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6 days DIY land, then Millennium SB 6/30-7/7


kpd21880
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Vancouver

We didn’t rush off the ship, as we didn’t have a flight to catch and let the masses fight to get off first. Thus, when we left at 8:45am, disembarkation was a breeze, no lines to get off or grab our bags. Right outside the bag area was the Avis car rental kiosk and they drove us downtown to pick up our reserved car the location on Hornby St. We had great luck with car upgrades on this trip and were given a sporty Dodge Charger, full sized and fully loaded for the compact car we reserved. Our bags went into the trunk and we headed off to Grouse Mountain for the day.We bought tickets for the “Ultimate Experience” which included the Skyride, all of the activities at the top of the mountain, the Peak Chairlift and the Eye of the Wind turbine tour. The Skyride was amazing, though they really pack you into those cars (98 people) and you’re quite smooshed. Kiddo was not a fan of the smoosh at all.

 

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He was, however, a super fan of all of the activities afterthe Skyride. The Grizzly habitat was amazing – one of the bears was splashingand playing in the water on this super-hot day. The lumberjack show was kitschyfun and the kiddo couldn’t have loved it more if it was the real-deal ESPNathletes. The guided Eco-walk was notstrenuous and was informative. We had lunch at the top at Rusty Rail BBQ and while the food was delicious, the line to orderwas incredibly slow. After lunch, we headed up the Peak Chairlift for ourturbine tour. The hubs is an energy industry geek and couldn’t wait to seeinside the pod of the turbine. Unfortunately, the elevator inside the turbinebroke down and it closed for the day. Bummer! Grouse did refund that portion ofour tickets at the end of the day. Instead of touring the turbine, we did getto watch two people take off from the Peak on the Paragliding tour. It was incredible to watch – something Iwould never be brave enough to do, but amazing to witness. Grouse Mountain FFF:10

 

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Vancouver, continued

A rush hour drive back into downtown Vancouver (whoops, we should have timed that better!) and we checked into our hotel, Marriott Delta Suites (booked with Marriott rewards points). The hotel was recently renovated and was very nice – separate bedroom and living room areas. We dropped our bags in the room and headed back out to spend the evening in Stanley Park.We rented bikes from Spokes Bike Rental to explore the seawall and park. This time we got 2 adult bikes and 1 child bike, as the kiddo wanted to ride solo.Easy rental and bike/ helmet fitting and we were off to explore. The Seawall is one-way riding, so you can not turn around and ride back from where you came. You either have to do the full circuit or cut through one of the many park trails. We went about half way around the Seawall and then cut through. Highlights in the Park were stopping on the Seawall to watch float planes take off and land, the kid’s spray park and the 3-4 playgrounds we stopped at to play. Biking through the park at dusk was beautiful! FFF: 10

 

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Travel home: Vancouver - Ohio

 

We had 1:30pm flights from Vancouver back home and were a bit nervous about wait times and the multiple checkpoints at the airport, so we took a 10:30am cab from the hotel to the airport. Quick and easy ride and only about $25 for the 25 minute ride (well worth the convenience of not lugging our bags and kid on the SkyTrain). The cab driver told us there were 3 cruise ships that had pulled into the Port of Vancouver that morning and the airport was very busy.

 

I know this can vary wildly, but I tracked our approximate wait times at the 4 mandatory checkpoints flying from Vancouver to the USA at airport: Delta check in: 20 mins, separate bag security drop off: 15 mins, airport security: 25 minutes, US customs: 20 minutes. By the time we got to our gate, we had about 30 minutes to grab some lunch before they started the boarding process. Busy morning and two flights later we were home from this amazing adventure!

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General thoughts on the cruise:

 

We had a concierge class balcony stateroom on deck 8.Originally, we booked an ocean view room, but about 2 months before the sailing, we caught a price drop and upgraded to the balcony. I had been tracking the price for MONTHS and it finally paid off! The price drop happened for only a day, and we jumped on it. I am the balcony lover of our family– it’s my bit of vacation heaven, sipping my morning coffee, enjoying the peace and quiet, having a cocktail out there at dusk while getting ready for dinner. As far as scenery watching? We did not use the balcony for viewing – we stayed on the top of the ship to get the full 360 views. I know people say a balcony is a “must” for Alaska - and I would agree – a balcony for me is a cruise vacation must. But, I don’t think my guys could have cared less about it!

