<p>We’re going to do a 7 day cruise from Whittier/Anchorage to Vancouver in August.</p>
<p>Anyone have any tips/advice to offer?</p>
<p>Avoid the mind-numbing fake jewelry seminars, and any or all shops recommended by the tour operators (they get a cut to shil).</p>
<p>We always booked our own excursions. It was cheaper and more suited to our tastes. In Skagway, instead of taking the train that everyone else was doing, we rented a car drove along side of the tracks but then went on farther and went to Carcross to see the world’s smallest desert (it is in the Yukon). We were able to stop and see anything that looked interesting.</p>
<p>In Juneau, we had some time on our hands and just picked up a tour to see bears. That was not a good tour. It was a trip to the dump and there were no bears but we did laugh and laugh about the guide. He was an original.</p>
<p>So do some research (which you are already doing) and see what is out there.</p>
<p>H and I are looking into doing one of the cruises out of our town. Thanks for the tip about bear excursion - LOL, a trip to the dump! 
Some CCers highly recommend Cruise Critic, and that’s what I’ve started to look at (google it - I cannot link it here).</p>
<p>There are always bears at dumps. Not only in Alaska. If you want to see grizzly bears in Glacier National Park, you go to the dump. If you have time after the cruise, take the train to Denali or do some fly-in fishing out of Anchorage.</p>
<p>robrym, of course, dumps are like 5-star restaurants for bears. We have black bears raiding trashcans and dumpsters in our neck of the woods. I’d love to see natural landscapes, even if they don’t have any animals. :)</p>
<p>If you want a chance to get right up close to a glacier at the waterline, I recommend the Glacier Point Wilderness Safari tour out of Skagway (that is the tour name under the HAL version; other lines may have a different name for it; don’t know if it is offered independently). </p>
<p>We did this back in 2004 with 13 and 11 year old sons. It has some physical elements via hiking and canoe paddling, but that was needed after two days of doing not much more than eating.</p>
<p>Look it up on the Holland America website if this kind of thing interests you. If you have further questions I will respond. Thread bookmarked.</p>
<p>If you can afford it, get a cabin with a balcony. We were out on ours all the time. We lucked out and got upgraded to one. It was great! And take binoculars, one for each person because sometimes you won’t want to share. Pack gloves and hats as it is cold by the glaciers.</p>
<p>Rain gear. Take rain gear.</p>
<p>Added to dmd77’s post: Make it GOOD rain gear. We got great goretex stuff (jackets and pants) at REI, and were happy as clams (and about as wet) while others were moping around cold and damp. Can’t go to places that get 150" of rain a year and not expect some!</p>
<p>Second the suggestion of arranging your own tours – not only will you save some $, but you’ll generally be in much smaller groups. We had a great float down the Chilkoot River. Sea kayaking sounded great, but it was unfortunately too foggy.</p>
<p>At one stop, we just walked along a dock and found a local boat owner to take us out. We wanted to see whales, which did not happen to be in the area, but we saw eagles, seals/sea lions–do not remember for sure, and other wildlife. The guy also told us where to watch for whales once the ship set sail that afternoon and we saw whales where he told us we would.</p>
<p>We have done the Alaska cruise twice, we love it. I second the rain gear, hats/gloves for Glacier Bay. Add bug spray. Extra socks (dry feet make everything better). We had our then 7 yr old D with us the second time, hiked the Chilkoot trail and did the river float, she LOVED it. Saw a pod of humpback whales breeching another day. </p>
<p>Cruise Critic is wonderful. I used the resources extensively for a Mexico cruise and couldn’t have been happier. I tend to book my own excursions for those close to port, but for the zipline outside of PV Mexico, I booked through the ship. Not worth the stress of worrying about missing the ship.</p>
<p>We have cruised HAL (love it, but not great for teens) and RC…RC is better for our family. D loved the rock wall, and they had more teen “stuff”.</p>
<p>Spend as little time as possible shopping for souveniers. There’s nothing there you really need and it will be overpriced.</p>
<p>Onward - I hope you at least saw a lot of eagles at the Juneau dump!</p>
<p>If you like hiking, many of these ports - especially Juneau and Skagway, have nice trails right out of the town center. I like the train trip out of Skagway, because you don’t have to worry about driving and the scenery is great. </p>
<p>Have a great time!</p>
<p>We did do excursions from the ship, too. We did the white water rafting, the train trip, and the guys went salmon fishing. We all enjoyed our trips. My then young son caught a sea bass and they had it dried and shipped home, an expense we would have skipped had he not been a little kid.</p>
<p>Thanks! I’m already on Cruise Critic (different user name), and I’ve gotten lots of advice there, too. But I trust our College Confidential community, so figure I’d post here as well!</p>
<p>I’m a little worried about booking my own excursions on our first trip out, but I may go that way as well.</p>
<p>If you are concerned about booking excursions on your own, you might call/email the vendors you are considering directly. See what the response time is to your inquiry, etc. Sometimes on Cruise Critic there are threads for specific sailings, you can see if there is one for your trip, someone might have done some of the research already.</p>
<p>For some things, I really do only book through the ship. It’s just less stressful. Those tend to be things really important to one of us (swim with dolphins), farther from the ship (zipline in PV Mexico), or a situation where I want to know the cruise line has done the safety/background check (helicopter tour to top of a glacier–DH loved it). The sightseeing around town stuff we do on our own…most towns in Alaska are easily walkable. Juneau has an amazing museum that we really enjoyed. Sitka has a beautiful Russian Orthodox (sp) Church.</p>
<p>If you stop in Skagway, go to the Skagway Brewery for a pint of the Spruce Tip ale. It’s brewed with the tender new shoots from spruce trees. Really wonderful and high in vitamin C.</p>
<p>If there is a trip to observe sea otters in the wild, do it! My Alaska cruise was almost 20 years ago, and my mom and I still talk about those otters playing in the kelp and looking at us.</p>