagway/haines. also you have a day to cruise glacier bay and 2 sea days. its a great itinerary for you to see everything and do everything.

 

the difference with a northbound or southbound is that instead of skagway/haines, most likley you'll get sitka. personally i liked skagway/haines a lot more than i liked sitka. also northbound and southbound is really only good if you're going to do a pre and/or post cruise through denali national park on their land tour package.

 

additionally for a first timer to alaska i think that the roundtrip offers the best of alaska, plus its cheaper since it embarks and disembarks from the same place. also, the zaandam is a great ship!

[Esme]

We did the 7 day round trip on the Volendam last August - ports were Juneau, Ketchikan, Skagway and Glacier Bay. This trip was from Vancouver and returned to Vancouver - much easier than flying to Anchorage or returning home from there. I think you would like the Volendam - she is a beautiful ship.

[Disney1992]

Thank you all. I was leaning towards a round trip cruise, but I wanted to hear what others thought. I thought I might be missing out on something.

 

Windy City,

Thank you for the comment on the flight upgrade. I am a nervous flyer and don't want to takeoff and land more than I have to. I will put that in the budget so we can have a non-stop flight. Did this allow you to specify which flights you were on or just that you wanted non-stop flights? Did you fly into Vancouver or Seattle? I live in the Washington DC/Baltimore area and it looks like I have more choices to fly into Seattle than to fly into Vancouver.

 

Would anyone happen to know when the 2005 schedule will be out?

[WindyCity]

We flew into Vancouver - we are from Chicago. We did not specify a particular flight - figured we would let HAL figure out what time we had to be there. We flew United. We also sailed on the Zaandam - loved the ship! We got an S suite (husband is slightly claustrophobic and was worried about space) and had our 21 yr old son in the same room. He wants to go back to Alaska - absolutely loved it. In fact, we spent the day on our verandah in Glacier Bay. If we got cold we could go in and still see everything. Very Very nice. If you can manage try to get a balcony cabin.

 

The only mistake we made was scheduling 2 shore excursions for 1 day in Skagway. Was a little too much.

To save a little money, we took the first cruise in May. Actually the weather was not bad - did not need heavy coats. I wore a light waterproof coat with a liner. If I thought it would be cold, I layered a shirt, then a sweatshirt - was very comfortable, but I also like cool weather. Although there was not as much wildlife activity, we did see whales, bald eagles, dolphins. No bears.

[azsheep]

Our first cruise we did a southbound from Seward to Anchorage on the Ryndam. Great trip. We just returned (on 7/17) from a roundtrip cruise from Vancouver on the Zaandam. Ports of call were, Juneau, Skagway, and Ketchikan. Although the 3 hour bus ride from Anchorage to Seward was absolutly beautiful, it made for a very long travel day....certainly would never want to do it on the way home :p . I would highly recommend the roundtrip to Vancouver, you get the same ports and the same number of sea days.

[ore-ee-gun]

We just returned a few weeks ago from a 7-day Alaska cruise aboard the Amsterdam. Great ship, great itinerary - it included Glacier Bay, Juneau, Sitka, Ketchikan, and Victoria BC. We sailed from and returned to Seattle, and the airport is just 20 minutes from the pier. Whatever trip you choose, Alaska is a great place - you'll love it!

[ASM]

Tonight DH said I should start looking into Alaska for our next cruise! He definitely wants the whole cruise - land tour option. Any ideas out there about when, which ship, north or southbound cruise, etc.? Our family's last Alaskan experience was on the Nieuw Amstrdam in 1992.

[Minybear]

Just wanted to say "Hi'". This is our first HAL cruise coming on 8/28 for Alaska. We normally do DCL or WDW. So this is something new to us. I hope we get the same excellent servcie we got on DCL on HAL. I think we will. We are DVC members and doing points for our Alaska cruise. We are doing the inside passage for our very first Alaska cruise. We are sailing out of Vancouver. We are sailing the Zaahdam.

 

Minybear

[Giorgi-one]

One major suggestion. You must have a balcony cabin. This is not a Carribean cruise and you will spend most of your time looking at scenery and wildlife from the ship. We had balcony cabin on the rear of the ship which offerered several advantages. First of all you had a 180 degree panoramic view. Secondly, the ship blocked the wind and I spent considerable time on the balcony in a bathing suit or shorts while everyone on deck was wearing a jacket. Finally, we had whales following the ship for two days and we could see everything.

[sheldrvrT6A]

Giorgi

Have to agree with the balcony cabin.! We had deck 7 toward the aft on the Oosterdam the first week in July. Did not have much wind and only wore jacket next to glacier. Note here for you the statendam sometimes cannot get into glacier bay for some reason and will go to Hubbard instead sometimes if they can fit in between other ships. Consider Hubbard instead of Glacier Bay. Hate to have you dissapointed if you could not get near some glacier. Oosterdam is a great ship and has, I feel, the best captain in the business (no, I am not related). This guy can stop and spin this thing on a dime! 80,000 tons is a lot to stop. But as I have said before if someone is going to consider a balcony, Alaska is the place. O stops at Juneau, Hubbard Glacier, Sitka, Kethcikan and Victoria. Have fun.

Jerry

[Disney1992]

Hi Mindy!

 

All of our vacations have also been WDW or DCL. I've only cruised twice, one 7 day this past March and a 3 day. I think I've narrowed it down to the Zaandam. If you think of it when you get back, could you give an update on how your trip went?

 

Have a wonderful and safe trip!

[Minybear]

Hi Disney

 

Email me your email address at mminybear@aol.com and after our cruise I will email you our photos and tell you all about it. We are just like you. We just did our 1st Eastern 7 night cruise this last January and last year did our very 1st cruise a 4 night on DCL. Loved it. Rebooked while on board for 12/05 (I forgot exact date) for the Eastern again.

 

We are doing a verandah room and on deck 7 midship.

 

Miny

[ASM]

Thanks for the great info about the aft balconies! I would book a balcony anyway but the aft sounds terrific. Any other tips? Right now DH and I are talking but as soon as the kids hear, our group might expand!