no1racefan1

I saw that mentioned here on CC, but I haven't seen it anywhere when I sign on to Princess. Oh well, from what I've read the earlier prices are still the same or cheaper than the 'sale'. I think they raised prices on excursions and then put them on sale to the original price, lol.

They were available to book when the cruise opened up (so Feb 2023 I think?) although they added more throughout those first several months. And of course, pricing, scheduling, and availability has fluctuated.

We are only 122 days away from touching down in Alaska!! Can't believe we started at 400+ days. DH called today to reserve our dog sitter. It's a big expense but she'll come to our house 3x per day to feed, walk, play with, and (if necessary) clean up after our dog. Our dog gets to stay in her home, where she's comfortable, and we can check on her with our Ring cam. So the expense is worth it! Haven't looked at shore excursions for awhile so decided to check just so I could share information with you all! First of all, is it just me or has there been a minor redesign on the website? This looks different: Check out the excursion we have booked in Skagway. We booked for the morning time slot at $164.95 when it was the only time slot available. Then they raised the price a month or two ago. Now they've opened up a second time at the lower price. If anybody reading this had booked the earlier one at $199.95, I'd consider switching!

Great deal! Our flight leaves at 5:15am but at least it's from our hometown 😴

I found who I think is the tour operator for this particular excursion, and they have great reviews on TripAdvisor, even in May. I'm waiting to hear from DH though--I sent him the excursion and the reviews and told him to decide if he still wants to try it. I don't really know what he's looking to get out of it, LOL.

I love Alaska Airlines. They were our airline of choice when we had to drive two hours to get to an airport. Now, United is serving our local airport, so we use them. But I'd choose Alaska if I had a chance 🙂 We're flying United to Denver and then switching to Alaska Airlines to Anchorage next spring. Their west coast flight times/options are so much better, and we've always had excellent service from them. Also they have their $99 companion fare if you get their credit card, although I'm pretty sure it can't be used in first class.

Yeah, I don't know if its unusual or not, but many excursions have gone up by $20-$50! Maybe they had them listed at last year's prices until they confirmed with the vendors for 2024? I'm not sure, I'm just glad we booked early. Ex. the Ketchikan fishing excursion I booked for DH at $369.95 is now listed at $419.95.

As soon as you know what you want. On our 2024 Alaska cruise, several excursions are already sold out and most of them have gone up in price since we booked.

Honestly the time to reserve it was last summer.

Not an issue in theory, but some shore excursion times end up getting changed. Last summer there was a lady who had to cancel and rebook excursions three times because they kept getting changed and overlapping each other. Just something to be aware of. I'd have a plan B just in case you have to cancel one of them.

Thanks, I'll mention this to DH.

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season! This morning I did a quick perusal of all of our trip reservations and discovered that one of our flights has gone down in price. I was able to cancel and rebook, saving us 2,000 miles. It's not a lot, but I'm grateful to get those miles back since I'm trying to save enough miles to upgrade our seats! When you book things far in advance, you should always regularly check reservations for any price changes. I also checked in on Princess excursions just so I could share information with you all--the Hubbard Glacier excursion is, for the first time, under 20 spots available!! This being five months out, that's a good indication of how quickly this excursion can sell out. DH is still the only person booked on his fishing excursion, but I'm sure that will change.

Use the hangtag on the door. Do not call. Do not use the app. Do not pass go. Do not collect $200. 😉

No it is not.

