Skagway tenders with ships in the RRF location

[world_traveler_et]

This week seems to have the most ships in the port of Skagway at once with more in the RRF location and tendering.  I booked an excursion independent with Chilkoot for there Scenic Bennett Journey.  I have used them on two previous sailings and this will be my second time doing the Scenic Bennett Journey.  I believe our ship is due to arrive around 6AM.  I need to meet up with my group around 9:15AM.  Do you think this will be an issues with tendering? 

 

Will priority be given only to people who booked through the cruise line to get off the ship?  Do we get tender tickets?  How is the process working for those who have already cruised?

[Guest ldtr]

If they are tendering then you will probably need tender tickets until the morning rush is over.

 

They will list a location to get tender tickets.  The earlier your party arrives the lower the tender tickets.  The good news is the tender is short.

 

Suites and Elite get priority tender tickets in a different location.  Princess excursion groups will also get priority.

 

Should be fine making the 9:15 depending upon when they start tendering.  Just do not dawdle in getting ready and getting the tickets.

[SuzieQ521]

5 minutes ago, world_traveler_et said:

This week seems to have the most ships in the port of Skagway at once with more in the RRF location and tendering.  I booked an excursion independent with Chilkoot for there Scenic Bennett Journey.  I have used them on two previous sailings and this will be my second time doing the Scenic Bennett Journey.  I believe our ship is due to arrive around 6AM.  I need to meet up with my group around 9:15AM.  Do you think this will be an issues with tendering? 

 

Will priority be given only to people who booked through the cruise line to get off the ship?  Do we get tender tickets?  How is the process working for those who have already cruised?

 

We were just in Skagway last week and boat tendered from RRF. We did have  Princess excursion with the train. We were told to meet up in the theater at a set time and then were given priority to disembark. 

 

For everyone else, they had to line up to exit on the gangways (those without tender tickets); Try to get a tender ticket; otherwise, I would line up as early as you can to be off quickly.

 

And yes, it's a really short boat ride (less than 10 minutes).

Edited May 30, 2023 by SuzieQ521

[phroggie]

1 hour ago, SuzieQ521 said:

 

We were just in Skagway last week and boat tendered from RRF. We did have  Princess excursion with the train. We were told to meet up in the theater at a set time and then were given priority to disembark. 

 

 

Which ship/day? If is was Discovery Princess on Wednesday, from the bridge cam  it looked like it tied up at RRA. Were they tendering due the the rockslide hazard?

[SuzieQ521]

7 minutes ago, phroggie said:

Which ship/day? If is was Discovery Princess on Wednesday, from the bridge cam  it looked like it tied up at RRA. Were they tendering due the the rockslide hazard?

 

We were Royal Princess on 5/23 at RRF--we had to boat tender because of the rockslide which was right near that area.

[Kay S]

We just got the email about tendering at Skagway.  The Royal.  I have been reading about the rock slides and wondered if we would be affected.  We have an excursion booked through the ship, so I'm assuming we will be able to tender ashore in time.

[memoak]

1 hour ago, Kay S said:

We just got the email about tendering at Skagway.  The Royal.  I have been reading about the rock slides and wondered if we would be affected.  We have an excursion booked through the ship, so I'm assuming we will be able to tender ashore in time.

Yes you will meet on board as a group and escorted to a tender

[SuzieQ521]

1 hour ago, Kay S said:

We just got the email about tendering at Skagway.  The Royal.  I have been reading about the rock slides and wondered if we would be affected.  We have an excursion booked through the ship, so I'm assuming we will be able to tender ashore in time.

Yes, we just did this on the Royal last week.

 

You will be given your excursion tickets in your stateroom 2 nights before and they will tell you where to meet. Ours was at the Princess Theater at 9:10 a.m. You will then be escorted in groups from there to the boat tender areas and then take a very short boat trip to shore. Then depending on the excursion (ours was the train), there will be a line for the excursion right when you get ashore. 

