Boarding Time in Anchorage

[wrongwaywatson]

We are looking at a cruise that starts in Anchorage.  The sail away time is 8pm.  Looking at flights, we could be there very early afternoon.  Can you board the ship early afternoon or do you have to wait until later afternoon?  What is the earliest time you can board?  I tried to search for the answer, but the wheel just keep spinning.  Thanks!

[NavyVeteran]

My Travel Summary says "Your ship begins boarding at 12:30 PM on Sep 04 and sets sail at 08:30 PM on Sep 04." Your Travel Summary should have the exact times for your cruise.

 

The ship sails from Whittier - not from Anchorage. The train from Anchorage takes 2 1/2 hours; I'm not sure about the bus. Princess guidelines for embarkation in Anchorage (from my Travel Summary): "Latest flight arrival: 4 hours, 30 minutes prior to the ship's departure."

 

If you arrive in Anchorage early afternoon, you won't be boarding until late afternoon. The ship will be ready before you get there. In your case, I would definitely recommend a Princess transfer instead of trying to arrange transportation to Whittier on your own.

[wrongwaywatson]

3 minutes ago, NavyVeteran said:

My Travel Summary says "Your ship begins boarding at 12:30 PM on Sep 04 and sets sail at 08:30 PM on Sep 04." Your Travel Summary should have the exact times for your cruise.

 

The ship sails from Whittier - not from Anchorage. The train from Anchorage takes 2 1/2 hours; I'm not sure about the bus. Princess guidelines for embarkation in Anchorage (from my Travel Summary): "Latest flight arrival: 4 hours, 30 minutes prior to the ship's departure."

 

If you arrive in Anchorage early afternoon, you won't be boarding until late afternoon. The ship will be ready before you get there. In your case, I would definitely recommend a Princess transfer instead of trying to arrange transportation to Whittier on your own.

Thank you!  We haven't booked it, so we don't have a travel summary yet!  We actually have a sailing booked for Vancouver to Anchorage, but we are looking at moving it up a week possibly, and we were wondering about boarding time.  Thank you

[Shippy]

Flying in the same day......good luck !

[wrongwaywatson]

9 minutes ago, Shippy said:

Flying in the same day......good luck !

We haven't booked anything for this, yet.  We are actually booked one week later on the Vancouver to Anchorage leg.  We may have to change it.  We just wanted to see the flights/boarding times before we changed our plans, if possible.  

[Shippy]

We cruise several times a year. It has amazed us how many of our fights have been delayed.

   From faulty aircraft to the crew not arriving on time for our flight.

I would NEVER attempt to fly in on the same day of a cruise.

Glad you have not booked yet.

[wrongwaywatson]

16 minutes ago, Shippy said:

We cruise several times a year. It has amazed us how many of our fights have been delayed.

   From faulty aircraft to the crew not arriving on time for our flight.

I would NEVER attempt to fly in on the same day of a cruise.

Glad you have not booked yet.

We like to fly in the day before, and when we did Alaska last year we did fly in the day before.  However, there are some times that our work schedules just don't work out that way.  When we DO fly in day of, we fly as early as possible, get non-stop flights and we book through Princess.  But, I agree, day before is preferred!

Edited May 4 by wrongwaywatson

[TheArtfulPenguin]

On 5/4/2024 at 8:25 AM, wrongwaywatson said:

We haven't booked anything for this, yet.  We are actually booked one week later on the Vancouver to Anchorage leg.  We may have to change it.  We just wanted to see the flights/boarding times before we changed our plans, if possible.  

We are doing the Whittier to Vancouver cruise in late June. The cruise leaves on the 26th and we didn't want to worry about delays so we are flying in on the 24th. This gives us the 25th to do an excursion or something else in Anchorage. We are treating Anchorage as a port on the cruise to explore, not just the place to fly in and run to the ship.  

[frugaltravel]

On 5/4/2024 at 10:46 AM, wrongwaywatson said:

We like to fly in the day before, and when we did Alaska last year we did fly in the day before.  However, there are some times that our work schedules just don't work out that way.  When we DO fly in day of, we fly as early as possible, get non-stop flights and we book through Princess.  But, I agree, day before is preferred!

