TWT---AM or PM?

[Tafky]

We are booked for the#7 cruise tour.With HAL. First ever. Is the tour thru Denali as complete as these other ones ? I'm learning more everyday reading these posts and I want to know everything I possibly can and be prepared when we get there. Trying to figure out shore excursions also. Help:confused:

[wolfie11]

We are booked for the#7 cruise tour.With HAL. First ever. Is the tour thru Denali as complete as these other ones ? I'm learning more everyday reading these posts and I want to know everything I possibly can and be prepared when we get there. Trying to figure out shore excursions also. Help:confused:

 

For Cruise tour #7

Day 9 Fairbanks/Denali National Park

Today you’ll board the McKinley Explorer, the largest domed railcars on the historic Alaska Railroad route, an Alaska Scenic Byway. Sit back and relax in the observation lounge and watch magnificent scenery glide by. You’ll arrive and check into your comfortable lodge and later, enjoy a 5 hour official Natural History Tour of Denali National Park. Travel deep into the park for excellent chances of seeing wildlife — caribou, moose, grizzly, wolves and Dall sheep are frequently sighted. And enjoy dramatic Mt. McKinley viewpoints. Tonight, enjoy your accommodations at your inviting lodge.

 

You are booked on the DNHT. If you want the longer tour, you can take the pm TWT (you have time) but you will need to change either through HAL if possible as discussed above or change it on your own (try calling Aramark).

 

BTW, their claim that you will travel "deep into the park" is BS - the DNHT goes only a couple miles further than I can drive my car (14 miles out of a total of 92 miles).

[cruisingmimi]

Hi Tafky,

 

Welcome to these boards. You will find much invaluable advice here as I did. There is lots of info on the different tours available in Denali. You are doing the same itinerary as we are for Denali. We, too, booked the HAL cruisetour but ours is #24 southbound. We only have 3 days land and 7 days cruise. I would have booked a longer land tour had I known the difference but it is what it is as this point. We leave 7/1 for Denali and will be doing our Denali tour on 7/2. That said, you are also booked for the Denali Natural History Tour as part of your cruisetour. I did not know there were different tours so didn't pay any attention to this. However, after I started trying to put our itinerary together I realized that there were indeed different tours.

 

The Natural History tour and the Tundra Wilderness tour are managed by Aramark as is the McKinley Chalet hotel where we will stay. The other tours you can book in lieu of the history tour are the shuttle bus tours offered through the National Park Service. The 2 are not connected.

 

I called Holland America and was told that there was no upgrade available, it is the Natural History Tour and only the NHT that is available as part of the cruisetour package. However, I received different info from the hotel when I called them. They said we could upgrade and pay the difference but I needed to have our TA call and request the upgrade. Our TA was given the same info that I was, there is no upgrade! She said she does it all the time for Princess tours.

 

The reason we would like to do the longer Tundra Wilderness tour is as noted by wofie 11 in the post above this one, the history tour only goes 14 miles into the park.

 

When are you going on your cruise?

 

I will be happy to pass on what information I can find out about the Tundra tour. You can send me an email if you like rather than post here. My email: socolady@msn.com

Just put Not Spam in the subject line or it will go into my junk box.

 

If you would like info on tours I can give you that also. You can also go online to HAL and browse the tour listings there. You will not receive any brochures in the mail.

 

We have not booked many tours. I have a lot of info on the different port stops. What ports are you visiting?

 

Mary

[Budget Queen]

 

The Natural History tour and the Tundra Wilderness tour are managed by Aramark as is the McKinley Chalet hotel where we will stay. The other tours you can book in lieu of the history tour are the shuttle bus tours offered through the National Park Service. The 2 are not connected.

 

 

Sorry you are wrong. ALL the buses INTO Denali are operated by Aramark. Shuttle buses and Tour buses, (there are NO shuttle bus "tours"???)

 

As I have already mentioned, it is a mistake to wait and try and fix this when you get there. These cruisetours, have only ONE slot of time for you to get INTO the park, and your misinformation, of the lodge shuttles ending at 6:30pm is also inaccurate.