 

It was very easy and efficient. And we had no line to take the boat on the way back.

[Buckeye10640]

5 hours ago, world_traveler_et said:

This week seems to have the most ships in the port of Skagway at once with more in the RRF location and tendering.  I booked an excursion independent with Chilkoot for there Scenic Bennett Journey.  I have used them on two previous sailings and this will be my second time doing the Scenic Bennett Journey.  I believe our ship is due to arrive around 6AM.  I need to meet up with my group around 9:15AM.  Do you think this will be an issues with tendering? 

 

Will priority be given only to people who booked through the cruise line to get off the ship?  Do we get tender tickets?  How is the process working for those who have already cruised?

We docked there 2 weeks ago with a 915 meet time for our tour with Chilkoot. You will not get priority tendering for an independent excursion.  We went to get tender tickets in the Photo Gallery area about 815am and we were on a tender by 830. Its a really short 5-10 minute ride so we were earlier than needed. Not enough time to walk anywhere so we just found somewhere to sit and waited for our tour.  

Edited May 31, 2023 by Buckeye10640

[Coral]

I was in Skagway last week and saw people docked and then tendering. We were at the Broadway dock and didn't need to tender.

 

Chilkoot is aware of the situation. I would be on the phone with them. The ship docks so early - I would probably just plan on leaving much earlier than you had originally planned. People are not going to race to get off the ship at 7 am. There may be lines at 8 or 9 though. I would call them. They have been dealing with ships for a few weeks concerning this. They can probably advise you on the best time to leave the ship.

[Coral]

You can see the tender in the one picture and where it is going to.

 

[portiemom]

4 hours ago, phroggie said:

Which ship/day? If is was Discovery Princess on Wednesday, from the bridge cam  it looked like it tied up at RRA. Were they tendering due the the rockslide hazard?

May 25th was Thursday. Discovery Princess was scheduled to be at RRA.

[Coral]

4 hours ago, phroggie said:

Which ship/day? If is was Discovery Princess on Wednesday, from the bridge cam  it looked like it tied up at RRA. Were they tendering due the the rockslide hazard?

 

Yes! The ship is docked but you have to exit through a tender.

[Shippy]

We are currently on the Crown.

We we’re just in Skagway the other day and did NOT have to tender !

 

[Dlynna]

12 hours ago, phroggie said:

Which ship/day? If is was Discovery Princess on Wednesday, from the bridge cam  it looked like it tied up at RRA. Were they tendering due the the rockslide hazard?

I was on Discovery last week and we were tied to the gangway. I had a ship tour and We had to meet in the theater and our bus was parked next to the ship after walking through some containers. Everyone else had to get off the ship and line up for a shuttle bus to take them to the end of the pier.

[Coral]

1 hour ago, Dlynna said:

I was on Discovery last week and we were tied to the gangway. I had a ship tour and We had to meet in the theater and our bus was parked next to the ship after walking through some containers. Everyone else had to get off the ship and line up for a shuttle bus to take them to the end of the pier.

Interesting - thanks for the update. We saw the Majestic tender.

[Coral]

5 hours ago, Shippy said:

We are currently on the Crown.

We we’re just in Skagway the other day and did NOT have to tender !

 

That is great. We were on the Crown the week before and we were at the Broadway dock. I confirmed with the officers that the ships at RR dock had to tender after I saw tenders running back and fourth.

 

I wonder if they are modifying plans as the season goes on.

Edited May 31, 2023 by Coral

[Hulagirl]

We were on the Discovery last week, May 25.  No tenders required for that day at the RR dock.  I had expected tenders due to what I'd read.  When we were in the Concierge lounge I asked about this ahead to know what to expect.  They have many shipping containers lined up to protect from the hill side that you will walk through.  Shuttle buses are constantly running to take you part way to a lot then walk into town.

 

Apparently though they have 2 cruises in the next month where tenders will be required.  I don't remember what he told us was the dates for those or why those weeks will require them.  But there are a couple coming up.  Made it nice for the stop to not tender at all.

