<p>We sailed on June 1st last year and the weather was unseasonably warm so you just never know.</p>
<p>We went in late August 4-5 years ago and everyone wore heavy ski parkas! It was cold! But beautiful.</p>
<p>Would January be unbearably cold?</p>
<p>We went in early June one year and it was in the 80’s!</p>
<p>
None of the mainstream cruise lines cruise Alaska in January. The season is mid-May through September; then the ships reposition for the winter cruises (Mediterranean, Mexican, Caribbean).</p>
<p>Another type of vacation in Alaska would probably be cold, and remember, very dark.</p>
<p>We caught the last cruise of the season in September and all the towns along the cruiseline were closing up for the winter. Many of the yours and car rental places also were closing, as we’re the restaurants.</p>
<p>We had a lot of rain in the early part of our cruise last year in June. My co-worker just came back from roundtrip out of Seattle on the Oceanic, smaller ship and had picture perfect weather both on the cruise and in Seattle. She loved it but that itinerary does not include Glacier Bay. It did stop at Hubbard Glacier and Tracy Arm, as well as Victoria on the return trip to Seattle.</p>
<p>thanks for the timing tips, very helpful! </p>
<p>can someone please clarify why it was recommended to not do a roundtrip? or suggest a good place to read about Alaskan itineraries, sounds a bit daunting to me thus far…</p>
<p>We did the round trip in September, with Seattle as our port. It worked OK, but could have seen more if it was a one-way trip and our embark and return cities were different. We had mostly wonderful weather, with a small bit of drizzle, 9/15-22.</p>
<p>We did round trip and did not take any of the overland excursions. It just fit better into our schedule and budget. We enjoy Victoria so were thrilled that it stopped there on the way back to Seattle.</p>
<p>thanks, that whale watching excursion sounded great!</p>
<p>The White Pass and Yukon Railway is also great. I did RT Seattle and loved it . Of course, you see more of Alaska if you do it one way. But for the time I wanted to spend and budget, the RT was great. We enjoyed a couple of nice days in Seattle before the cruise.</p>
<p>lindz, go over to the other CC forum. . . cruisecritic dot com and on the top right-hand side of the page, click on Community and then Forums. You will find everything you wanted to know about cruises and more! Topics by cruise line, destination, cruising with families, cruise air fare, etc. etc.</p>
<p>Our cruise was round-trip from Seattle. I think the advocates of the “one-way” cruises say that because you get farther north and perhaps more spectacular scenery, although the scenery in Juneau-Skagway-Ketchikan is pretty darn spectacular too. The one-way cruises will have you flying into and out of different cities (usually) so that adds another wrinkle.</p>
<p>The other consideration is whether a cruise goes to Glacier Bay National Park (which is where we went and it was incredible) or Tracy Arm for glacier viewing.</p>
<p>Be aware that glaciers are what they call “scenic cruising” – you don’t get off the ship, but the ship comes very close to the glacier and slowly spins around, so everyone on both sides of the ship gets a view (or you can go up top and see all of it). The only way to actually “stand on a glacier” (from what I recall) is one of the helicopter tours.</p>
<p>I will also say that I don’t think a balcony is a “must” for Alaska. In fact, you can see more if you are on one of the upper open decks, where you can walk from side to side on the ship and see whatever’s there. Unless you get a great deal, I’d save the money on the balcony and use it towards excursions.</p>
<p>We opted for no balcony because we had a rather unpredictable young boy when we went on our cruise…</p>
<p>We had a mini suite with a balcony (perks of going with a travel agent). It was great because my son’s bed folded down from the ceiling and DD’s bed was below in the sofa.</p>
<p>We didn’t have a balcony on our Alaska cruise and didn’t feel we missed anything,especially there is a good chance it will be raining which it was and cold. There was plenty of room outside on the upper decks to see all. You do need to be prepared for spending time outdoor on the deck or your balcony with plenty of layers, gloves and either a hat or something to cover your ears.
The nice thing about Alaska cruising is that the day is long… very long. On our last night on the ship before docking in Whittier, sunset was after 11 PM. We did an Eastern Caribbean cruise this year and it was the reverse but we did enjoy our balcony on that ship and had some spectacular sunsets.</p>
<p>I loved our balcony. While we did a lot of glacier watching on deck, it was nice to be able to go out on the balcony and watch the scenery with a glass of wine while one of us was getting ready, or before dinner, or when I got up before he did, or whatever. I didn’t feel the need to rush out of the cabin because I might miss something! (We saw the only orca of our trip off the balcony.)</p>
<p>Another vote for using Cruise Critic to help plan an Alaskan or any other cruise. But for those who are interested in planning their own land trip to the interior as well as other advice on cruising options, I highly recommend the Alaska forum on TripAdvisor. I got very helpful advice there from expert members who were able to help with specifics of where to stay, where to eat, what to see, rental cars etc. If you post your proposed itinerary there, they will have great suggestions about whether it will work or not and will propose other alternatives. Invaluable!</p>