Thanks for the feedback. The Alaska Dream Cruises experience sounds like it would be totally awesome for me, and I'll have to put it on my list to do sometime, but I don't think the rest of the family would appreciate it as much.

I've cruised Alaska 3 times now, on RCL (7-day from Seattle), CCL (10-day from San Francisco), and most recently Princess (14-day from Vancouver). The best experience we had was probably the Princess cruise - better food, we got to sail through Glacier Bay National Park, and it was a nice long trip (7-day back to back's from Vancouver - Whittier and Whittier - Vancouver). Princess also offers land tours, e.g. Vanouver - Whittier 7-day cruise + 3 days in their lodges to visit Denali. I haven't done that, but friends said it was nice. We didn't want the 9-hr train ride since we took a 15-month old with us that trip, and preferred to just stay on the ship and round-trip it (we saw Juneau, Skagway, Ketchikan, and GBNP each twice. We saw College Fjord on the way up and Hubbard Glacier on the way back.

As far as timing, if you go later in the season the mosquitos (AK state bird) will be out in force. We went June 8-22 this year and only really saw them in Whittier on 6/15; the rest of the stops we didn't see many, but we didn't do a lot of hiking in the woods either at any of the stops.

Side of the ship doesn't matter much; you'll be going up the inside passage so you'll be able to sit on the balcony and watch the scenery go by from either side. I didn't notice much difference in wildlife from either side, on any of our trips. I'd definitely get a balcony if you can swing it; there's a lot more scenery in Alaska than say the Caribbean (which is mostly just looking at open water unless you're in port). As you cruise the passage and get closer to the glaciers, you'll see seals on the ice flows, sometimes see whales, etc.

ALL the pools on the Sapphire Princess were heated this year, including the outdoor ones. They'd be steaming in the mornings on the back deck. There was also an "indoor" pool there which was nice - you don't freeze in the wind when getting out to dry off. The pools on the RCL ship we sailed in 2017 were not heated, so we only used the hot tub. I don't recall on the CCL Miracle but don't believe Carnival heats any of their pools.

If you need excursion ideas or providers, shoot me a PM with your email address and I can send you all my stuff from our 3 cruises - who we booked with, what we did, costs, etc. You can also get a lot of ideas over at the cruisecritic forums. And before you book anything, once you figure out some dates and ships, it's worth submitting a request on cruisecompete - it's a reverse auction for travel agents to bid on sailings. We've gotten some incredible deals that way (e.g. 14-day cruise out of Rome for 2 people in a balcony for $3400 TOTAL (not each)).... vs. $6500 direct from the line or other travel agents. After I booked, they threw in 2 free dinners at the steakhouse on board, in addition to some OBC, as a thank you.

If binocs don't come with your cabin, bring your own! We saw SO MUCH wildlife. Sadly, very few other people availed themselves of their balconies - we saw bears swimming and were talking about it at dinner -the naturalists were the only others who we talked to the rest of that cruise who saw the same thing. We firmly believe there's no bad weather, just bad clothing, so we're prepared. We've lucked out - our trips have been Sept and the weather has been fabulous. We haven't done the train/land trips from Princess or HAL but had family living in Delta Junction at one point, so we rented a car and stayed with them, then drove to Whittier to get on the cruise....Saw moose, lynx on that drive ;-) My in-laws rented an RV and traveled all around Alaska at one point - my MIL kept telling us we would love it. I finally said - your son and I hate to drive on vacation and neither of us like camping at this age either. Exactly what about rving would we "love"? Driving around is freaking amazing, so she got us there.

I sailed on Coral Princess Whittier to Vancouver in June 2019. Coral Princess is the perfect size ship for this itinerary. We had a balcony cabin at the very back of the ship that had views over the side and back, cabin E 736. If we wanted to go to the back viewing deck which was never crowded, the door was right outside our cabin. We spent 7 days pre cruise in a rental car and visited Seward, Matanuska Glacier, and some other small towns. That was the best part of the trip, better than the cruise. For more info on Princess in Alaska look at cruise critic. The trouble with the giant ships is too many people in the small town ports at the same time. Coral Princess holds 2000 pax, a good size.

