narsibvl

Sorry to revive an old post

 

I got assigned this cabin for my cruise based on a guarantee.

 

Do you mind sharing pictures (if you still have them from a few years ago?)

 

Thanks!

Let me first reiterate...there is absolutely nothing to worry about in terms of any structure hiding your view. It is a gorgeous cabin. We loved it. Unable to upload the pics due to size. Have given links to it from my facebook Not sure how helpful it is but this is what we have :)

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=626103754067250&set=a.626103600733932.1073741831.100000028926329&type=3&theater

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=626947723982853&set=a.626947617316197.1073741836.100000028926329&type=3&theater

That was our group for sure. The ones with the huge smiles on our faces! Did you have a good flight? It was starting to cloud up a little more when we got back, but sometimes a few clouds just add another perspective. And I guess it wasn't until quite a bit later in the afternoon that it really clouded up. Hope you had fun!

Oh yeah, we went head on into that system on our way back, the ride was a bit bumpy but nothing that bothered us. Our son like the trip back more than then the one going in :>)

Great blog.

I believe we saw you guys at the Island wings docks. We were taking the 12:00 trip with Mountain Air service and we saw Michelle land back from her 10:00.

It was foggy in the morning time but by the time we went at 3:15 it was fine. It was incredibly beautiful!

 

 

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Ours is 12:00 - 2:00 - Will let you guys know how it goes :)

When Michelle is booked, she refers you to Mountain Air Service. It's a different company and a different pilot, but they share dock space. I got referred to Randy at Mountain Air after inquiring with Michelle and she was booked for our day in port. Island Wings booked the trip for me and I sent the deposit to them, but Mountain Air Service operate the plane. The company is basically him, his wife, and a guy who does the transport from the cruise ships to the dock.

 

Randy did a fantastic job and the flight was incredible. I highly recommend going with him. From what I can tell, he does a very similar flight to Island Wings, landing on a lake and taking you inland a bit to look at nature and take photos. Randy is from Ketchikan and has lots of interesting local information about the logging camps, weather, flora/fauna, etc. He also provides an amusing soundtrack for the flight. :) We were extremely happy with our trip and thought it was worth every penny. He also did a great job with the kids that were on our flight, if that's of interest to you.

Yep, thats my understanding too...yes, we were told that he is very good with kids and that is important to us as we have a 8 and a 4 year old. Good to know you guys had a fantastic time with him.

We also learned while in town that there is an Avis car rental right near the port that would have been much easier. Not sure about the rates though.

 

 

edit: sorry pictures aren't uploading correctly from photobucket so I'll have to add them later :(

We have rented a car out of Avis, the cost came upto 80+ on a standard size car.

 

A couple minutes later, Bev, myself and 4 folks from Oklahoma City - a mom and three teenage girls - were buckled in and ready to taxi down the runway/waterway and head into Misty Fjords!

 

 

 

L.J.

So how does a passenger get into the plane ? I have a 4 year old and a 8 year old and am a bit nervous about getting them on and off the plane.

We booked thru Hoonah Whale Watching with a BOGO coupon from Alaska Toursavers. They have a 6 person & 18 person boat. The captain was excellent & provided a great narrative. They had bottled water & bags of Famous Amos cookies for a snack. I'll post more pics later on. We're just about to leave for a float plane tour of Misty Fjords :D

We will be following your foot steps excursion by excursion we too have the Misty Fjords float plane booked out of Ketchikan :)

Royal Caribbean just sent out e-mail say....." We would like to provide you with important information regarding your June 14, 2013, sailing onboard Radiance of the Seas. During the last sailing, a number of guests onboard experienced some gastrointestinal illness. In an abundance of caution, we will conduct some enhanced sanitizing onboard the ship and within the cruise terminal to help prevent any illness from affecting your cruise. Because of this extra cleaning and sanitizing, boarding is now anticipated to begin at approximately 1:00 p.m. "

 

So how bad is it? What is the ship's Captain saying.

Really !!!? This is the last thing I wanted to hear !!!!

DW and I booked F.I.S.H.E.S. last year and it was the best whale watching tour we have done. There were so many whales you could not count them. Floyd is an excellent boat captain. We took many pictures and videos of whales next to the boat. If I remember right, Floyd's boat is about 36 feet long and 10 feet wide. There is a cabin that will hold 7 people and Floyd provides drinks and cookies. It is a very safe boat and plenty of room to move around and take pictures of the whales. It was about a 45 minute ride from the dock to where the whales are located. Along the way you can look for bears on the shore line. I hope you enjoy you whale watching trip as much as we did and it was well worth the money.

I can't wait for this trip :) ...

Just a little sample of what we saw yesterday on our whale watching tour. Absolutely the best excursion we've ever done! This was from our small 18 passenger boat and there was no zooming in, they were thisclose!

 

http://s1338.photobucket.com/user/Ace1Zoe/media/2013%20Alaska%20Cruise%20Tour/Day%2012%20-%20Icy%20Strait%20Point/P6111721_zps3741e2c3.mp4.html

 

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Awesome !!!! Which company did you go through for this tour ? We have booked with FISHES in ISP for the whale watching tour...hopefully we are as lucky as you.

The second pilot is Randy, apparently he owns Ketchikan Mountain Air service . I did fine some feedback about him online. All looks good.

