Alaska Cruise Air Question

[madkil]

We will be doing a cruisetour on the Radiance in June 2007. Right now we are booked with RCCL for the air flights. The cruise leaves from Fairbanks. There are no direct flights from Newark NJ to Fairbanks. In looking on the internet most flights are to Seattle and then to Fairbanks. The price quoted to us from RCCL is $719. All the prices on the internet are in the $900 range. I am afraid that RCCL will not be non stop to Seattle hence the cheaper price. Has anyone had any experience with RCCL air that may help me decide whether to book on my own or stay with RCCL

[Bruin Steve]

We will be doing a cruisetour on the Radiance in June 2007. Right now we are booked with RCCL for the air flights. The cruise leaves from Fairbanks. There are no direct flights from Newark NJ to Fairbanks. In looking on the internet most flights are to Seattle and then to Fairbanks. The price quoted to us from RCCL is $719. All the prices on the internet are in the $900 range. I am afraid that RCCL will not be non stop to Seattle hence the cheaper price. Has anyone had any experience with RCCL air that may help me decide whether to book on my own or stay with RCCL

We did an Alaska Cruisetour in July 2004 on Celebrity Summit...

Note that RCCL and Celebrity run their cruisetour air and land operation under the same umbrella, so I am certain my experience would have been the same for either line...

 

Our cruisetour started in Fairbanks and ended in Vancouver...

We live in Southern California...

RCCL/Celebrity arranged almost PERFECT flights for us...

They had us on a flight directly from LAX to Seattle--with no change of planes, just the stopover, and directly on to Fairbanks...

Our return flight was NONSTOP from Vancouver to Los Angeles...

 

Now, it MAY be easier to find direct flights from LA to Seattle or Vancouver than from Newark, but it is also true that they could have easily flown us through any number of stops or plane changes...They just didn't...We were absolutely satisfied with their handling of the air requirements (Note: We also used Celebrity Air to fly to and from our 2003 Millennium Mediterranean cruise...and they flew us each way, LA to Venice and Barcelona to LA with ONLY one stop in each direction...and those are routes with no nonstops that I know of)...

 

I would go with RCCL's air any time...obviously, there's always a chance of an inconvenient flight or an extra stop...but I really think they'll get you the best flights available...

 

Of course, if you want, you can always get a "deviation" and call your own flights, but...I seem to remember they had the Fairbanks thing incredibly well worked out...there were three bus-loads on our 13 night cruisetour...and almost everyone arrived together on the same flight...and the "Royal Celebrity" (that's what they call the combined Alaska operation) folks were there in the Airport waiting for us...

 

By the way, it's an absolutely woinderful cruisetour...I am assuming you're taking one similar to ours: 2 nights in Fairbanks, dome train to Denali, dome train to Talkeetna, bus to Anchorage, to Alyeska, to the ship in Seward...Skagway, Icy Strait Point, Juneau, Ketchikan, Vancouver...

 

The hotels they used were absolutely first class (especially loved the Talkeetna Alaska Lodge and the Alyeska Prince) and the included excursions were great...

 

Enjoy...

[cruzingduo]

We are also going on a June Alaska sailing. We are flying out of Newark and you are correct, there are no direct flights. We are flying Newark to Seattle, then Seattle to Fairbanks. Check out Alaska Air. We do not like to fly and searched for direct flights. We found it cheaper booking ourselves.

 

Where are you from?

[kyriecat]

RC usually like to get as many people on the same flights as they can so that they only have to send one bus to pick up a group rather than a few here, few there, etc. I would almost bet that they will not give you a non-stop flight to Seattle so that they can add a few more people.

 

I only used RC air once. We left Houston at 6:30 AM, were flown to Atlanta, then Miami, and finally San Juan, arriving at 7:45 PM for a 10 PM sail time. We were exhausted from either sitting in the airport waiting for hours between flights or else running from 1 end of MIA to the other because they only gave us 30 minutes between flights.

 

It's normally a 3.5 hour flight for Houston direct to San Juan.

 

Have you looked at booking your flights separately - roundtrip for Newark to Seattle, then a 1 way on Alaska Air for Seattle to Fairbanks? Also, have you checked Continental? Newark is their hub so you can can a direct flight to Seattle then switch planes and continue to Fairbanks. Return is Seattle direct to Newark. Current price (assuming fly out on June 6 and returning on June 16 is $728 pp.

[madkil]

We are also going on a June Alaska sailing. We are flying out of Newark and you are correct, there are no direct flights. We are flying Newark to Seattle, then Seattle to Fairbanks. Check out Alaska Air. We do not like to fly and searched for direct flights. We found it cheaper booking ourselves.

 

Where are you from?

 

We are leaving on June 18 and returning on the 30th.

We are from Middletown NJ. There are 3 couples going on this cruise

 

I will try Alaska Air. Thanks

[Murphy]

Our Alaska trip air thru RCCL is cheaper than I can get on my own right now as well. If you are worried about picking the best flight, use their Custom Air service. If you are Platinum or higher, it's free, otherwise, it's $50, which is still cheaper that you can apparently book on your own and you have the peace of mind that you get the flight/airline/time you want.

[cruzingduo]

We are from Middlesex county and our cruise tour starts on June 4th, however we are flying out a day ahead. We end in Vancouver and are staying 3 extra nights there. When I worked with RCL's custom air (we are Diamond and will be Diamond Plus after the Alaska cruise) we found that we were able to get air quite a bit cheaper (more than $50 per person). I don't recall the exact amount, I have it written somewhere. We fly to Fairbanks and we are staying at the same place (Sophie's Station) as the hotel RCL uses for the first night of our cruise tour. Plus they have free airport transfers to the hotel. Too bad we're not on the same trip. I purchased our tickets last month and have not check the rates since. I used Liberty Travel because we fly out on Alaska Air and return nonstop on Continental. Since 2 airlines were involved I had them do the ticketing.

 

Good luck.