If you do the land portion with Princess, be aware that off-peak (May & September) I've seen a LOT of reports of lackluster service due to not having enough staff. Most of the jobs in the resorts are college students that come in for the summer, and a lot of them are only there June-August due to class schedules. So things like cold food, VERY long (45-60min+) wait times for food, etc and generally poor dining experiences seemed to be the norm in the early part of the season this year.

Congrats on planning your first Alaska cruise. I've never traveled with young kids, so can't give you specifics related to them, but here are my thoughts given that you will not be choosing an adult-only line:

Cruise Line: We thought that for a big ship, Celebrity did a good job.

Side of ship: If you can get it shore-facing, that is a plus. I would not choose a cruise just based upon availability of shore-facing suites. Often, the shore is quite a distance without recognizable features.

Time of year: If you think snow on ground is scenic, go for the earliest cruise available. Otherwise, weather is variable and unpredictable. We have had some of the best weather in September, a time when we were told it is too "iffy."

Itinerary: Yep-Glacier Bay is the way to go, if you can. If not, you will return to Alaska someday and see it.

If you start to settle on a particular cruiseline, lots of people here can give you better information. Also, check out Cruisecritic.com for reviews and helpful threads for each cruiseline and each ship and each voyage.

Bon voyage!

We did RCCL 1 way from Vamcouver to Seward in early June of 2023 and a land tour as far north as Fairbanks(20+ hours of daylight is a trip).

Weather was great but you need to be prepared for anything at any time.

On the Radiance of the seas the outdoor pools were heated and were hotter than the hot tub. This was a great break after a port day.

We didn't see Glacier Bay but did see Hubbard. They did have a naturalist on the boat talking and answering questions. My research suggested that you have more time seeing Glacier Bay but Hubbard is closer and more expansive. But weather and other ships could make either experience vary. We balanced the less time from Hubbard by hiking on and to glaciers in our excursions. In Seward we took a small ship to Kenai Fords NP where we were close to a Glacier and had a great day.

For 1 way crusies that take the inside passage the side of the ship matters less as you will have land on both sides for some parts.

For cabin selection we had 1 balcony and got lucky to get a second balcony for less that it would have been straightaway via the last minute upgrade program all lines seem to have these days. Again availability will drive this opportunity. We had inside cabins as well which we have had on other ships and are fine with.

If price is a factor i would recommend spending on excursions over the cabin. We tried to get out of town at least part of each port day to experience the land. We have many more memories of those different places vs our cabin. We also found lots of viewpoints on the ship, like at dinner where we were close to windows that was 1.5 hours of view each night. But if you spend alot of time in the cabin not sleeping then it should be a higher priority.

We also used an RV and train to get around for our land tour, but we like these modes of transportation. The RV(not the latest model year but was still nice) was similar in cost to renting a large suv even if you were not using it for accommodations(we only used it for sleeping one night where a child and adult fit better in thr RV). Gas may have put it over the top but our grouo appreciated the ability to move around while driving.

For planning, I started from the cruise ship land tours to get ideas and if you are a planner you can find what that they have and do it independently. You want the train car they have with a outside balcony you can do it independently, you want the nice lodge outside of Denali you can book it independently, you want cabin on the river in Fairbanks you can book it independently. You just have to put more effort into getting between places in interior Alaska. Again train and Rv/car are the most available options, bus a little less, but you really need to plan them all out.

My experience has been the opposite in regards to glacier bay and hubbard. Hubbard in particular can be *very* variable on whether you can get anywhere near to it. If I remember properly, I think I've had 3 trips that had Hubbard on the itinerary. One of those ended up in fog and ice, and by the time things cleared enough they didn't have time to go anywhere near. One ran into enough ice far enough out that it didn't go all that close (like, we could see it on the horizon, but it wasn't exactly what I'd call a glacier experience). The other made it basically I think to the entrance of Disenchantment bay, but was still pretty disappointing far away in my opinion. On that trip, we did the "small" boat excursion that took us closer, and I'm glad we did, because it was far better than what we'd have gotten from the ship. That said, I've heard of ships that made it about as far in as the small boat goes too, so it just really depends on conditions. I will say, since Hubbard is actually a *growing* glacier, it's exceptionally active along the front, and is probably one of your best chances of seeing calving of any of the glaciers.

