Timeline for booking excursions - third-party booking showing no availability

[DougnSam]

We recently booked a 7-day cruise to Alaska on Holland America for May 2025. We really want to do a helicopter tour of Mendenhall Glacier. On the HAL site, the excursions are available for booking. We have been told that many tours can be booked cheaper directly through the company, or through booking sites like Viator or AlaskaShoreExcursions.com. We went to a number of booking sites and found the exact trip we want (much cheaper, as described) but there are no times available. Is this likely because it is too far in advance or because they are sold out? If they are sold out, we will book through the cruise line (and pay more). If they are not selling to the public yet, is it better to wait?

 

Example: https://alaskashoreexcursions.com/juneau/helicopter-glacier-walkabout

[GeezerCouple]

4 minutes ago, DougnSam said:

We recently booked a 7-day cruise to Alaska on Holland America for May 2025. We really want to do a helicopter tour of Mendenhall Glacier. On the HAL site, the excursions are available for booking. We have been told that many tours can be booked cheaper directly through the company, or through booking sites like Viator or AlaskaShoreExcursions.com. We went to a number of booking sites and found the exact trip we want (much cheaper, as described) but there are no times available. Is this likely because it is too far in advance or because they are sold out? If they are sold out, we will book through the cruise line (and pay more). If they are not selling to the public yet, is it better to wait?

 

Example: https://alaskashoreexcursions.com/juneau/helicopter-glacier-walkabout

What did they say about this when you called them or sent them a direct email?

 

Oh, and Welcome to CruiseCritic!

🙂 

 

GC

Edited September 16 by GeezerCouple

[Jnsplace1]

It might be that they aren't offering it through that website service next year?   When I went to the link, it had nothing after Oct 2024 for availability.

when I selected your ship and May, I saw lots of other tours, but not that one.

 

Could be that they haven't decided.

 

I agree, you may need to contact the company directly and see what they say.

[Crew News]

Welcome to Cruise Critic and Holland America Line.

 

Feel free to ask lots of questions here to help in your planning until your roll call becomes more active.  Since I will be in Alaska in May before your cruise, I will post the Main Dining Room (MDR) menus (all 7-Day HAL cruises have the same menu) on the link in the lower right of my signature.

 

As a many-time Holland America Line (HAL) cruiser to Alaska, I have learned that cruise line contracts with flying excursion contractors give the cruise line passengers priority.  If you delay making reservations through HAL, you risk not getting a seat if HAL fills every seat.

 

Booking excursions through HAL earns loyalty point toward onboard discounts, among other benefits.

 

Note that each helicopter to Mendenhall Glacier drops off passengers and departs to pick up another group.  The glacier has about 1/4-inch of running water which requires crampons (fitted once on the glacier) to enable walking.  Bring a collapsible cup to take a drink. 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited September 16 by Crew News

[DougnSam]

50 minutes ago, Jnsplace1 said:

I agree, you may need to contact the company directly and see what they say.

Thanks. I don't know why I didn't think to call. So used to doing everything online nowadays. They said helo bookings for May will open in October. 

[peety3]

Fair warning: some of the vendors have signed exclusivity contracts with the cruise lines. Those vendors will likely not accept your booking unless you present yourself as a non-cruise traveler, and may also be hesitant to discuss pricing with cruisers.

 

It's also possible that they have allocated all of their capacity to the cruise lines for now. We did a boat tour to Misty Fjords back in 2015. It was perhaps the first day of the season, and there were only two ships in port that day. The tour boat held 150 passengers. Apparently the "game" is that when the ship and tour schedule is first made, the tour vendor offers 75 seats to one line and 75 seats to the other line. Every so often, as the date gets closer, the tour guide negotiates with the lines on how much capacity they want. If one line isn't showing a lot of sales, they might throttle back their request, at which point the vendor can offer it to the other line. At a certain point, the cruise line makes a final commitment to the vendor (and ends up on the hook for that many tickets, no matter whether they sell them or not). The vendor could then sell any excess uncommitted capacity to the public (or could perhaps have reduced their capacity offer to one of the lines ahead of time if they wanted to sell to the public).

 

We had an instance where we were in Juneau perhaps 1:30pm to 10:00pm. Our favorite whale watch tour/vendor apparently only had offerings on our ship at 2:00pm, even though they likely had plenty of time to go out on the water 1-2 times more well before dark. We wanted to do a "double" whale watch, so we called up the vendor and made arrangements. The vendor, for better or worse, would not commit to a second tour until the very last minute, even to a point where we didn't know if we'd get the second tour until we got back to the dock from our first tour. (We were ok with that...better a maybe than a flat no.) Interestingly, in order to make absolutely sure they were not selling that second tour to us without going through the cruise line, they wrote paper tickets for us and handed them to us to hold. If we were successful at getting on a second tour, we'd hand in those paper tickets to be billed.Sure enough, we made it out for a second tour.

[Coral]

I like to go directly to the vendor and not use a middle man like Viator. Here is one vendor:

 

https://temscoair.com/mendenhall-glacier-and-guided-walk/

 

[DougnSam]

4 hours ago, Crew News said:

Welcome to Cruise Critic and Holland America Line.

 

Feel free to ask lots of questions here to help in your planning until your roll call becomes more active.  Since I will be in Alaska in May before your cruise, I will post the Main Dining Room (MDR) menus (all 7-Day HAL cruises have the same menu) on the link in the lower right of my signature.

Thanks! That's very helpful. I'm drooling with anticipation