[SuzieQ521]

17 minutes ago, Hulagirl said:

We were on the Discovery last week, May 25.  No tenders required for that day at the RR dock.  I had expected tenders due to what I'd read.  When we were in the Concierge lounge I asked about this ahead to know what to expect.  They have many shipping containers lined up to protect from the hill side that you will walk through.  Shuttle buses are constantly running to take you part way to a lot then walk into town.

 

Apparently though they have 2 cruises in the next month where tenders will be required.  I don't remember what he told us was the dates for those or why those weeks will require them.  But there are a couple coming up.  Made it nice for the stop to not tender at all.

 

Yes, I'm not sure how they are determining who tenders. We were on the Royal on 5/23 (also a big ship) and we had to boat tender. There were 3 or 4 other ships in Port with us, including a Celebrity ship which was very large. The Hal ones were smaller.

Maybe it's when there are 2 megaships in Port?

[memoak]

1 hour ago, Hulagirl said:

We were on the Discovery last week, May 25.  No tenders required for that day at the RR dock.  I had expected tenders due to what I'd read.  When we were in the Concierge lounge I asked about this ahead to know what to expect.  They have many shipping containers lined up to protect from the hill side that you will walk through.  Shuttle buses are constantly running to take you part way to a lot then walk into town.

 

Apparently though they have 2 cruises in the next month where tenders will be required.  I don't remember what he told us was the dates for those or why those weeks will require them.  But there are a couple coming up.  Made it nice for the stop to not tender at all.

There are 2 RR docks. RRA and RRF one requires tenders one does not

[Hulagirl]

We were in the exact location that Coral posted her picture of the Majestic the week before. Whatever it’s called we didn’t have to tender. But they will have to in June twice we were told. 

[wen_c82]

I was on Majestic Princess in May. When we docked at RRA on May 9 we were bused. When we docked at RRF on May 17, we were tendered.  Same with other mega ships docked at RR.

 

RRA is bused and  RRF is tendered. 

[Coral]

1 hour ago, wen_c82 said:

I was on Majestic Princess in May. When we docked at RRA on May 9 we were bused. When we docked at RRF on May 17, we were tendered.  Same with other mega ships docked at RR.

 

RRA is bused and  RRF is tendered. 

This is the most bizarre thing ever. I wonder what determines tender vs bus.

[Guest ldtr]

20 minutes ago, Coral said:

This is the most bizarre thing ever. I wonder what determines tender vs bus.

The aft dock RRA gets bused, the front dock RRF, under the fall area gets tendered.

 

They installed a warning system on the fall area. They also took steps to reduce risk of large rocks falling. The logic is that the warning system negates risk for the brief time that a bus is passing by the front dock. But still to high of a risk to have passengers loading and offloading onto the dock directly under the fall area since the warning system would not provide enough time to clear the dock space.  That is why they exit via tenders from the opposite side of the ship.

 

https://www.ktoo.org/2023/04/11/large-rock-throws-wrench-into-skagways-cruise-ship-schedule/

 

https://alaskapublic.org/2022/10/11/skagway-assembly-adopts-engineers-short-term-fix-for-rockslides/

Edited June 1, 2023 by ldtr

[world_traveler_et]

Thanks for everyone who has commented so far.   Here is a link to see where your ship will be docked in Skagway

 

https://claalaska.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/SKG-Skagway-2023-1.pdf

 

The Crown Princess was docked at the Broadway dock on May 29th so that is why they did not tender.  Any ships docked at Broadway and the Ore are not impacted.

 

I appreciate the information on the tenders and the process of getting tickets. 

 

Even though my tour is scheduled to meet at 9:15AM for the tour and the ship arrives at 6AM many things can happen.  In 2013 I was on the same independent tour which was scheduled meet up around 7:15 AM.   It was a challenge getting off the ship and walking fast to get to the tours meet up location.  The tour was great and worth repeating as the scenery past Frasier is stunning.