If you can't fly in the day before the cruise departure, I would definitely do the northbound cruise departing from Vancouver.  As was mentioned above, your cruise doesn't even depart from Anchorage - it departs from Whittier, which is a 90 minute bus ride or 2+ hour train ride from the Anchorage airport.  If you miss the cruise ship departure, you will miss three nights of the cruise at a minimum since the next place you could pick up the ship would be in Skagway (the first two full days are at Glacier Bay and Hubbard Glacier, which are sailing days).

 

[memoak]

On 5/6/2024 at 1:06 PM, TheArtfulPenguin said:

We are doing the Whittier to Vancouver cruise in late June. The cruise leaves on the 26th and we didn't want to worry about delays so we are flying in on the 24th. This gives us the 25th to do an excursion or something else in Anchorage. We are treating Anchorage as a port on the cruise to explore, not just the place to fly in and run to the ship.  

Fly in a day early. 

[wrongwaywatson]

Due to work, we are unable to fly in the day before.  We booked out flight through Princess, leaving O'Hare around midnight, nonstop and we arrive in Anchorage at 4:30am.  

[frugaltravel]

5 hours ago, wrongwaywatson said:

Due to work, we are unable to fly in the day before.  We booked out flight through Princess, leaving O'Hare around midnight, nonstop and we arrive in Anchorage at 4:30am.  

That is a very unique flight time.  Which airline?

 

One of my hedges against flight delays is to look at options in case of a delay.  If you have to leave later in the day, you would only be able to depart much later in the morning.  Alaska Air has a non-stop at 10.05am arriving ANC 1.55pm.  Other than that you probably need to make a connection, departing about 6am and arriving about the 1pm.  

[wrongwaywatson]

16 hours ago, frugaltravel said:

That is a very unique flight time.  Which airline?

 

One of my hedges against flight delays is to look at options in case of a delay.  If you have to leave later in the day, you would only be able to depart much later in the morning.  Alaska Air has a non-stop at 10.05am arriving ANC 1.55pm.  Other than that you probably need to make a connection, departing about 6am and arriving about the 1pm.  

We are flying Alaska Airlines out of O'Hare.   

Edited May 12 by wrongwaywatson

[frugaltravel]

7 hours ago, wrongwaywatson said:

We are flying Alaska Airlines out of O'Hare.   

The date you are planning on flying must have an extra flight with Alaska Air.  Their normal ORD-ANC departures leave in the morning during daylight hours.

 

[wrongwaywatson]

July 27th

[Muffinz]

On 5/12/2024 at 4:24 AM, wrongwaywatson said:

Due to work, we are unable to fly in the day before.  We booked out flight through Princess, leaving O'Hare around midnight, nonstop and we arrive in Anchorage at 4:30am.  

if you are unable to fly in the day before then I would seriously consider booking the cruise for another date when you are able to fly in a day or 2 early

as mentioned above any number of things can happen, flight delays due to bad weather, the previous incoming flight delayed....

We had friends doing a cruise around NZ earlier this year and they met some people who flew in from the USA, arriving in Auckland NZ on the morning of the cruise.... but their luggage wasn't on the plane and was still in the USA

[wrongwaywatson]

1 hour ago, Muffinz said:

if you are unable to fly in the day before then I would seriously consider booking the cruise for another date when you are able to fly in a day or 2 early

as mentioned above any number of things can happen, flight delays due to bad weather, the previous incoming flight delayed....

We had friends doing a cruise around NZ earlier this year and they met some people who flew in from the USA, arriving in Auckland NZ on the morning of the cruise.... but their luggage wasn't on the plane and was still in the USA

We appreciate the concern, but this is when we will be able to cruise.  We understand flying in the day before is the best.  We kind of added this cruise last minute, because we didn't want to wait until November for our next cruise.  We may regret it, but we do feel that we did the best that we can do under these circumstances.  Our flight will get in at 4:30am the day of the cruising and the ship doesn't sail until 8:30pm that evening.  We are flying out of O'Hare, which does have flights leaving after our scheduled departed time.  We also booked our flights through Princess, we also have insurance, so financially we are somewhat protected over this.  Would we be disappointed?  Yes, but booking the cruise with this in mind is better than staying at home until we cruise in November!

