Alaska on the Radiance

[Nancynurse]

We will be sailing on the Radiance of the Seas in May/June for a B2B cruise. My family (two teenage boys) was looking for a slightly younger demographic than our previous Celebrity cruises. Will there be a younger age group on this ship, or will it be the same just due to the fact that it is an Alaska cruise.

 

Will there also be more teen type activities and younger shows than what we have experienced on Celebrity. I have seen some really funny looking "adult themed" shows on youtube. Are these also done on Alaska Sailings?

 

Last but not least...is the dress code as formal as with the Celebrity dress codes? We found that things were slightly more relaxed on our previous Alaska cruise. Will this be the same on Royal Caribbean?

 

We are very excited and looking forward to this cruise. We will be Diamond for this B2B and looking forward to better perks than what we have seen on Celebrity.

 

Thanks in advance for your input.

 

Nancy

[GMoney]

Hi Nancy - I spent 2 weeks on Radiance in September after 2 weeks on land in Alaska. Here are some quick opinions:

 

> Generally, RCI skews younger than X, but Alaska cruises generally skew older, so they may offset. Plan for an older than usual crowd.

 

> X's and RCI's formal dress codes are similar, but things were definitely more casual on our Alaska cruise compared to, say, Caribbean cruises. More folks took advantage of the Windjammer for dinner. It wasn't jeans in the DR kind of thing, but just generally more casual.

 

You'll love Radiance for AK. Click on the link in my signature for pictures and a detailed review. It takes time to download, but might be very helpful.

[4bythebeach]

We did Radiance in Alaska early June last year and took our 2 teenage boys. They had a wonderful time and found plenty of kids their ages and said that the kids couselors were the best they have ever had. But there were fewer kids on this cruise than on the Caribbean itineraries.

I have never done Celebrity, so I can't compare the two.

Yes, the Alaska was quite a bit less formal. During the day on ship alot of people wore nice sweat suits or jeans, we did opt out of the formal dinning room and just did the Windjammer for dinner (for the first time). We didn't do as much at night either as this was a port intensive cruise and with all the money we spent to be there, we didn't want to be beat for the port!

Have a great time, the Radiance is beautiful!

[Onessa]

We've done two AK cruises on Radiance. It is the perfect ship for the itinerary!

 

Both times there were large groups (one business type trip, on the second is was a 'reward' trip for one of those selling stuff through home parties groups). In both cases the groups consisted almost entirely of families. One of the cruises there were more pax under 21 than any other on Radiance-class up to that point (any iternerary).

 

AK is a very family oriented itinerary, so you may be surprised as to the number of kids.

 

We've never cruised the caribbean (AK, HI, Maritime provinces, Baltic, Med) so I don't know if AK skews more casual than the caribbean cruises. It does skew a bit more casual than the European cruises.

 

Have a great time.

[Nancynurse]

Thanks for all of your wonderful input.

 

Gmoney...your pictures are beautiful. You also did a B2B. Do you recall how quickly you were able to get off the ship in Vancouver? We will be meeting up with my parents there and would like to spend the day with them prior to when they board the ship. I am hoping that they can drop off their luggage at the port and just check in later in the day. If not, I am sure that they could probably just store it at the hotel until later on and then just pick it up later.

 

When we sailed on the Mercury to Alaska, we found the ages to be quite the variety, but the teen areas were pretty sparse. They are hoping to find more their age. With this being so port intensive though, I don't think it will make a big difference.

 

Thanks again for all of your responses.

 

Nancy

[GMoney]

Thanks for all of your wonderful input.

 

Gmoney...your pictures are beautiful. You also did a B2B. Do you recall how quickly you were able to get off the ship in Vancouver? We will be meeting up with my parents there and would like to spend the day with them prior to when they board the ship. I am hoping that they can drop off their luggage at the port and just check in later in the day. If not, I am sure that they could probably just store it at the hotel until later on and then just pick it up later.

 

 

Hi - Our B2B was unique in that we did a SB from Seward to Vancouver, then did a Vancouver to Vancouver. However, I can still answer your question in that we disembarked in Vancouver twice.

 

Both times we got off with the self debarkers. That started around 7am. Immigration went quickly.