Meanwhile, every trip I've done in Glacier Bay we seemed to get pretty decently close (and I'd say closer than anything but the small boat trip in hubbard). And we've made it on every trip. One of those, even the naturalist on the ship was impressed, saying it was the closest she'd seen the ship get.

If you can get to it, Hubbard might be marginally more impressive because of the activity. But the reliability of actually getting to it leaves a lot to be desired, while the glacier bay trips generally seem to have a much better track record of actually making it (although I know even those sometimes run into problems).

I think you prove the point of variability and I don't know if I got lucky(we did get close and saw alot of calving) or you got unlucky relative to Hubbard. Also since I have never been to Glacier I don't have any comparisons to know if you were lucky in your trips there.

It's a data sample size problem, I wonder if there has been research on how often and how close ships get in the Hubbard vs Glacier debate. The individual cruise lines will brag about where they go so marketing tends to cloud their discusion of it.

To give you an idea here is a view including the ship for scale as we turned away and left we were a little closer than this for the 360 turn the ship made. Back to the posters question about side of ship since they turned 360 at the glacier then the side of ship did not matter in this instance.


Hubbard from Radiance of the seas balcony.

LOL! I get plenty of snow on the ground here in Boston in winter time, thank you very much.

We're going in late June or July based in large part on kids' school schedules.

If you are choosing betwen the Coral and the Island, take the Coral. The Island is the most-hated ship by Princess cruisers. They started life as sister ships, but the Island was chopped up to add more cabins. The outcry was so bad that the Coral was spared that fate.
Cunard has not yet released 2026 Alaska sailings, you are correct. Holland has released Alaska 2026 dates now.

I am putting down a deposit on a southbound sailing on the Coral Princess in July. Thank you everyone for your advice.

I do see that HAL has released their 2026 Alaska sailings, but I am guessing they haven't yet published all the fares. Every single southbound sailing for the entire 2026 season on both ships only has interior and oceanview cabins for sale. Not a single verandah or suite is available. I am skeptical they are all already sold out.

I didn�t get here in time but like your choice. We sailed Sapphire Princess from Vancouver to Whittier. We couldn�t be more pleased with the Princess experience and are looking forward to our 4th cruise with them in April. They have an exceptional kids program. We took the grandkids with us in June to the western Caribbean and the kids (8+11) begged to go to the club every night.

We sailed the inside passage on the port side and still saw lots of land - not to mention whales - from our balcony. It�s also a very gentle trip up to a point. We enjoyed the Lumberjack show in Ketchikan-hokey but fun and I know most kids would like it. Our Juneau whale watching tour was a bust - never got close, but it�s luck of the draw. We visited College fjord and Hubbard glacier. The sound of the glaciers was surprising. Skagway was a hike to the waterfall and lunch at the brewery. Great trip. Just a bear getting back to the east coast from Anchorage. Plan on staying an extra day or flying on a redeye.

A travel advisor may be able to add extra on board credit and Princess lets you transfer the booking to one.

Whether or not you do that, consider the Princess Plus package. Even if you are not drinkers, it is a good value as it includes gratuities, wi-fi, drinks and more.

Thanks, that's what I am doing. I'm using an agency that responded to my Cruise Compete request. I'm getting the same base price as with Princess directly, but through the agency I'm getting a bit more in Princess on-board credit, as well as just over $1,000 additional in discount and/or on-board credit from the agency.

I am booking as Plus. I keep debating whether I want to book the Premiere package or not -- not so much for drinks, as we're not huge drinkers, but more so for 4 Wi-Fi devices vs. 1 and the additional premium and casual dining options being included.

Any thoughts on Plus vs. Premiere?