Which land tour in alaska on star princess

HI, PLANNING ON GOING TO ALASKA NEXT JULY. WE ARE DECIDING IF WE SHOULD TAKE THE 13 Nights Off The Beaten Path T6akb6 OR THE 13 Nights Denali Explorer T6ajb6. ANY HELP WOULD BE APPRECIATED...THANKS:confused:

Each tour is different, so you have to decide for yourself what you want to see. Do plenty of research on the Alaska board on locations and prioritize.

Personally would recommend avoiding the McKinley Lodge if possible (this lodge is 45 minutes west of Talkeetna, and the only real activity there is looking at the mountain. Everything else requires a ride back into town.

Also, if your Denali Lodge includes the Natural History Tour, try to upgrade to the Tundra Wilderness Tour. The latter is 8-9 hours long, but goes much farther into the park. Or set up a bus ride with the park service (the main bus is not a guided tour, though). This does require two nights in Denali.

Personally would recommend avoiding the McKinley Lodge if possible (this lodge is 45 minutes west of Talkeetna, and the only real activity there is looking at the mountain. Everything else requires a ride back into town.

 

First of all, I recommend that whichever tour you take should spend two nights at each location. With only one night, you really have no time to see much of the area.

Personally, I recommend the McKinley Lodge. Yes, it is an hour ride to or from Talkeetna, but we did have activities from the Lodge. See our report at http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1727858 to see what we did at each lodge we were at.

I suggest taking a flightseeing tour or other nature related tours from Mt Mckinley lodge. We booked a flightseeing tour but unfortunately bad weather forced the cancellation of flights that day.

Do note McKinley lodge use satellite internet due to its remoteness - every internet connection available on lodge is very very slow and is only enough for basic web surfing or facebook postings.

If your cruisetour does not include the Tundra Wilderness Tour, ask ur TA to upgrade the complimentary Natural History Tour..it cost us about US$55 per pax(was charged in our local currency). Remember to bring along some food for meals as the provided lunch pack is quite miserly and is more like a snack pack.

hi

we have never done a cruise tour before or been on princess line but have done 5 cruises

we have booked rocky maintianeer first 9 nights then star princess cruisetour OA6 to faibanks

my query relates to meals on land part says we have voucher for one entree +dessert plus tax this relates to breakfast ? not sure what a entree breakfast is ??

can somebody help??

also do you have assigned seats in the train part of land tour??:confused:

The KB6 tour includes a catamaran trip across Prince William sound, a stay at the much smaller Copper River Princess lodge, a bus trip across the Denali highway, as well as 2 nights at Denali but not Fairbanks. Few people get to Wrangell-St Elias National Park so I would opt for the KB6.

The KB6 tour includes a catamaran trip across Prince William sound, a stay at the much smaller Copper River Princess lodge, a bus trip across the Denali highway, as well as 2 nights at Denali but not Fairbanks. Few people get to Wrangell-St Elias National Park so I would opt for the KB6.

Thats what we ended up booking. 2 nights at Denali, but really looking forward to a glacier landing in Talkeetna. And the train trip there. Hopefully that catamaran is not a sea sickness kind. I hear it goes pretty fast which is better than wallowing slowly.

We just did the Off the Beaten Path KB6 tour combined with Star Princess, last week of July and first week of August this year. Absolutely fantastic. We really enjoyed each location, with Copper River being by far, our favorite stop. Talkeetna was wonderful, some great food and atmosphere, very quaint.

Denali was good, we enjoyed the 5 hour natural history tour which was included - for us, it fit our plans well.

We really appreciated not being tied into the Princess meal plans as we had many more options to eat and enjoy variety. Plus, way less expensive, at least for us, than the added meal plans were. The food at the lodges is good, it just gets repetitive. We enjoyed the flexibility of eating off site, especially at Denali, with lots of options in easy walking distance, and Talkeetna with some excellent choices..

The catamaran ride across the sound was a great way to arrive at the ship. We had really calm waters, which -from the crew - is pretty normal and no one was running off to the bathrooms ill. It's a large, high speed cat, with a spacious open deck if needed also. We loved it..

Have a great time. We thoroughly enjoyed it. The

hi

we have never done a cruise tour before or been on princess line but have done 5 cruises

we have booked rocky maintianeer first 9 nights then star princess cruisetour OA6 to faibanks

my query relates to meals on land part says we have voucher for one entree +dessert plus tax this relates to breakfast ? not sure what a entree breakfast is ??

can somebody help??

also do you have assigned seats in the train part of land tour??:confused:

We are booked on OB6 which is the same as your connoisseur cruise tour but we tour first and cruise afterward. Check out caribill's thread HERE. (It's the same one he posted above.) It has a LOT of info regarding the connoisseur cruise tour - including info about the meals.