[karatemom2]

Yes, it's always better to fly in the day before IF YOU CAN. But sometimes, like the OP, you can't for whatever reason.

 

So here is the reality - there have been a number of cruises where we had to fly in same day due to work or family commitments. And may the odds remain ever in our favor, we never had a single problem and made every cruise. So it is quite probable that the OP will have no issue. If there is, as the OP pointed out, they are prepared to deal with it. 

 

Sometimes you just gotta roll the dice! Best of luck to you and I hope you make it and have a great cruise!

[wrongwaywatson]

36 minutes ago, karatemom2 said:

Yes, it's always better to fly in the day before IF YOU CAN. But sometimes, like the OP, you can't for whatever reason.

 

So here is the reality - there have been a number of cruises where we had to fly in same day due to work or family commitments. And may the odds remain ever in our favor, we never had a single problem and made every cruise. So it is quite probable that the OP will have no issue. If there is, as the OP pointed out, they are prepared to deal with it. 

 

Sometimes you just gotta roll the dice! Best of luck to you and I hope you make it and have a great cruise!

Thank you, @karatemom2!

[cruisequeen4ever]

Boarding begins between 12 and 12:15. Definitely don’t risk flying into Anchorage in the afternoon. Anchorage is a 1.25-1.5 hr drive from Whittier where you board.

[wrongwaywatson]

1 hour ago, cruisequeen4ever said:

Boarding begins between 12 and 12:15. Definitely don’t risk flying into Anchorage in the afternoon. Anchorage is a 1.25-1.5 hr drive from Whittier where you board.

Our flight gets in at 4:30am

[arizonaperson]

@wrongwaywatson enjoy your Alaska cruise.

How are you getting from the airport to the ship? I am sure the Princess transfer bus is probably the way to go? Does any of your paperwork say how early they start transporting people to the ship? otherwise, you’re going  be finding a pillow and a blanket  & food beyond security in the Anchorage airport,you may have a long time to wait, which obviously is out of your control.

I am sure there’s information somewhere out there how soon they start transporting passengers. ( 9 am/10am??)

 

We did the land tour first and then the cruise, so we flew into Anchorage rented a car for 24 hours then went back to the airport the next morning and caught the Princess bus and then went on the land tour portion,so my scenario was different. I have nothing to add to it. 

[arizonaperson]

On 5/12/2024 at 2:36 PM, frugaltravel said:

The date you are planning on flying must have an extra flight with Alaska Air.  Their normal ORD-ANC departures leave in the morning during daylight hours.

 

It’s an overnight flight. Leaves on July 26th arrives on 27th at 4:30 am. AS 565.

At first glance, I didn’t see it either. I was right with you on a special flight ,but obviously OP/ author knows what flight they have and that they’re valid.

[wrongwaywatson]

8 hours ago, arizonaperson said:

It’s an overnight flight. Leaves on July 26th arrives on 27th at 4:30 am. AS 565.

At first glance, I didn’t see it either. I was right with you on a special flight ,but obviously OP/ author knows what flight they have and that they’re valid.

Actually, it leaves on July 27th at 12:59AM, arriving at 4:30AM.

[wrongwaywatson]

8 hours ago, arizonaperson said:

@wrongwaywatson enjoy your Alaska cruise.

How are you getting from the airport to the ship? I am sure the Princess transfer bus is probably the way to go? Does any of your paperwork say how early they start transporting people to the ship? otherwise, you’re going  be finding a pillow and a blanket  & food beyond security in the Anchorage airport,you may have a long time to wait, which obviously is out of your control.

I am sure there’s information somewhere out there how soon they start transporting passengers. ( 9 am/10am??)

 

We did the land tour first and then the cruise, so we flew into Anchorage rented a car for 24 hours then went back to the airport the next morning and caught the Princess bus and then went on the land tour portion,so my scenario was different. I have nothing to add to it. 

We haven't booked a Princess Transfer, we were thinking of taking the train from Anchorage to Whittier.  We could eat breakfast after we collect our luggage and then catch the first train.  Or, we may decide to get a transfer, but I hate the thought of hanging around the airport.  We will probably be able to sleep on the plane, but it will still be a very long day!