14-Day Authentic Alaska land/cruise tour southbound with the Jewel - just the land part

[D&J38]

When I somewhat arbitrarily booked this southbound tour, I couldn't find much information about it on here.  So I'm going to write a little about it.  Undoubtedly it is best to do the land part first and then relax on the ship, because the land part is not particularly relaxing!  And a big caveat.  Our tour guide was ill with the flu and was replaced after two days.  Half the bus was soon coughing, and pretty much our trip was ruined because my husband and I both got it.. BUT there are lots of good parts, so here's some info.

 

We let NCL book our flights, resulting in a 5 a.m. flight from Eugene, Oregon.  Not a great way to start a trip.  We also spent the entire day in the Vancouver airport awaiting our 7:30 p.m. flight home, also not great.   But there was a wonderful guitarist playing soft rock music all afternoon, which was very enjoyable.

 

We flew into Fairbanks, and the cruise lines are all there awaiting you.  You get your bags off the carousel and roll them a few feet to the cruise desk, and they take it from there and put you on a bus.  We were grouped A,  B and C, meaning there were three busloads of us doing the NCL land tour.  The first day is just about getting there.  When we got to our hotel lobby, folks were asleep on any surface they could find because they arrived on early flights and you can't get into your room until late in the afternoon.  You will meet your tour guide, and he or she will give you your room keys (which is how it works at each hotel)..

 

The next morning you will meet your bus driver, who will be with you the entire land trip.  You will have new luggage tags and a summary sheet telling you what time to have your bags outside your room each morning.  Think 6 a.m.  Ugh.  If you have a bag you don't need until you get on the ship, you can get a different tag for that and it will stay on the bus until Seward. Otherwise each day your bags will go on the bus with you.

 

Our first excursion was to the Riverboat Discovery Cruise in Fairbanks.  What a treat that was!  It is such a well-run family-owned outfit and so very interesting.  A bonus was that we arrived early enough to shop at their large store where I got my pretty pink rain jacket for $24.99.  It was a good store.  Then on the boat you can have free blueberry doughnuts and coffee.

 

The Princess passengers were to have their lunch in the facility's dining room, but our buses went to downtown Fairbanks where we had some choices for lunch.Then it was back on the bus for a long trip to Denali.  Our Denali tour the following day did not start until 4:30 p.m., but that gave us time to sleep in (thank goodness!) and see the two short films at the visitor's center.  Our Denali tour bus driver was another delightful lady.  SHE SAID THE REST OF THE ROAD TO DENALI MAY NOT BE OPEN UNTIL JULY OF 2026--MAYBE.  It's a bad slide situation.

 

The next day promised a kennel tour.  We had seen Susan  Butcher's husband's sled dog operation on the riverbank in Fairbanks, but this was a whole other thing. This was Jeff King's Husky Homestead outside Denali and was the highlight of our trip.  We held pups, watched some training, and then went inside where he regaled us as well as any stand-up comedian.  He was a riot!  

 

Then it was back to the Denali Visitor Center where we  boarded the train to Talkeetna.  The tour company that NCL uses (Premier Alaska Tours) owns two large domed "Wilderness Express" cars and contracts with the Alaskan Railroad to pull them.  They were very nice with a full bar up top and a restaurant below.  Definitely the nicest  cars on the train.  Again we had a train guide named Sterling who was top notch.  There's a lot of good talent up there!    It's about a four-hour train ride.  We only saw Talkeetna long enough to use the bathroom at the station, and then it was back on the bus to Anchorage.  Yes, long confined bus rides.  The Anchorage Hilton was a ZOO with eight NCL buses arriving Friday evening and luggage everywhere.  The hotel is fancy downstairs but was the most disappointing of the ones we stayed at, with no microwave, no refrigerator and no room to turn around in the room.  The others were all better.  My brother and I found good fish tacos at a Mexican restaurant right across the street.

 

The next day it was off to a wildlife center and then Homer for two nights  In hindsight, we could have skipped Homer, but we were too sick by then to care and just needed to recuperate.  I did get to do a quick load of laundry in the hotel.

 

When we were on the train, the bus driver rode alone and met us.

 

Then it was off to Seward after the Kenai Wildlife Refuge.  Seward was a quick and easy place to get on the Jewel.

 

So I just wanted to summarize what to expect on this land tour.  It's go, go, go, bags out early, not a lot of choices for meals.  BUT fortunately the bus did make two strategic stops at Fred Meyer in Fairbanks and Safeway in Soldotna so we could shop for deli food or necessities, which was much appreciated.

 

I hope you've found some of this interesting.  I'm so glad our trip included the Fairbanks riverboat and the Husky Homestead.

 

Janice

Edited August 30, 2023 by D&J38
Clarify what it covers

[D&J38]

Obviously I left out a lot.  We did see caribou, moose, a grizzly bear and dall sheep on the Denali bus tour.  There was also a stop at the Alaskan Pipeline.  One reason I chose this tour was that we would see both Fairbanks and Anchorage, but it's not like we really saw much of Anchorage other than driving in and driving out.  

 

We've done Alaska on the Jewel before, and we like the ship.  Enough other people will and have covered that.

 

Janice

[bonvoyagie]

good review, we did this same tour in late June this year. We did the helicopter tour with glacier landing at Denali as well as the wildlife boat tour in Homer. Both were ordered through the tour company - we had a blast. Sorry to hear about your illness we both caught colds on the cruise ship.

 

We originally planned to do the northbound cruise an do a DIY land tour afterwards but after watching the NCL video on ISP we decided on the southbound and do the cruisetour - so glad we did. 

 

I agree that we needed the more relaxed time in Homer to decompress. 

[cruiseny4life]

Thank you for this review. I haven't really read any reviews regarding the land tours in Alaska. It sounds like you had a good time and I'm glad you did! For me, it sounds horrendous which is why I'm so happy you posted this. I'm still hesitant to book a cruise to Alaska on a NCL ship given how big all of them are. I'd be happier on an under 100 person vessel. And, now I know I'll be much happier traveling to Alaska on my own doing a land tour in my car. I've done it before, it was just in March. I do want to see Alaska in the summer as well.

 

Again, thanks, I really appreciate you posting this!

[D&J38]

I'm glad you enjoyed it.  That's why I wrote it--I couldn't find much, either, ahead of time!  And actually the Jewel isn't as big as many of NCL's ships; I think they said there were 2,000 aboard this time and 2,400 the week before.

 

There are so many land versions to choose from.  Maybe four or five days would have been less stressful, but I wouldn't have wanted to miss the Fairbanks riverboat or the Husky Homestead.

[julig22]

On the subject of flights.... I'm on the Jewel now, I  usually use NCL to book my flights and fly out of Eugene but booked my own flights this time for just the Seward-Vancouver cruise.  After trying to get something decent scheduled for both Anchorage and Vancouver, I opted to drive to Seattle and fly from there. It's about a 4hr drive, way faster than having to deal with layovers and inconvenient times. The flights I did choose were odd times, not anything NCL would have booked for sure but perfect for my situation. I opted to spend a day in Seward pre-cruise, so early arrival to Anchorage, in time for the train to Seward. Flights out of Vancouver arriving in Seattle at 12:30 or 2:20, so I'll be home long before that 7:30 flight even departs! Plus I'm another hour from Eugene.

I took the same land tour back in 2019. Definitely agree it's better to cruise afterwards. Sorry to hear people got sick.