 

Our service and dining on board were wonderful. Bartenders,room attendants, waiters, everyone was great! Most nights we ate in the Main Dining Room and enjoyed our meals very much. One night we dined in Qsine and loved it, as always. We have cruised Celebrity many times before, always on S-Class ships. The M-Class was decidedly different, but the only thing we truly missed was Murano, our favorite restaurant on board.

 

Glacier viewing: We had 3 prime opportunities on this trip to view a glacier relatively up close (Matanuska, Hubbard and Mendenhall). Only one out of the three worked out as planned. If glacier viewing is a prime concern of yours, give yourself multiple opportunities through out the trip and have back up plans!

 

Weather: very variable, of course, but for the most part we had a least a little rain every day and a lot of rain one day. We wore our raincoats as either a rain or wind shield every single day. “Santa” brought us each a water proof, hooded North Face, Columbia or Marmot rain jacket. They were the single best investment of the trip! AND, they are relatively inexpensive during December via Amazon Prime J

 

We also invested in water resistant hiking boots for each of us (again, waiting for sales via Amazon) and they kept us comfortable, dry and blister free the entire 2 weeks. I think you could certainly do without them with a good pair of supportive sneakers, but we were happy to have them and not have rain soaked feet.

 

Packing: I stressed over packing! With all of the pre-cruisetravel we were doing, we didn’t want to be hauling around tons of luggage. We ended up with one regular sized bag each and one small carry-on (backpack). The key for us was having a few points throughout the trip to do laundry: 1. Cabin in Denali, 2. Hotel in Seward and 3. Skagway: there is a little gas station and Laundromat called Family Fuel. You can drop you laundry there for the day and they will wash and fold for $15. We dropped ours on the way to Emerald Lake and picked it back up on the way back to the ship. Everyday we wore: jeans, short sleeved tshirt, long sleeved tshirt, sweatshirt and rainjacket and peeled off and put on layers during the day. The hubs and I could easily wear layers more than once without needing to wash them... the mud magnet kid? Not so much!

 

That's it!! This trip was an incredible experience for our family and we can't wait to go back in a few years!

Edited by kpd21880
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Great review! Love reading especially about DIY land trips.

 

Renting the bikes in Stanley Park-was it fairly flat? If you did the whole circuit do you know how far it was?

 

We just started our ressies for June 2018[emoji16]

 

 

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you sure packed a lot into your vacation time! No wonder the kiddo was always smiling .. fun, fun, fun!!

You know, i've never been to Grouse Mountain. Can't seem to get beyond Stanley Park; too easy to spend a weekend there.

 

Thanks for all the great info on lodging, restaurants, etc. It will be very useful for people planning a trip in 2018.

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Great review! Love reading especially about DIY land trips.

 

Renting the bikes in Stanley Park-was it fairly flat? If you did the whole circuit do you know how far it was?

 

We just started our ressies for June 2018[emoji16]

 

 

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Hi there! I think the Seawall is about 5 and a half miles, full circuit. The paved road is very flat and easy to bike. There is a marked path for both walkers and bikers. It was so easy a 6 year old could do it independently! There's so much to see and do INSIDE the park too, which is why we didn't complete the full circuit. Too many cool trees to climb and playgrounds to try out!

 

Good luck planning & it's great you're starting to reserve now.

 

 

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You know, i've never been to Grouse Mountain. Can't seem to get beyond Stanley Park; too easy to spend a weekend there.

.

 

 

We LOVED Grouse Mtn! We could have spent two whole days there, and then ANOTHER two in Stanley Park! When we flew home from Vancouver, we all said that we'd like to go back for just a trip to Vancouver. We absolutely loved the city and we barely scratched the surface. Best part of traveling! Identifying places to go back to and explore more :)

 

There is a completely free shuttle to Grouse from Canada place in a very nice coach bus that runs throughout during the day. We rented the car because it was an easy solution to luggage storage and transportation in one, without having to waste time going to the hotel to check in and drop bags before heading to Grouse.

 

Mapleleaves, how do I link this trip report into the 2017 thread? I wasn't sure what link to use!

 

 

 

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Your trip report is FABULOUS! Not only did you do an amazing amount of research, it was very well written! Thanks for sharing! Your itinerary is very similar to something I would enjoy. Airfare to Vancouver and Anchorage is pricey for me. I read your post about opening Delta Amex SkyMiles card. This might be key for me to be afford the high airfare. Did you have any issue receiving or using the miles or when you closed your account? Also, when you booked your Celebrity cruise, did you book directly through them or a third party? I have only cruised once before and it was a locked in price, so I was never able to upgrade. Thanks in advance for your help. - Natalie

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Love this review! I have a question about the creek side cabins , the house. It says 3 bedrooms but in the photos on their site it only shows 2. Can you give me some details on the bedrooms , if any are on the bottom floor?