There is such a misconception on CC about ship-sponsored excursions being all big, obnoxious, less enjoyable, etc. We've had exceptional tours through the cruiselines, you just have to do your research and know what you are getting. Our experiences (from various cruise lines) have included: Rainforest & Waterfall Hike on Maui--8 people on the tour, and the guide was a 20+ year local (actually relocated from MT, as almost everybody we met in Hawaii had moved there from somewhere else). It was a muddy, wet, active, fabulous excursion! Volcano Hike in Hilo--6 people on the tour and the guide was also weirdly from MT. She worked for a local tour company. We walked across an old volcano, visited the national park, and then since we were three couples (all strangers) celebrating anniversaries, she let us vote to get back a little bit late in order to take a detour to see a black sand beach. It was amazing and so was she! Private Beach Getaway in Cozumel--this was probably the biggest ship excursion we've been on and I think it was about 20 ppl. We were taken by bus to a beach house and waited on hand and foot while we laid on the beach, got massages, etc. They made fresh guacamole for everyone, including making a special batch for my DH who's allergic to onions. Then they cooked lunch for us right on the grill and brought us whatever we wanted. It was heaven and DH tipped them very generously, lol. Helicopter to Dogsledding Camp in Juneau--Only us and one other couple in the helicopter--I think there was one other helicopter. This is very obviously a local tour company as I think most of them are in Alaska, contracted by the cruise line. It was a magical experience and probably what sold me on cruising and cruise excursions. We have, on occasion, also done things on our own in ports, but if I'm booking tours I almost always book through the ship. It's not even about the whole 'getting back to ship' thing. It's just the ease of booking through the cruise line, getting tickets in our cabin, being directed where to go, and having all the scheduling arranged for us. Never have to worry if the ship arrives late, departs late, doesn't make it to a port, etc. Don't have to coordinate or communicate with any tour operators. It's all arranged. Just tell me where to go, lol. Some places we could have saved a few bucks probably; however, I've noticed especially in AK that booking direct is the same price or nearly the same price as booking through the cruise line. Might as well let them do all the work!

Glacier Bay and Inside Passage are different places and not related to each other. If a ship is going to Glacier Bay, it will be clearly listed as part of the itinerary: Note that inside passage is not listed as part of the itinerary, as it's just part of the ship's route. You can see from the map somebody else posted that Royal class ships must sail to the west of Vancouver Island, thus not sailing the 'true' inside passage. (I say 'true' because a lot of round-trip itineraries are called Inside Passage, and may or may not be sailing to the west of Vancouver Island depending on class of ship. The terminology is misleading.)

My understanding is you can check your bag through to your cruise ship when you get on the train in Anchorage.

If you decide to stay at Harbor 360, it is owned by Major Marine, and you can get a discount at the hotel if you book a tour through them. Or vice versa, I can't remember. At any rate, call and ask about booking the two together!

You can buy gift cards at an 8% discount from AARP Rewards. Search the boards for AARP gift cards, there are a lot of threads.

Yes, the ship water is fine! We bring refillable bottles too. I like to have the bottled water on hand in case we're hanging out somewhere and forget to bring our bottle to fill, or to take off the ship, or to have in the cabin chilled.... we just really like water, lol

Yesterday I took care of some loose ends! I reserved bikes for our first morning in Anchorage from Pablo's Bike Rentals so we can ride the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail. They have a really generous cancellation policy, which is nice in case we need it. I also prepaid crew appreciation and a case of water. My original plan was to buy another discounted Princess gift card from AARP and then apply this onboard to pay for crew appreciation; however, with all the little changes Princess keeps making, I was worried they might decide to increase prices, so I just went ahead and paid those. I decided to cancel my Lumberjack Show excursion. I just wasn't that excited about it and I kind of felt like I booked it just to have something to do that day while DH goes fishing. I think instead, I'm going to take a 'me' day and book a massage in Ketchikan, walk around, and enjoy some time on the ship with fewer people. I thought I'd share a budget update since I haven't done so in awhile. The column on the left is budgeted and the column on the right is what I've actually spent. I update the left hand side once I know for sure what the amount is. I'm sharing my budget because going to Alaska can be very expensive, and I want to show that it is possible to do it on a budget (kind of!). This is still more than we spend on most trips and I was hoping to get it under $7K, but I don't think that's realistic unless we cut out some of the things we really want. We have tried to focus the bulk of our spending on tours/experiences. The biggest remaining item we have some control over is meals, so I'm open to any suggestions on how to reduce expenses there!

I just don't see the benefit in spending who knows what amount of time on the phone trying to get it fixed. What would we gain by having him recognized as sailing once previously? Unless we are trying for elite or platinum or whatever it is...which we're not.

Yes, he should be. For some reason their system isn't recognizing him.

Hmm, can you try and speak to somebody else? We haven't sailed Princess since 2006, and mine came right up when I signed in to the Princess website to book our cruise for next year. I was actually able to sign in using my same email address, I just had to reset the password since I hadn't been on the site in years. It's not recognizing my DH as a returning cruiser but since I don't see any benefit to him being gold instead of blue (or whatever the colors are) I decided not to pursue it.

I logged on yesterday via Chrome with no issues.