[Budget Queen]

 

I called Holland America and was told that there was no upgrade available, it is the Natural History Tour and only the NHT that is available as part of the cruisetour package. However, I received different info from the hotel when I called them. They said we could upgrade and pay the difference but I needed to have our TA call and request the upgrade. Our TA was given the same info that I was, there is no upgrade! She said she does it all the time for Princess tours.

 

 

 

So your TA called the hotel/lodge and was told the tour could not be upgraded, but you were?? I would call them back and see again what they say, and then get the name of who you speak to and have your agent call them, IF you get the reply you first did.

[Budget Queen]

Hi Tafky,

 

We, too, booked the HAL cruisetour but ours is #24 southbound.

 

 

With this particular tour, as I have mentioned, you have only ONE TWT option, that leaves at 1:30pm, pick up drop off at the hotel. With this "24, I would also totally skip the cruisetour transit to Seward and get the most I could, and just book the Alaska RR independently and get myself into Seward in time to at least do one activity. The cruisetour transits leave Anchorage too early and arrive in Seward too late for much of anything. This itinerary is already too much time in transit, comparing time at destinations and activity availablity.

[DD]

Sorry you are wrong. ALL the buses INTO Denali are operated by Aramark. Shuttle buses and Tour buses, (there are NO shuttle bus "tours"???)

 

As I have already mentioned, it is a mistake to wait and try and fix this when you get there. These cruisetours, have only ONE slot of time for you to get INTO the park, and your misinformation, of the lodge shuttles ending at 6:30pm is also inaccurate.

 

Something else interesting I learned last week (when we were one of only 6 people on a park bus passing by busload after busload of TWT jam-packed busses) -- they use the same pool of drivers! In other words, it's not like the tour busses get special drivers that have extra knowledge or spotting abilities. It's the same pool of people. The drivers bid on their shifts and their routes. Our driver has done both the tours and the shuttle. She said that the only difference is that on the tour, she HAS to keep the commentary up. On the shuttle, it's her choice. She said that if she wants to talk, she does. We had excellent commentary on all of our shuttle bus rides.

 

I can't imagine why someone, if they had the option, would choose the TWT or the NHT over just taking a shuttle bus. The shuttle bus gives you so much flexibility. All the ones that we saw were much less crowded too, although that could vary. At 6am, our shuttle was packed -- after a few stops, we were down to a skeletal crew of riders.

 

We absolutely loved our shuttle tours. The first day we saw a bunch of grizzlies, a moose and baby, a fox, tons of sheep and carabou, a grizzly vs carabou encounter (more posturing than anything else as both gave up the game and walked away), eagles galore, wolves, swans, squirrels, rabits, some other little round varmint, and more birds than I can count. On the next trip, we saw 12 grizzlies, including twice seeing one within 10 ft or so of the bus. We watched the close-up grizzlies for about 15 minutes -- at one point there were only the 6 of us in the bus watching. It was amazing.

 

On both our park days, the mountain was out in full glory, completely out all day long. We didn't see any wildlife (other than birds) from Eilelson to Wonder Lake, and our driver said that's normal. Mosquitos were evident, but not bad at Wonder Lake. That's the only place we really dealt with them. While our first driver indicated that the area from Eilison to Wonder Lake wasn't a prime wildlife viewing area, I heard differently from others, so I wouldn't take that to the bank. What I would take to the bank is that 8 hours on a bus feels a LOT shorter than 11 hours on the bus. Perhaps if we saw wildlife on the last leg of it, I'd feel differently, but the visitors center at Eilison to Wonder Lake and back again felt very long. The rest flew by.

[cruisingmimi]

DD, thanks so much for your report, very helpful and objective. I am sorry that some of the info I posted is incorrect but I was given this by others who have been to Denali and/or stayed at McKinley Chalets. I have been trying to validate as much of what people post as possible so I have first-hand information.

