I just went to Alaska last year with Carnival. That one was a roundtrip from Seattle. The ports were Tracy Arm Fjord, Icy Strait Point, Ketchikan, Juneau, and Victoria. I loved all of the Alaska ports. Victoria really didn’t have a shot because almost the entire city was closed for the day by the time we arrived. I knew I would be going back to see Skagway. I didn’t expect it to be this soon.

Looking at cruise lines other than Carnival allowed me to look at one way cruises between Seward and Vancouver. That allows me to revisit all of the ports I went to last year, adding Skagway and a new glacier. Not to mention the ability to add time onto Anchorage and/or Vancouver. In this case I’m adding the time in Anchorage. I do believe I will come back with Princess another time. That time I’ll try to spend time in Seward.

Booking

This is my first time booking with NCL. The Carnival prices this summer were outrageous. I decided to open it up to all cruise lines. I wanted something different so if I did the Caribbean I was going to book Allure of the Seas out of Galveston which was comparable to Carnival prices out of Galveston and New Orleans.

In Alaska I was looking at Majestic Princess and NCL Jewel. With NCL they weren’t charging me double as long as I booked an inside guarantee cabin. They also had airfare included for about half of the price it was going to cost me to fly up there. I still really wanted to book Majestic Princess. Ultimately the NCL cruise running Monday-Monday with one the second Monday being Labor Day is what clinched it for me.  Flights to Anchorage are not plentiful and that allows me plenty of time to get there over the weekend.

My guarantee room was assigned at least two months out. I think it’s fine. It’s a basic interior room on deck 10, midship. I have cabins above and below me. I’m close to the midship stairs. It’s two decks down to O’Sheehan’s and two decks up to lido. I think it’s a nice central location where I’ll be able to avoid using elevators.

Flights

I took the chance booking my flights with NCL for $623. They had a deal where the second person flies free so it would’ve been an even better deal for two people. All of my flight research came up with the flight costing north of $1,000 booking it myself. More like $1,200 for reasonable flights.

My initial impression with booking through NCL vs. booking through Carnival is Carnival allowed me to pick my flights prior to agreeing to book Fly2Fun. With NCL I just had to take a chance. My personal vacation planner told me I would be able to contact their air department 30-75 days out. I would return from my transatlantic about 75 days prior to this cruise so that was at the top of my list upon my return. 

You are able to request a deviation for up to three days for $25. I requested a Saturday flight that way at a minimum I have a full day Sunday in Anchorage.

As I mentioned when I booked this my vacation planner told me I could work with the air department 30-75 days out. What a surprise I got when my flights were booked and sent to me exactly 75 days out. It turns out you have to work with them before that. I’m perfectly happy with my flight to Anchorage. It’s Alaska Air and connects through Seattle, getting me into Anchorage at 1pm on Saturday. My return flight? They booked me on Air Canada out of Vancouver at 11:30pm. I have to fly all the way over to Toronto to change planes before heading down to Dallas. That gets me in to day at 10:30am on the day I was planning on returning to work. 

I called the vacation planner. She said it was a misunderstanding. She gave me the number of the air department. All they could do for me was cancel the entire flight and keep 50% of my money or keep 100% of my money and allow me to book a different return flight. At the 60 day point the 50% refund goes down to 25%.

If I had booked the cruise in June, I probably would’ve just booked my own air because at that point I could’ve picked my flights for about $100 more than what I paid through NCL. The problem is the cheaper of the two flights would’ve been the one I wanted to keep. If I took either of their two options my flights would’ve gone up over 1,000 just for base tickets. And I always like to pay for additional legroom.

I ended up just keeping their flights.

Free at Sea Upgrade

The “Free At Sea” deal I booked under included all drinks up to $15. It did not include specialty coffee or bottled water. It also included $50 off of each excursion, two meals at specialty restaurants, and 150 minutes of WiFi. The WiFi part is the most ridiculous one. I told the vacation planner they might as well advertise “free cruises” then tell people only the first 150 minutes of the cruise are free.

I had to upgrade WiFi. That was going to cost me $200-300. For $294 I could just upgrade my Free at Sea and get more expensive drinks, unlimited WiFi, and two more specialty dinners. That’s what I did. Add in another $300. They also charged $156 beverage gratuity on the initial “Free at Sea.”

At first I thought the $50 off of excursions was a bunch of baloney sandwiches. Just mark the price up $50 and give everyone $50 off. But that doesn’t seem to be the case. There are some $50 excursions that you can book for free.

Cabin Upgrade

A couple weeks after booking I received an email with an opportunity to bid on upgrades. The minimum bids were $100 for an ocean view, $200 for a balcony, or $600 for a club suite. I didn’t see a large amount of value in the ocean view myself because I rarely used my window in Alaska last year. I did put in a $110 bid just to be ahead of any other minimum bidders. I put in a $310 bid on a balcony and did not bid on the suite. They say bids are evaluated 1-14 days before the cruise. I put those in three months out, but didn’t receive and upgrades.

Anchorage Accommodations

I struggled to find a hotel in Anchorage. Everything near downtown was $350 and up with extremely mixed reviews. There wasn’t much savings away from downtown. I was still going to pay $300/night and have to find transportation.

Even the Sheraton and Hilton hotels had bad reviews. Every hotel had these “old and dirty” reviews. The one I found that didn’t have those reviews was $900/night. If I were looking to start a business I would buy a hotel in Anchorage. It seems like you could make a fortune with just a  simple modern, clean hotel.

