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Whale watching in Icy Strait or Juneau?


TwinMamainMN
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We will sail in August northbound from Vancouver to Seward on RCCL Radiance of the Seas. We want to book a small private charter for whale watching in either Icy Strait (on Glacier Wind Charters) or Juneau (on Harv and Marv's Outback Alaska). We will be 6 people total, 3 adults and 3 kids.

 

Which one would be better, and why??

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You could have your own private excursion with Glacier Wind Charters because their boats hold only six passengers, but you would need to do something quick as they are selling 2018 now and they only have two boats, meaning four trips per day.

 

I have no idea which one is better because we are going next June. We're doing something else in Juneau. You may want to see what else is available at each port and make your decision based off of that.

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You could have your own private excursion with Glacier Wind Charters because their boats hold only six passengers, but you would need to do something quick as they are selling 2018 now and they only have two boats, meaning four trips per day.

 

I have no idea which one is better because we are going next June. We're doing something else in Juneau. You may want to see what else is available at each port and make your decision based off of that.

 

I just contacted Glacier Wind today actually. :) I think we are leaning towards using them in ISP as there seems to be more options in Juneau to do other things. I would love to go twice, but that darn money tree in our backyard is bare.;p

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We went with Glacier Wind in ISP and loved it. The walk on the trails near the dock was also nice.

 

If you are in Juneau from at least 8:00 AM until 7:00 PM , look at Adventure Bounds tour to Tracy Arm. It is well worth it and we saw lots of wildlife, including whales. We also got very close to both the North and South Sawyer Glaciers.

 

If time doesn't allow for Adventure Bound, take a shuttle out to Mendenhall Glacier and maybe do the Tram in town if the weather is nice.

 

 

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I go out of both of these areas equally. Juneau does have slightly more chance of one of the resident pod sightings, but that is only about 20% of the trips- on average.

 

As you've found out, look at the entire schedule, if there are activities you want to do in Juneau, them include them and go whale watching out of Hoonah. In August it's especially good, for salmon diet brown bears out of Hoonah- with the cheapest viewing option since it's road access, where mainland tours are fly ins. So, I try and do both. :)

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Pods? Sounds like Orca talk.

You might see a single Humpback whale or a mama and baby. Sometimes you see a group of 4-10-12 Humpbacks together on the hunt for food with bubble feeding a pending tactic.

If I wanted to see humpbacks, I would chose Fredrick Sound or Point Adolphus - the latter offered by Icy Strait Point.

Juneau is great for seeing a glacier (Mendenhall Glacier, Tracy Arm), helicopter tours to the top of the glacier, a great fish hatchery tour.

If you want to shop, Juneau hands down. Juneau will not fail you on whales either.

Edited by Sea-level
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Pods? Sounds like Orca talk.

You might see a single Humpback whale or a mama and baby. Sometimes you see a group of 4-10-12 Humpbacks together on the hunt for food with bubble feeding a pending tactic.

If I wanted to see humpbacks, I would chose Fredrick Sound or Point Adolphus - the latter offered by Icy Strait Point.

.

 

You are out of date. Point Adolphus is lacking for humpback predictability. They aren't congregating in this area in the numbers they used to. I went out on 3 whale watching trips, out of Hoonah, - this season and NONE had humpbacks there. May, June and August.

 

Vendor verified this trend as well.

 

Auke Bay is still loaded, with a simply circle around Shelter Island all that's needed for a "successful" whale watch.

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We will sail in August northbound from Vancouver to Seward on RCCL Radiance of the Seas. We want to book a small private charter for whale watching in either Icy Strait (on Glacier Wind Charters) or Juneau (on Harv and Marv's Outback Alaska). We will be 6 people total, 3 adults and 3 kids.

 

Which one would be better, and why??

 

 

 

We went with Glacier Wind Charters in Icy Strait Point. It was fabulous! It is small boats -6 people- and they made us feel like family. Best of all, we saw SO many whales!

 

 

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When I did the same cruise, also with kids, we did the whale watching out of ISP, and our reasoning was that there is limited things to do there compared to Juneau.

 

Excellent point! That is what we decided as well. We booked a private charter with Glacier Wind and I'm really excited to not have to jockey for space to see with 100 other people (or whatever). Our kids don't know about the trip yet, but they are going to freak out when they realize we have a boat just for us!

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Excellent point! That is what we decided as well. We booked a private charter with Glacier Wind and I'm really excited to not have to jockey for space to see with 100 other people (or whatever). Our kids don't know about the trip yet, but they are going to freak out when they realize we have a boat just for us!

 

 

 

You can go outside on deck or inside to watch and take pictures. They have free hot chocolate and snacks on board. We had a big male orca swim right up, go under the bow, and breach on the other side. It was a rare treat.

 

 

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