 

Budget Queen, again, I was given the McKinley Chalets shuttle info from several people who stayed at the hotel and also from their website. I just checked their website again and it says the last shuttle from Denali is 6:30 pm. I am going to call the hotel again today to see what they tell me. This is why I was trying to change to TWT as hotel would pick us up late evening. I would have booked the shuttle bus ages ago except for the late evening drop off. My sister has some mobility issues w/ her knees so if we had to walk from the visitor's center late evening it would be a problem.

 

Budget Queen: "This itinerary is already too much time in transit, comparing time at destinations and activity availablity." Couldn't agree w/ you more, way too long and then some. You live and learn as they say. I am learning fast. LOL

 

I appreciate everyone's input. Thanks for listening.

 

Mary

[frugaltravel]

Something else interesting I learned last week (when we were one of only 6 people on a park bus passing by busload after busload of TWT jam-packed busses) -- they use the same pool of drivers! In other words, it's not like the tour busses get special drivers that have extra knowledge or spotting abilities. It's the same pool of people. The drivers bid on their shifts and their routes. Our driver has done both the tours and the shuttle. She said that the only difference is that on the tour, she HAS to keep the commentary up. On the shuttle, it's her choice. She said that if she wants to talk, she does. We had excellent commentary on all of our shuttle bus rides.

 

One fact that you left out is that most of the senior drivers (i.e. who get first choice in the bidding process) tend to bid for the camper and shuttle buses. So in fact, in general though not always, the more experienced drivers tend to drive the camper and shuttle buses.

[wolfie11]

Another point is that drivers bid on what they want to drive for the season, not on a daily basis. So if a senior driver wants to drive a shuttle, he'll drive the shuttle for the entire season.

 

However, most drivers are cross-trained for the tours, so if they get a bump day(when there aren't enough passengers going out for all the drivers to work) they can be called in to do a DNHT, TWT, or Kantishna Experience if they are qualified for those tours. They also have to be "certified" to drive sections of the road (something I am thankful for everytime I go over Polychrome). Many of the DNHT drivers can't drive a shuttle or longer tour because they haven't been checked out on those sections of the road.

[cruisingmimi]

Thanks for all your updates.

 

Budget Queen: Quote: "and your misinformation, of the lodge shuttles ending at 6:30pm is also inaccurate."

 

I called the McKinley Chalets to ask about the last pick up at the Visitors Center if we were to do the Eielson shuttle and she told me it was 6:30 pm. The scheduled shuttle times are also listed on their website.

 

Mary

[mapleleaves]

if you can't upgrade, can you cancel and get a refund ? The reason I ask is... perhaps there is still space on the park shuttle. Might be worth a try. Go to their web site or give the res center a call. We RV'd for the last 2 weeks of Aug last yr, with 3 days at Denali. We took the 9am bus to Eielson, returning around 4:30pm (about 10 miles further than TWT). The season starts to slow down mid Aug so there were at least a dozen empty seats on our bus. I think it was $30 for an adult fare.

BudgetQueen is right about it being a great time of year for wildlife viewing and the fall colors were awesome. We saw everything except wolves. We saw several moose around milepost 15, as we entered and again when we left. The bears were mostly around Toklat and towards Eielson. Good luck.

[Budget Queen]

Thanks for all your updates.

 

Budget Queen: Quote: "and your misinformation, of the lodge shuttles ending at 6:30pm is also inaccurate."

 

I called the McKinley Chalets to ask about the last pick up at the Visitors Center if we were to do the Eielson shuttle and she told me it was 6:30 pm. The scheduled shuttle times are also listed on their website.

 

Mary

 

In the past, All you had to do, was take the Princess lodge shuttle bus, (tip) and walk to your hotel. IF you have NO mobility limitations. They run later to about 9pm.

[dinomac]

We will be taking the TWT June 5, 2011... will there be any bears up and around that early in the season? What wildlife should we expect to see at the time of year??? We are on the 6:00 a.m. tour.

[Budget Queen]

We will be taking the TWT June 5, 2011... will there be any bears up and around that early in the season? What wildlife should we expect to see at the time of year??? We are on the 6:00 a.m. tour.

