Can you take a Princess Landtour without taking a Princess cruise?

Planning on an Alaskan Cruise in 2019. I was speaking with a friend today that went on a Princess cruise and loved the land tour. She thought that she had met people in the Princess lodge/hotel that had used a different kind for the cruise option. If you have any knowledge of this please let me know. Thank you!

Bonni

Did they travel by train? If so, the Alaska Railroad has package tours and I believe they partner with Princess Lodges.

https://www.alaskarailroad.com/travel-planning/packages/summer-packages

The Alaska Dept of Tourism has a web site with lots of info, incl vendors of land packages.

Thank you so much! This is what I was looking for.

This is direct through Princess:

https://www.princesslodges.com

bonniboo1 we took a southbound cruise with NCL on the Sun but booked the Princess Lodge Land Tour separately. It was a great trip and we were lucky to be able to get a buy 1 get 1 free package. We stayed at Denali Bluffs and it was a nice hotel. The views were beautiful and a short walk to the stores and restaurants on the strip.

We ended up booking our cruise when they were first released in December of 2015 and the land tours were not yet available. By the time they came out the price of the cruise had gone up more than the full price of the Princess tours were so we booked them separately. So glad we did, the train ride although long was amazing. Highly recommend the Princess land tour.

My travel agent has been trying to get Princess to extend my cruisetour by adding the land only portion of the heart of the rockies tour 1A, so far no success. I start in Fairbanks, land tour to the ship in Whittier, sail the inside passage disembarking in Vancouver. The heart of the rockies tour begins the same day in Calgary. I can fly into Calgary from Vancouver, no problem. So why is it a problem to extend my Princess experience without a repeat cruise?

My travel agent has been trying to get Princess to extend my cruisetour by adding the land only portion of the heart of the rockies tour 1A, so far no success. I start in Fairbanks, land tour to the ship in Whittier, sail the inside passage disembarking in Vancouver. The heart of the rockies tour begins the same day in Calgary. I can fly into Calgary from Vancouver, no problem. So why is it a problem to extend my Princess experience without a repeat cruise?

Disembarking in Vancouver can be messy at times. They often say not to book a flight before noon. Not sure if the train takes off that same day in Calgary but that may be cutting it close or if you are in a hotel that night. You can look at booking direct: https://www.rockymountaineer.com

Rocky Mountaineer is very expensive. Already checked flights, 1pm out of Vancouver, should not be a problem since we get put off the ship before 9am. Princess is the problem. Will not give an answer re: land tour portion only.

Sent from my iPad using Forums

My guess is the answer to your question is yes. However, the term "Land Tour" may be deceptive. Princess offers three types--"Optional Land Excursions" and two types of what used to be called "Cruise Tours" now they seem to be calling them "Land and Sea Vacation" and "Connoisseur Deluxe Escorted Land and Sea Vacation".

In Alaska, at their lodges, they provide an Alaskan brochure titled "Alaska Optional Land Excursions". It is my understanding anybody can book one of their land excursions. I know groups from other cruise lines stay at their lodges, namely HAL. Also, independents stay at their lodges. I believe anybody can book one of those tours regardless of whether you are booked into the lodge.

As far as the Cruise Tour or Land and Sea Vacations, I don't see where it would be possible to book the land portion separate since the cruise is included in the price.

I'm already booked on a 15 night cruisetour from Fairbanks to Vancouver. Princess has another cruisetour begining in Calgary the same day as I disembark. I want to "add on" the land only portion. Princess is dragging their feet with an answer. They must have a price for each part since the cruise CAN be booked separately. It's very easy to fly from Vancouver to Calgary after disembarkation. I simply do no not want to repeat the cruise.

There are several companies that do land tours. As mentioned the Alaska Railroad has packages and there are a few very nice itineraries at this site.

http://www.alaskatravel.com/tours/land-only-tour.html

Sometimes it is really difficult to find a land tour that is good as the land portion of a cruise tour offered by Princess. A couple of years ago my wife ran across a Princess cruise tour starting in Toronto then over a week on the coach hitting Niagara Falls and all points in between Toronto and Quebec City where the group boarded the Caribbean Princess and did maple leaf season port touring of more of the north east then voyaged on down the coast ending in Houston.

At the time, we had a Regent cruise in mind that started in Quebec City and ended up somewhere in the Caribbean. But they didn't offer any land portion that did Niagara Falls or any of those Canadian cities, and didn't try to help much either finding something. So I spent a lot of time looking for a tour that was similar, in order to come up with a pre-cruise coach tour ending up in Quebec City. I looked everywhere, even contacted Budget Queen who lives in up state New York. Finally I gave up, Regent was really expensive anyway.

So we did the Princess Cruise Tour. We really enjoyed that entire trip including the sea portion. Sure glad we didn't find a substitute.

They don't have next years information/dates fully loaded in the system yet but here is the website for Princess to book a train/land tour which we did from Anchorage to Denali this time last month. Not sure when the dates and pricing for 2018 will be up but you can at least peek around a bit.

https://www.princesslodges.com/alaska-rail-tours/rail-tours/

We were very happy booking our own itinery on land with Alaska Travel

Sent from my SM-G950U using Forums mobile app