An Alaska cruise tour is a seven day voyage of the glaciers cruise, combined with rail travel, combined with multiple overnight stays at wilderness lodges in Alaska.
And why would you take a cruise? You would take a cruise tour to experience Alaska's top two attractions, Glacier Bay National Park and Denali National Park. These are the top two attractions that you cannot miss when you visit Alaska. So a voyage of the glaciers cruise is a seven day one-way cruise between Whittier and Vancouver BC and you can choose to do this cruise northbound or southbound, so it goes both directions.
On this Alaska cruise tour, you'll go to Juno Ketchikan Skagway and you'll get two glacier experiences. Every cruise gets Glacier Bay National Park, and either College Fjord or Hubbard Glacier. Most people prefer Glacier Bay National Park because it is a protected national park that is highly regulated and not every cruise line gets to go into Glacier Bay.
Glacier Bay has many glaciers in it, but you enter the Bay and Park Rangers board the ship and they get on board and they give presentations and they really teach you about the wildlife and the area and all of the glaciers that you'll be seeing for that day.
You will see a Junior Rangers program where kids can take the oath to become a park ranger, which is super cute. And the pinnacle, the highlight of the day is when pulls up to Marjorie Glacier and each side of the ship gets to see it because the ship does a little turn, 360 turn and hopefully, if you're lucky, the glacier will calve and you will hear the magical sound of white thunder.
So you will definitely love Glacier Bay and it's a major highlight and we know it's a highlight because it's one of the top attractions for. Okay, so another part of the cruise tour experience is the train experience, it is direct to the wilderness rail service that takes you between the ship and one of our Denali aerial lodges.
And this Alaska cruise experience is in domed rail cars. The great land cause they're scenery everywhere and it's very comfortable. You can order a beverage up top or a meal downstairs. You can listen to the commentary of a tour guide that shows you all of the sites in the area. It's one of our most popular experiences and it really helps to bring Alaska to life.
So rounding out this cruise tour experience is Wilderness Lodges. They're only operational in the summer to serve our cruise tour guests. The biggest one is the Denali Princess Wilderness Lodge, and this is located about a mile outside of the park entrance and it's a hub of activities.
It's very special. We have a lot of great restaurants and land excursions that you can book it. It's right on the river. You will also see a new Fanny Q saloon there, which is really fun. This is a great, base camp for your Denali experience. The Den Princess on the other side of the National Park sits the Mount McKinley Princess Wilderness Lodge, and this actually sits within Denali State Park.
It's a very special place and it was built with the sole purpose of having a great view of Mount Denali. And it does also at this location; you will see Animal Planet Tree house that was featured on the pit show, Tree house Masters. One more attraction is mountain climber.
Every day, twice a day where you can hear the tale of a mountain climber who's climbed Mount McKinley now called Denali and hear their experiences and they'll, they let you play with their gear and show you their pictures from their climb. There is a lot going on at that location. There is one more lodge, the Kenai Princess Wilderness Lodge, and this is located on the Kenai River, and this is a very popular lodge.
It's only 86 rooms, and each room has its own wood burning fireplace, lots of recreational fishing there and rafting on the river. It's really a very special place. Our fourth lodge is the Copper River Princess Wilderness Lodge, and it's located on the boundary of Wrangles St. National Park, which is the largest national park in North.
And the Copper River Princess is again a smaller lodge. It's about 86 rooms and it offers a lot of really great excursions like fishing. You've heard of the famous Copper River Salmon. There's a lot of fishing in that area. ATVs, you can go into the National Park. It's a really special place. Our last lodge is the Fairbanks Princess Riverside Lodge, and this sits right on the Chena River and offers a great spot to start or end your Alaska Cruise tour.
So, as already mentioned that Denali National Park is one of the main reasons why people go. Go to Alaska and it is for good reason. Denali National Park is 6 million acres of spectacular wilderness. People go to Denali National Park to see the mountain called Denali, or the great one, people from all over the world travel to Alaska to try to summit Mount Denali.
Another reason why everyone is so interested in Denali National Park is for wildlife. There is an abundance of wildlife in Denali National Park and everyone's trying to hit the big five, which are bear, moose, caribou, wolves and doll sheep. So if you're lucky, you'll hit all five. Alaska cruise offers many cruise tour options there are some couple tips to help narrow those down.
So the first thing you should think about is, do you want cruise first and do your land after, or do you want do the land portion first and cruise later? People tend to want to do land first and cruise later, which is the southbound version. If you do the opposite direction, the northbound cruising first, doing the land later, there are good deals to be had on those cruise tours.
So if you're looking for a bargain that might be a good place to start. The cruise tours range from 10 nights to 17 nights, so there's a lot of variation there, so think about how much time you wanted to vote to that. If you're interested in doing a Denali National Park tour, one of the longer ones that we talked about, make sure you book a cruise tour that has two nights at the Denali Princess Wilderness Lodge.
One of the things that Princess does better than anybody else is it creates this very seamless cruise tour experience. It own and operate the lodges, the train, the buses, the crews, so it's one experience. It takes care of everything from luggage handling to key cards in your room, to booking your dinner reservations.
So, Alaska cruise is such a seamless experience, and you'll get to see the best of the great land. For those of you who are looking for a more immersive Alaska experience, a cruise tour could be a great option.
Hope this post about Alaska cruise been very helpful to you.