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So we took a last minute decision to book the misty fjords flight through Island wings and inquired about availability. I have quite a bit about Michelle and I always thought she was the sole pilot. I got a reply from them that Michelle is not available but they do have a second plane and a second pilot. Does anybody have any experience going with Island wings but not with Michelle ?

Paying quite a bit for this and I don't want this excursion to turn out to be a bummer.

Thanks in advance.

Narsi

Amen - we're the exact same way! We've started trying to return home on Saturdays if possible just to give us two nights sleep at home before retuning to the real world:).

 

L.J.

My vacation next week ends on a Sunday...late. The following monday is going to be pretty interesting !!!! :)

Day 5 - Ketchikan - our first time we'll set foot in Alaska! Up at dawn's early light again, I was topside checking out the views for a couple hours before we made it to Ketchikan. One of the cool things about being up that early is being able to see the changing conditions. From the first glimmer of sunrise to the end of the day, it's amazing how variable conditions can be - even in just a few hours. These photos below show the changing light and color palette over about two and a half hours. While I was completely exhausted by the end of the trip, I'm glad I had a chance to see as much as I was able to with these early mornings.

 

 

 

My first Alaskan sunrise!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The warmth or the early morning sun hidden behind the clouds...

 

 

 

 

 

 

On the opposite side of the ship, the light was much cooler/bluer as the cloud bank diffused the rising sun showed the snowy mountains in the distance

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The sun back out, you can see that as the sun rose the clouds began to burn off, leaving us with a sunny, calm start to our day in Ketchikan!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Not too long later, we turned left to port around the south tip of Pennock Island, entered the right side of the Tongass Narrows, with Revillagigedo Island (and soon to be Ketchikan) on the right. FYI Revillagigedo Island is the twelfth largest island in the U.S., measuring 50 miles N-S, and averaging 35 miles E-W.

 

 

 

L.J.

I hear you...I am the type who usually needs a vacation after my vacation !!!!

Thanks Becci!

 

We've been at sea the last couple of days & I'm not paying for an internet package. We're pulling in to Juneau as I write and are due to arrive at 9am. I checked and they've already turned off "Cellular at Sea" so I'm back on AT&T so I turned my data plan on to catch up while we wait to clear for debarkation.

 

Hope to post more pictures this afternoon.

 

 

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Looks to be a fabulous day in Juneau....been watching the cams for a while now and as far as I know..you guys chose the best of the juneau days to be out there.

First of all...I gotta to say....what you are doing here is so very helpful...I almost feel like I am part of your tour.. :) . Lucky me,I get to do this all over again..

Now for my question : )....

We are doing the motor coach from Denali to Anchorage...and the coach reaches Anchorage by 3:00 with an optional excursion we can do. I am wondering whether I should upgrade to the train from Denali. The downside is of course we reach later at around 8:00 pm which means no sightseeing in Anchorage would you know whether they allow this ? What do you suggest ?

Hi! I do not have a printed copy of the excursion list. Our particular cruise tour (#13 pre) includes a 3 hour Kenai Fjords tour. I know there is a 5 hour tour also, but not sure if RCI offers it, or if you have to book that one independently.

 

I will try to get a list of the excursions offered and the prices from our tour director in the next few days.

 

Until then, here is a link for what is shown on the RCI website to give you some idea of prices:

 

http://www.royalcaribbean.com/statichtmlpage.do?pagename=brochure_alaska_land_excursions

 

 

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Thanks a bunch...didn't know the website listed the land excursions, I was told that land excursions are run by a different company and so RCL doesn't have a lot of control on it....apparently I heard wrong.

Thanks again....

did you enquire about the optional land excursions that are available ? I am particularly interested in the kenai Fjords tour in Seward..not sure if it is available through the land excursion.

Good to see the lodge we will be in 15 more days... :)

Here is another one from the HAL board.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1841439

I hope you love it as much as we did! I will continue with as much detail as I can!

 

 

 

I know nothing about Radiance. What size is that ship? I've also heard bad things about Liberty (Freedoms' sister ship) but I can say that I've never heard anything negative about Freedom, and we also loved her!

 

The boy from the Fantasy is still in a bad way. He was moved back to Minneapolis and has moved again to another hospital. He was in a medically induced coma, and he has a feeding tube. Poor little guy has a lot of brain damage, but they are seeing slight signs of improvement each day.

Radiance size wise compares to Wonder. The itineraries are far better with Radiance to Alaska. From what I hear, Radiance was built with Alaska voyages in mind, so much glass around that you could see outside from where ever you are in the ship.

I guess if we had the dreamworks experience it would have been more interesting for the kids, but this time around we are doing it more for sightseeing then the kids experience.

Just like you our family would be making the leap from the mouse to the Radiance of the seas this June. A big leap I say...after a few DisneyWorld/Land trips we tried our first cruise on the wonder. Ever since then we are hooked....have done the bahamas, the mexican rivera, so much so that the kids now call the "Wonder" their ship.

Heard about the accident on Fantasy..really said.. hopefully the kid has recovered by now.

We were in 8102 a few weeks ago. What a fantastic balcony.:D Shame about our neighbours though. :rolleyes: Hope you get 'my cabin' ;)

Oh yes...we got it !!! :) . Do you have any pics of the cabin ?

We are booked on 8166 for June Alaska southbound and we are waitlisted on 8102. Will keep our fingers crossed.