 

Yes, you will see wildlife. Could be "any" bears, caribou, moose, dall sheep. etc

 

I was there 6-2 and 6-3, saw wolves 4 times, along with the above list. Binoculars are necessary. I use 10 power, which is my min. The TWT does have a video screen in the bus.

[achirodoc]

Something else interesting I learned last week (when we were one of only 6 people on a park bus passing by busload after busload of TWT jam-packed busses) -- they use the same pool of drivers! In other words, it's not like the tour busses get special drivers that have extra knowledge or spotting abilities. It's the same pool of people. The drivers bid on their shifts and their routes. Our driver has done both the tours and the shuttle. She said that the only difference is that on the tour, she HAS to keep the commentary up. On the shuttle, it's her choice. She said that if she wants to talk, she does. We had excellent commentary on all of our shuttle bus rides.

 

I can't imagine why someone, if they had the option, would choose the TWT or the NHT over just taking a shuttle bus.

 

We absolutely loved our shuttle tours. The first day we saw a bunch of grizzlies, a moose and baby, a fox, tons of sheep and carabou, a grizzly vs carabou encounter (more posturing than anything else as both gave up the game and walked away), eagles galore, wolves, swans, squirrels, rabits, some other little round varmint, and more birds than I can count. On the next trip, we saw 12 grizzlies, including twice seeing one within 10 ft or so of the bus. We watched the close-up grizzlies for about 15 minutes -- at one point there were only the 6 of us in the bus watching. It was amazing.

 

DD,

We had considered doing the land portion on our own. When I looked at the information on the Denali Park website, it said there could be hour + waits for the shuttle if you get off. Did you experience this? Or did you stay on the same shuttle throughout.

 

I attempted to book the TWT directly through the Danali website with dates ranging over a full 2 weeks, but the only tour that had openings was NHT. This was about 2-months ago. I don't know if they open up seats as it gets closer to the departure date.

 

Had I been able to book TWT on my own, we probably would have skipped the land portion and just done the cruise. At the time, the shuttle option did not seem reliable enough when traveling with two in their 70's and two children.

[frugaltravel]

When I looked at the information on the Denali Park website, it said there could be hour + waits for the shuttle if you get off. Did you experience this? Or did you stay on the same shuttle throughout.

 

"Up to" means just that. I have hopped on and off shuttle buses a lot and only once remember waiting for a bus more than the first one to come along. That was because another bus had broken down so they put everyone from the broken bus onto another bus. But it is best to expect the worst and hope for the best.

[wolfie11]

DD,

We had considered doing the land portion on our own. When I looked at the information on the Denali Park website, it said there could be hour + waits for the shuttle if you get off. Did you experience this? Or did you stay on the same shuttle throughout.

 

I attempted to book the TWT directly through the Danali website with dates ranging over a full 2 weeks, but the only tour that had openings was NHT. This was about 2-months ago. I don't know if they open up seats as it gets closer to the departure date.

 

Had I been able to book TWT on my own, we probably would have skipped the land portion and just done the cruise. At the time, the shuttle option did not seem reliable enough when traveling with two in their 70's and two children.

 

You can often book or upgrade the TWT through your hotel when you arrive. They do usually go out full but there is a lot of fluidity in the schedules up to the day before the tour.

[negc]

With this particular tour, as I have mentioned, you have only ONE TWT option, that leaves at 1:30pm, pick up drop off at the hotel. With this "24, I would also totally skip the cruisetour transit to Seward and get the most I could, and just book the Alaska RR independently and get myself into Seward in time to at least do one activity. The cruisetour transits leave Anchorage too early and arrive in Seward too late for much of anything. This itinerary is already too much time in transit, comparing time at destinations and activity availablity.

 

We didn't have to upgrade to the TWT with our RCI cruisetour. It was included in the booking price and was significantly better than the NHT that Princess provided the last time we were in Alaska. Also, RCI let us upgrade our transfer from Anchorage to Seward from the bus to the Alaska RR for only $25 per person. Best $50 we spent on the entire trip.:) Weather in Seward was less than optimal that day so I know that if we had arrived earlier we would likely have checkied in, boarded the ship and stayed on board. :)