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Your trip report is FABULOUS! Not only did you do an amazing amount of research, it was very well written! Thanks for sharing! Your itinerary is very similar to something I would enjoy. Airfare to Vancouver and Anchorage is pricey for me. I read your post about opening Delta Amex SkyMiles card. This might be key for me to be afford the high airfare. Did you have any issue receiving or using the miles or when you closed your account? Also, when you booked your Celebrity cruise, did you book directly through them or a third party? I have only cruised once before and it was a locked in price, so I was never able to upgrade. Thanks in advance for your help. - Natalie

 

Hi Natalie! I completely understand your problem - it's the SAME one we had in our planning... the cost of our airfare made the land/ cruise/ excursion travel cost prohibitive. Our flights (had we paid in $) would have been about $950-$1050 each. The SkyMiles card was the absolute key to us saving about $3,000 in airfare, which funded our DIY 6 day land portion of the trip. Without the "free" flights, we would not have been able to afford the land portion. So, yes, let me explain more about that. And, to be honest, I spent at least 2 hours on the phone with Delta over 3 phones calls before we attempted this, to be sure it was for real.

 

First, go to Delta's and search for flights in your time frame using SkyMiles (their search page lets you search using dollars or SkyMiles). This will give you an idea of how many you'll need in order to get "free" flights. For us, the flights ranged from 12,000-35,000 each way, with lots of variation in between. Note: the flights that were expensive when searching by dollar amount did not necessarily correspond to the flights that were highest in SkyMiles usage. And there's LOTS of fluctuation depending on the day you travel. Example: we chose to stay an extra night in Vancouver because we could get a hotel room relatively inexpensively and the flights home on Sunday were only 12,500 SkyMiles, rather than 35,000 on Saturday.

 

The Delta AmEx has promotional rates for 50,000 SkyMiles for opening the card with $2,000 in purchases in the first 3 months. I believe their "regular" SkyMiles bonus is 30,000 for opening the card, so you do have to wait for the promotion, which seems to happen every other month or so. My husband and I each applied for a card - each our own, NOT joint accounts. If the accounts are linked, you get ONE bank of miles. If they are separate, you EACH get 50,000 miles. That's key!! So, within the first 3 months you each have to spend $2,000 - we did this over the holidays, so that was easy for us, with family gifts, travel, etc. We also each paid $500 towards our cruise (Merry Christmas, honey!) as our Christmas gifts to each other. From the time you pay the bill when you hit that $2,000 in spending, the SkyMiles get deposited into your Delta account within 7 days. Once they're in your account, you can book the airfare! We booked our flights in January for our June cruise.

 

Our flights to Anchorage were 20,000 miles each, our flights home from Vancouver were 12,500. The best part? We actually booked red-eye flights home from Vancouver, as they were the least amount of SkyMiles. About 3 months before we traveled, Delta changed our flight times - really, just pushed it back by an hour. Not a big deal, but the flight change notification said that if the new time didn't work for us, we could change with no penalty. I called Delta and sure enough, they swapped us to the afternoon flight (which "cost" significantly more miles), with no added charge at all. Sweet!!

 

The AmEx also gets your checked bag fees waived when you travel, which was another nice (small) savings for us. When we got home from the trip, we just called AmEx and cancelled the cards. We waited until we got home so that we could be sure the flights all worked out and we got those bag fees waived :) Honestly, before trying this, we were skeptical. But, its absolutely worked out perfectly and was without question the biggest cost savings of the entire trip, by a LOT! I hope I explained this well, but let me know if you have any other questions at all!

 

Lastly, I think we aren't allowed to discuss specific travel agents on Cruise Critic? But, yes, we use one. He's great and always throws in some extra perks for us. Upgrading before or after final payment has never been a problem for us. We do it all the time when prices drop. Just email me at katievriezen at hotmail dot com and I'll be happy to send you the info.

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Love this review! I have a question about the creek side cabins , the house. It says 3 bedrooms but in the photos on their site it only shows 2. Can you give me some details on the bedrooms , if any are on the bottom floor?