I decided to look at VRBO and Airbnb. I haven’t had much luck with these in the past. Normally the cleaning fees double the price of the room. Last year in Miami I had an apartment canceled last minute and wasn’t a huge fan of the one I ended up in.

For Anchorage VRBO seemed to have the ridiculous cleaning fees but Airbnb did not. I ended up booking an Airbnb. I’m taking a chance on a new listing with no reviews. The host has all great reviews at her other listing just a couple blocks away. That one is a bigger place with multiple rooms and it costs and additional $100/night.

I picked the new listing which is a smaller place but big enough for me. I know I’m taking a gamble on this one, but I figured I’m taking a gamble on any hotel I book with those reviews. At least this way I’m saving money. I paid $278 total for the two nights. That’s cheaper than one night in a hotel. We’ll see how it goes.

The location is just outside of downtown about a block away from the 49th State Brewing Company and about two blocks from the Trolley Station.

Anchorage Tours

My flight lands at 1pm and my Airbnb check-in time is 3pm. Maybe my room will be ready earlier. In Little Havana I booked a place to hold my suitcase on Luggage Hero, but I couldn’t find any listings for Anchorage. I may have to take my suitcase with me to lunch.

Since check-in is at 3pm I went ahead and booked the latest Anchorage trolley tour which is a 4-6pm.  They have a basic 1-hour tour for $25 and a deluxe 2-hour tour for $50. I want to see as much as I can during my time in Anchorage so I booked the deluxe tour. 

On the second day I booked a day trip to Matanuska Glacier. I’ve been wanting to walk on a glacier but I don’t want to have to fly to the glacier. You can’t really drive glaciers on cruise excursions, but you can from Anchorage.

I looked at a bunch of local companies. Some of them are closed on Sunday. One of them only booked private tours and another was just significantly more expensive for the same tour and required me to leave at 8am.

I ended up booking the Full-Day Matanuska Glacier Hike and Tour with Viator. The meeting spot is the trolley station which is two blocks from where I’m staying and it’s a 9:30 meet time so hopefully I can get coffee and breakfast before the tour. 

Alaska Railroad

One of the unique things about cruising from Seward is you can take the Alaska Railroad from the airport to the cruise terminal. I have heard it’s a scenic ride that lasts 4-5 hours. This was definitely on my list. To get on this railroad they recommend you have a flight that comes in by 11am. Because of that I had to at a minimum request a Sunday flight to ensure I would be there in time for the train. To ensure I had to spend time in Anchorage, I requested the Saturday flight that I got.

I had two options for booking the train ride. Through NCL I could book it as an excursion. They are giving me $50 off of excursions making it a $69 train ride. Or I could book directly through Alaska Railroad for $119. If I booked through the railroad my only option was a 6:45am train. With the cruise line my only option was 1pm. I decided to book through the cruise line and spend more time in Anchorage instead of getting on the ship earlier.

Excursions

Excursion decisions are much easier on your second trip to Alaska. Last time I did Tracy Arm Glacier Explorer, Mendenhall Glacier in Juneau, Eagles, Totems, & Lighthouses in Ketchikan, and Whale Watching in Icy Strait.

The main excursion I missed out on last year since it was early in the season was bears. I did get to see one bear on my Tracy Arm excursion. This time I want to see more. I researched the various bear watching locations available to me and found Neets in Ketchikan to be the best option. There was a cheaper option accessible by car in Ketchikan but my research said it wasn’t as reliable of a bear location as Neets.

Dog sledding in Juneau was an excursion I looked at last year. I had to pick between that and Mendenhall. I picked Mendenhall. Last year Skagway was replaced with Icy Strait but I knew if I went to Skagway, White Pass Railroad would be on the list. 

I’m a big fan of the Icy Strait cruise port. There’s an eagle that lives there. There’s a whale that lives there. There are bars and restaurants with good food and local beer. There’s the beach, the tram, the zipline, and the free cultural show.

Last time I missed the cultural show. This time I want to make sure I see it. I also want to take the tram up to the top of the mountain. This is a good place to mention the “Free at Sea” $50 off of excursions. I know that tram up to the top of the mountain cost $50 last year. You can book it for free through NCL. Instead of just booking the tram for free I booked one that includes a tour at the top of the mountain. That cost me $20 instead of $70.

I was not sure whether or not to book the Hubbard Glacier Explorer. For me Tracy Arm last year was a no-brainer. Tracy Arm isn’t out in the open so the ship didn’t get anywhere near as close as we did. Bonus I got to see a whale and a bear on that excursion so it was totally worth it.

In the videos I’ve seen of Hubbard, it looks like the ships are able to get pretty close to it. And the cost of that excursion was significantly more than what I paid for Tracy Arm. But I ended up booking it. I look at this as a once in a lifetime deal. While I think I’m going to come back to Alaska, I may never go back to Hubbard glacier and I don’t want to miss anything. 

I ended up adding the Goldbelt Tram in Juneau last minute. It’s one of those $50 excursions that you can book for free with the NCL Free At Sea. If I have time after dogsledding I’ll have that ticket in my back pocket and it didn’t cost anything.

Vancouver

I have a day to kill in Vancouver since my flight doesn’t leave until 11:30pm. I might do the Hop-on, Hop-off bus there.