Alaskan Cruise

We are taking an Alaskan Cruise this summer at the end of July. We are on the Southbound Royal Princess starting in Fairbanks. Included is the Denali cruisetour. Included is Skagway, Juneau, Ketchikan and final destination is Vancouver. Do you have any hints or suggestions for our trip? We are pretty excited about this one. 2 couples are in this group.

I'll just tell you that I'm jealous!!!

Once in a lifetime trip to get my husband to go/fly!

Good for you. We'll get there - some day!

You will be really excited seeing your first few bald eagles. But then the thrill wears off when you see them congregating in parking lots like crows, at the dump, etc.

I enjoyed Skagway (lots of shops) and we hopped on a shuttle that took us up into the Yukon. I wouldn't get into a seaplane with all the accidents that have been happening...just sayin'.....

Glacier Bay is spectacular. Every cruise ship makes its way through it.

Ditto the Yukon Tour! That and the Whale watching tour were our favorites.

Thanks everyone. I'll be interested to see if I can get tired of seeing eagles. Waldensouth - Whale watching is about number one on my bucket list!

We went in July, 2017 and my favorite port was Ketchikan. It is such a cute little town! We did an excursion there where we went to a Lumberjack show and then they bussed us to George Inlet for a crab feast. It was a ton of fun and our kids really liked that day.

If you are on your own for lunch in Dinali, Prospectors Pizza has an amazing salmon pizza. They have a website. Red Onion restaurant is in Skagway, and was an 1890's brothel. Staff wear period clothes - lot of shopping/souvenirs in Skagway.
Remember to bring a camera and make sure it's charged. Abundant wildlife. Would do it again, and again

I'm SUPER jealous! Never been, so no advice except have lots of fun and take load of pictures!

hopefully the virus clears relatively quickly so you won't be stuck on board while docked for too long

I went on the Coral Princess Southbound land/sea cruise with my husband in July 2016. I was with our bank seniors group - 99 in total. I enjoyed that trip so much that I am going with our bank again, only this time with my sister, on the Pacific Princess at the end of July 2020. Denali tour is worth it for being able to see wildlife. We were lucky in 2016 and saw Denali both days while in Denali and also both days when we were at Mt. McKinley Lodge. Hopefully, we will be able to see all of Denali this coming year, since clouds tend to hide it. Glacier Bay day was great - we had a balcony (where my husband hung out), I was up on the top deck taking pictures and listening to the park ranger. Our ship was able to get fairly close to the glaciers. At Skagway, we enjoyed the train/bus to Yukon and Emerald Lake. Definitely do a whale watching trip. We even were fortunate enough to see bubble netting with the whales. We are booked on the same excursions again for the upcoming cruise. All of our excursions are through Princess. I have also joined several Princess Alaska Cruise groups on Facebook. Many good suggestions by the groups on tours, places to eat, shop, etc.

I thought of this thread on Saturday morning. We were coming home from the grocery and sitting in a tree overlooking the river was a huge bald eagle (Middle Tennessee). He was majestic!

Definitely get a balcony cabin! I did the cruise on Princess (don't remember the name of the ship) from Vancouver to Fairbanks 9 or 10 years ago and loved every minute. At one of the ports, my roommate and I picked up flat rate boxes at the post office and shipped a bunch of stuff home (some souvenirs, clothes we knew we wouldn't wear again, etc).

Do a dogsled tour!! (And find out which kennels the dogs / handlers are from and take lots of pictures!) A lot of the dogs / handlers are Iditarod & Yukon Quest teams staying in shape over the summer.

I am going on an Alaskan cruise end of September this year on Norwegian with a girlfriend of mine. I am so excited I can hardly stand it. We are leaving out of Seattle for the 7-day inside passage cruise. I can't wait to see the beautiful scenery and, hopefully, lots of whales. We don't have excursions locked down yet but whale-watching is going to be on the list!

Two very important words these days - "trip insurance"

Interesting comment Randy. We were out eating last Friday and ran into friends. They were telling us that they are just now cancelling the Italy part of their European trip in June because of the how prevalent the virus is in Italy. Their insurance isn't going to cover that because they don't cover your fear of being in Italy or the fact of the virus being bad there. At this point they are going to stick to Britain. I'm hoping that as more and more people cancel and complain that we see a change in that thinking. I'm hoping our friends to see a refund.

Before you do the whale watching check with the cruise, as when we went to Alaska we were told that they did not see any whales on the watch but we saw them from our balcony. Do not sleep through Glacier bay as the stop was early and quick.

We also booked 2 excursions at each destination as it was going to be a once in a lifetime trip which after going it we will be going back at some point.

Just like any other insurance, you have to read the fine print. You always want to buy trip insurance that allows you to cancel FOR ANY REASON.

now might be the best time to book as prices should be down, less people on the ship and the possibility of the cruise to be extended for 14 days.