Hoyaheel

HAL & Princess Alaska cruises are typically not too far apart in price. My first AK cruise was HAL, my 2nd on Princess (on Pacific Princess, though, which sort of doesn't count because it's so small - but that's our preference). The 2007 AK trip I did with my husband was great - we flew to Fairbanks and rented a car, stayed in town 2 nights then outside with family for 3 nights, then drove to Anchorage and dropped off the car (we saw more wildlife on our drive than many saw on the Princess excursion up to Denali, from talking to people who did that) and used a Princess transfer from ANC to Whittier. We booked that trip through Costco, I think.

As we're American, I can't speak to specifics of various travel agencies but would second the recommendation to keep looking around. Cruisecompete is the service where you submit your cruise wish and different agencies bid on it - not sure it works in the UK though.

Good luck - Alaska is gorgeous! We pretty much sat on our balcony ALL the time (not interested in entertainment on the ship either - had wine on the balcony, binoculars, and lots of entertainment outside!) Our trip was the last of the season for Pacific Princess- just after the beginning of Sept (was about to say Labor Day but as you're British that won't mean anything ;-) Salmon were mostly done spawning and dying in the rivers but we saw a TON of bears, so that was a good trade-off. I'd like to go earlier to have better whale sightings -we saw beluga whales in Turnagin Arm on our bus drive to Whittier (we had time to stop and take photos - great bus driver!) and I saw a few at one point way in the distance, but it was quite late for the humpbacks. Ah well - next time! (I think some who did specific whale watching tours on smaller boats were able to go out to where they'd been spotted and have better luck - we just opted not to do that - but I will next time!)