We are booked on OB6 which is the same as your connoisseur cruise tour but we tour first and cruise afterward. Check out caribill's thread HERE. (It's the same one he posted above.) It has a LOT of info regarding the connoisseur cruise tour - including info about the meals.

Definitely agree. I used Caribill's post to answer all my questions and another vote for the Connoisseur 6 day tour, which gives you 2 nights at each lodge.

We're doing the JB6 cruise tour in august 2016.

And I read Carbill's report and actually decided against the connoisseur package. We're arriving in Fairbanks the day before so booked an extra night with Princess at the beginning. So 3 nights in Fairbanks, 2 nights in Denali, 2 at McKinley and then the train to the ship. We'll be staying a night in Vancouver at the end as well.

Sounds WONDERFUL! First time for us for ... well basically all of it.

Hope the OP has a great time. :)

We just did the Off the Beaten Path KB6 tour combined with Star Princess, last week of July and first week of August this year. Absolutely fantastic. We really enjoyed each location, with Copper River being by far, our favorite stop. Talkeetna was wonderful, some great food and atmosphere, very quaint.

 

Denali was good, we enjoyed the 5 hour natural history tour which was included - for us, it fit our plans well.

 

We really appreciated not being tied into the Princess meal plans as we had many more options to eat and enjoy variety. Plus, way less expensive, at least for us, than the added meal plans were. The food at the lodges is good, it just gets repetitive. We enjoyed the flexibility of eating off site, especially at Denali, with lots of options in easy walking distance, and Talkeetna with some excellent choices..

 

The catamaran ride across the sound was a great way to arrive at the ship. We had really calm waters, which -from the crew - is pretty normal and no one was running off to the bathrooms ill. It's a large, high speed cat, with a spacious open deck if needed also. We loved it..

 

Have a great time. We thoroughly enjoyed it. The

Thankyou. That sounds fabulous.

More questions. Love the sound of the catamaran entry to the ship. When were you processed for the cruise? Did you just pull up on the Cat and then board the ship? James Bondish hey? The open deck will be great.

Agree about the meals. We dont usually need much food so self selection will work for us.

Did you do a review? Would love to read it.

Started Carbill's review last night which is wonderfull. Thanks for the links Carbill.

Thankyou. That sounds fabulous.

More questions. Love the sound of the catamaran entry to the ship. When were you processed for the cruise? Did you just pull up on the Cat and then board the ship? James Bondish hey? The open deck will be great.

 

Agree about the meals. We dont usually need much food so self selection will work for us.

 

Did you do a review? Would love to read it.

 

Started Carbill's review last night which is wonderfull. Thanks for the links Carbill.

The catamaran pulled up to the pier right next to Star. We disembarked onto land, went through check-in and boarded. Took about 15 minutes. Very cool sail in, watching the ship in the distance from larger, surrounded by the mountains and glaciers..it was great.

No review, sorry - not my thing really. Happy to answer any questions though.

We found the connoisseur tours would have been significantly more money for the meal plan addition, and we didn't spend anywhere near that amount with eating and drinking as we wanted, and having the various town, etc options. I personally don't see what the appeal there would be, except for the no-rhinking idea I suppose - if you're tied to the resorts restaurants for all meals, I suppose it's that much easier - we thoroughly enjoyed having the various options though.

Have a great time, you won't regret it!

Thanks reedprincess. Sounds just what we need. What time did you arrive at the ship? I have a few chores I need to attend to on boarding. :p.

I get frustrated waiting to eat and eating when there are so many new things to see, so a meal on the run, or even skipping the meal is best for us.

We arrived at the ship aboit 4:30/5. We didn't leave Whittier till late, I think it was 8:30. That first night, every dining room Is Anytime Dining due to the late departure, so now worries on when to eat or dining times. We went after muster drill, which was at 8.

It worked well for us, we really enjoyed the tour, arriving by catamaran, the little later boarding for ease of check-in, etc..

Have a great time!

We arrived at the ship aboit 4:30/5. We didn't leave Whittier till late, I think it was 8:30. That first night, every dining room Is Anytime Dining due to the late departure, so now worries on when to eat or dining times. We went after muster drill, which was at 8.

 

It worked well for us, we really enjoyed the tour, arriving by catamaran, the little later boarding for ease of check-in, etc..

 

Have a great time!

Yes. Sailway is 8.30pm. It sounded from the itinerary it would be a few hours travel. I can understand why people do the land tour first. The next day being Hubbard at around 3pm will make for a restful day.

Yes. Sailway is 8.30pm. It sounded from the itinerary it would be a few hours travel. I can understand why people do the land tour first. The next day being Hubbard at around 3pm will make for a restful day.

Exactly. It was perfect for us, especially with not arriving to the Glacier area till early afternoon - it was wonderful to unpack completely, relax and recover from the land portion with the cruise afterwards.

We really enjoyed it. Hope you do also.