Tendering at Icy Strait 7am . earliest disembarkment ?

[SEASICK STEVE]

We have a private whale watching tour booked ,pickup at 7:35am is this doable. Cheers G.

[cruisestitch]

Very doubtful. The first tender spaces will go to those who have booked Celebrity tours or who are high in the loyalty program or who are in the upper level suites. Only then do they open the tenders to other passengers. I would not expect that you would be ashore that early.

[CHEZMARYLOU]

We just returned from our cruise and had a 7:30 whale watch in ISP. Even though they passed out priority tender tickets they were not needed or asked for. Disembarkation began at 7:00 AM and we were on the dock by 7:10-7:15 so you should not have a problem.

 

BTW, it looked like the passengers on the ships excursions were tendering from a different station than the general tenders.

 

Mary Lou

[SEASICK STEVE]

Cheers CS & Mary Lou , been in touch with tour company and they say not a problem all season , just queue up early .only 30 days to go

Roll on :)) Cheers Gerry

 

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Edited August 6, 2014 by SEASICK STEVE

[CHEZMARYLOU]

Enjoy your cruise, it is awesome. Who is your tour with in ISP? We went with Harv & Marv and saw a pod of Orcas, & humpbacks bubble feeding, breaching, tail slapping and fin flapping. One humpback swam right by the boat and another went 4' under it.

 

Mary Lou

 

OOPS, wrong port, we were with H&M & Juneau. In ISP we were with FISHES and saw some great behavior from a humpback.

Edited August 7, 2014 by CHEZMARYLOU
Wrong Port

[Faircliff]

I wouldn't count on getting off the ship quickly with a private tour at Icy Strait. We just returned from the seven-day trip to Alaska and that was our first port. We had to tender in of course. Ship arrived I believe at 3 PM and it was at least 4 PM before the first tours got off the ship and those were Celebrity sponsored excursions. We had tender number 12 and it was at least 5 PM before we headed to shore. There were tender numbers past number 30 and I don't know when they made it. Most of the people at our dinner table gave up and stayed on board the ship. Pity as it was a nice (small) place, despite the rain.

 

 

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[CHEZMARYLOU]

Docking at 7:00 AM might have made it easier because unless you had an early excursion there would be no reason to tender to shore that early.

 

Mary Lou

[Italy52]

Docking at 7:00 AM might have made it easier because unless you had an early excursion there would be no reason to tender to shore that early.

 

Mary Lou

 

You are correct. We just got back from a B2B --- the first ISP stop was at 10:00 AM and the second stop was at 7:00 AM. We had priority tender tickets for the first stop but not the second. I asked one of the officers that was on board the tender why the difference in priority tendering tickets and he stated that at 7:00 AM not too many people want to get off the ship so early if they aren't on a tour. However, by the 10:00 AM time, a lot of people are awake and ready to go ashore.

 

In any event, we always make sure to be ready and in close proximity to the disembarking level so when the announcement is made, we can get down to the boat ASAP.