 

Hi! Sure, we loved the Carlo House! The 3 bedrooms were 1. the King master, which is upstairs with an en-suite bathroom; 2. a large room with 2 queen beds; 3. a small room with one queen size bed. The king master is beyond gorgeous - it's the only room on the second floor, along with the attached bath. The other two bedrooms are downstairs - along with the kitchen, living room, bathroom & laundry room. The 2 queen beds room is large and roomy. I'll be honest - the one queen bed room is tiny. It has just the bed and a small bedside table in it. (it's the one not pictured on their website). We too had questions about the room configurations before we traveled so I had emailed them for clarification. Here's their original response to me, which has a lot more details for you:

 

The Carlo House is a beautiful 3 bedroom custom home, approx. 1800 sq. ft., situated on 3+ wooded acres. Remodeled and refurbished in 2012. The Carlo House has (3) three bedrooms, (2) two full baths, washer/dryer, custom kitchen , living room, wood stove, cable TV, DVD player w/movies, and telephone. There is a grassed yard with a fire pit (great for smore’s or watching the northern lights in mid Aug on) and a sauna. There is a covered outside dining area with an exotic wood table with bench seating which seats up to 8+ and a BBQ gas grill. A small chest freezer is available if you have fish you need to freeze. The Carlo House is a 5 minute walk from our main property McKinley Creekside Cabins & Café. Complimentary Wi-Fi.

1st Floor

  • Two bedrooms - One bedroom with (2) queen beds, and a small bedroom with (1) queen bed
  • The full bathroom w/washer-dryer
  • Cozy living room with a small sofa, chair, wood stove, phone, TV, Satellite cable, DVD player, movies, games/cards
  • Custom Kitchen with stainless steel appliances and all the essentials of home. There is a small bar counter w/two stools for seating.
  • Wine chiller in the kitchen.
  • The dining area is a covered outside deck with a beautiful exotic wood custom table w/ seating and a gas grill.
  • Oak hardwood and tile floors.

2nd Floor

  • The master suite-(1) King bed, TV, Satellite cable, and a sitting area. A luxury bath with antique claw foot tub, separate tile & glass shower and amazing panoramic mountain views!
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hi natalie! I completely understand your problem - it's the same one we had in our planning... The cost of our airfare made the land/ cruise/ excursion travel cost prohibitive. Our flights (had we paid in $) would have been about $950-$1050 each. The skymiles card was the absolute key to us saving about $3,000 in airfare, which funded our diy 6 day land portion of the trip. Without the "free" flights, we would not have been able to afford the land portion. So, yes, let me explain more about that. And, to be honest, i spent at least 2 hours on the phone with delta over 3 phones calls before we attempted this, to be sure it was for real.

 

First, go to delta's and search for flights in your time frame using skymiles (their search page lets you search using dollars or skymiles). This will give you an idea of how many you'll need in order to get "free" flights. For us, the flights ranged from 12,000-35,000 each way, with lots of variation in between. Note: The flights that were expensive when searching by dollar amount did not necessarily correspond to the flights that were highest in skymiles usage. And there's lots of fluctuation depending on the day you travel. Example: We chose to stay an extra night in vancouver because we could get a hotel room relatively inexpensively and the flights home on sunday were only 12,500 skymiles, rather than 35,000 on saturday.

 

The delta amex has promotional rates for 50,000 skymiles for opening the card with $2,000 in purchases in the first 3 months. I believe their "regular" skymiles bonus is 30,000 for opening the card, so you do have to wait for the promotion, which seems to happen every other month or so. My husband and i each applied for a card - each our own, not joint accounts. If the accounts are linked, you get one bank of miles. If they are separate, you each get 50,000 miles. That's key!! So, within the first 3 months you each have to spend $2,000 - we did this over the holidays, so that was easy for us, with family gifts, travel, etc. We also each paid $500 towards our cruise (merry christmas, honey!) as our christmas gifts to each other. From the time you pay the bill when you hit that $2,000 in spending, the skymiles get deposited into your delta account within 7 days. Once they're in your account, you can book the airfare! We booked our flights in january for our june cruise.

 

Our flights to anchorage were 20,000 miles each, our flights home from vancouver were 12,500. The best part? We actually booked red-eye flights home from vancouver, as they were the least amount of skymiles. About 3 months before we traveled, delta changed our flight times - really, just pushed it back by an hour. Not a big deal, but the flight change notification said that if the new time didn't work for us, we could change with no penalty. I called delta and sure enough, they swapped us to the afternoon flight (which "cost" significantly more miles), with no added charge at all. Sweet!!

 

The amex also gets your checked bag fees waived when you travel, which was another nice (small) savings for us. When we got home from the trip, we just called amex and cancelled the cards. We waited until we got home so that we could be sure the flights all worked out and we got those bag fees waived :) honestly, before trying this, we were skeptical. But, its absolutely worked out perfectly and was without question the biggest cost savings of the entire trip, by a lot! I hope i explained this well, but let me know if you have any other questions at all!

 

Lastly, i think we aren't allowed to discuss specific travel agents on cruise critic? But, yes, we use one. He's great and always throws in some extra perks for us. Upgrading before or after final payment has never been a problem for us. We do it all the time when prices drop. Just email me at katievriezen at hotmail dot com and i'll be happy to send you the info.

 

thanks so much :)

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Hi! Sure, we loved the Carlo House! The 3 bedrooms were 1. the King master, which is upstairs with an en-suite bathroom; 2. a large room with 2 queen beds; 3. a small room with one queen size bed. The king master is beyond gorgeous - it's the only room on the second floor, along with the attached bath. The other two bedrooms are downstairs - along with the kitchen, living room, bathroom & laundry room. The 2 queen beds room is large and roomy. I'll be honest - the one queen bed room is tiny. It has just the bed and a small bedside table in it. (it's the one not pictured on their website). We too had questions about the room configurations before we traveled so I had emailed them for clarification. Here's their original response to me, which has a lot more details for you:

 

The Carlo House is a beautiful 3 bedroom custom home, approx. 1800 sq. ft., situated on 3+ wooded acres. Remodeled and refurbished in 2012. The Carlo House has (3) three bedrooms, (2) two full baths, washer/dryer, custom kitchen , living room, wood stove, cable TV, DVD player w/movies, and telephone. There is a grassed yard with a fire pit (great for smore’s or watching the northern lights in mid Aug on) and a sauna. There is a covered outside dining area with an exotic wood table with bench seating which seats up to 8+ and a BBQ gas grill. A small chest freezer is available if you have fish you need to freeze. The Carlo House is a 5 minute walk from our main property McKinley Creekside Cabins & Café. Complimentary Wi-Fi.

 

1st Floor

  • Two bedrooms - One bedroom with (2) queen beds, and a small bedroom with (1) queen bed
  • The full bathroom w/washer-dryer
  • Cozy living room with a small sofa, chair, wood stove, phone, TV, Satellite cable, DVD player, movies, games/cards
  • Custom Kitchen with stainless steel appliances and all the essentials of home. There is a small bar counter w/two stools for seating.
  • Wine chiller in the kitchen.
  • The dining area is a covered outside deck with a beautiful exotic wood custom table w/ seating and a gas grill.
  • Oak hardwood and tile floors.

2nd Floor

  • The master suite-(1) King bed, TV, Satellite cable, and a sitting area. A luxury bath with antique claw foot tub, separate tile & glass shower and amazing panoramic mountain views!

Thanks , it sounds perfect for our group of 6.

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  • 1 month later...
Wow, what a great trip report! And your son is so precious! It looks like all three of you had a great time. Thanks for taking to time to post a trip report.

 

 

 

Aw! Thank you. We think he's pretty precious too. :) Loved seeing your comment pop up today - made me scroll through my own pictures and relive our trip again!

 

 

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  • 8 months later...

I know this is an older thread, but I have found it to be extremely helpful - I am using it to plan our summer 2018 land and cruise vacation. Without seeing it, I would not have added Matanuska glacier to our itinerary. We are also stopping at Hatcher pass/independence mine while in that area.

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I know this is an older thread, but I have found it to be extremely helpful - I am using it to plan our summer 2018 land and cruise vacation. Without seeing it, I would not have added Matanuska glacier to our itinerary. We are also stopping at Hatcher pass/independence mine while in that area.

The TripAdvisor Forum for Alaska is also useful for planning the land portion of your trip: https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowForum-g28923-i349-Alaska.html

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I know this is an older thread, but I have found it to be extremely helpful - I am using it to plan our summer 2018 land and cruise vacation. Without seeing it, I would not have added Matanuska glacier to our itinerary. We are also stopping at Hatcher pass/independence mine while in that area.

 

 

 

Aw! Thank you! I’m so glad you found it helpful. It was exactly one year ago this week that we were in Alaska. It was an amazing adventure and we hope to return again in a few years. Have a wonderful trip this summer! ~Katie

 

 

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