 

The negative is where Radiance docks at Ballantyne Pier. It's no where near as nice or as centrally located as the other pier, Canada Place. Taxis are very hard to come by; waits can get very long. You can walk out of the pier and down to Canada Place, but you'll have to go through a sketchy neighborhood (i.e. - hypodermic needles on the ground). It was not a problem; just be prepared.

 

I'm not totally sure, but I do not think your parents would be able to check luggage at Ballantyne, go back into town, and then come back later in the day and check in. Someone will know for sure. I think Canada Place does have luggage storage though. The hotel may be the best bet.

 

On our first visit we did the silly big red bus city tour. The second time around we rented a car and went to Capilano Suspension Bridge and Grouse Mountain. All were nice, but Grouse was the best. The first 2 tours are total tourist moves. :) But there is so much to see and do you'll be busy for sure.

 

If you haven't already, be sure to stop by the AK boards and post there. Lots of very helpful, knowledgeable people.

 

A B2B is a great way to really enjoy AK. It's so worth it to have the extra time to take full advantage of the ports. Have a great time!

[Nancynurse]

Patrick...

 

I know what you mean about the B2B with all of the added time in port. That was difficult to deal with on our last cruise, especially with that cruise in particular. We had short port times in each port other than Juneau. Its hard to try to cram in a city in such a short time. This cruise has longer port times and we also get to do all if them twice.

 

I have "lived" on the Alaska board for the last several months. I found a great deal of info there on our last cruise also. We pretty much have all of the ports figured out except Vancouver and ISP. How difficult was it to rent a car in Vancouver?

 

Can't wait to go...

 

Nancy

[My2Kitties]

Nancy, we did Vancouver to Seward in August and there were teens and kids on the ship but it is not like the caribbean with so much to do that you can't possibly get it all in in one day...yet there were not kids running around the ship...dining was more casual than caribbean...ship is beautiful and so is Alaska...feel free to check out our pictures...we did 2 train rides that I highly recommend...we took the train in Skagway (White Pass Yukon RR) and we took the train from Seward to Anchorage...both were wonderful...

Have a great trip no matter what...

[Sue L]

Hey Nancy we did Alaska on the Serenade this past summer and we had a TON of teenagers. Mine are 19 and 21 and they had a ball. We did the helicopter to the glacier and it was amazing, though pricey but worth every penny. We also we horseback riding in Skagway and were supposed to kayak in Sitka, but our tour was canceled because of a small plane crash in town. Click on the link in my signature for pictures

 

 

[Nancynurse]

To all that have replied,

 

All of the pictures were beautiful. Thanks for sharing them with me! We are really looking forward to this cruise. My boys will be relieved to hear that there will be teens on the ship as well.

 

We are planning to take the train round trip from Anchorage to Seward. We will be renting a car however in Skagway. We did this on our last cruise and really enjoyed it.

 

We were fortunate enough to be able to do the glacier landing and the float plane on our last cruise. Will have to decide if we want to repeat...the cost has increased quite a bit, and there are four of us.

 

Thanks for all of the great replies. Keep them coming. I can only get more excited.

 

Nancy

[GMoney]

Patrick...

 

I know what you mean about the B2B with all of the added time in port. That was difficult to deal with on our last cruise, especially with that cruise in particular. We had short port times in each port other than Juneau. Its hard to try to cram in a city in such a short time. This cruise has longer port times and we also get to do all if them twice.

 

I have "lived" on the Alaska board for the last several months. I found a great deal of info there on our last cruise also. We pretty much have all of the ports figured out except Vancouver and ISP. How difficult was it to rent a car in Vancouver?

 

Can't wait to go...

 

Nancy

 

Hi Nancy - Sorry: I didn't realize you had been to AK before. :) It's great you have longer port stays this time around.

 

In ISP, think about ding whale watching with Capt Floyd and FISHES. Some other CC folks and I did his tour back in Sept and it was truly incredible.

 

http://www.visithoonah.com/fishes

 

Renting a car in YVR was easy. We rented from Avis, which is located in Canada Place. Walked right over from Ballantyne, waited a bit as there were a few folks in line at 8am, got the car and started sightseeing. No problems whatsoever.

[Nancynurse]

Patrick,

 

I have heard great things about FISHES. I am really considering them, but we might just take it easy in that port. After the cost of everythng else along with a B2B, we need to watch our bottom line.

 

Thanks for all of the great replies!

 

Nancy

[sagiv666]

We will be sailing on the Radiance of the Seas in May/June for a B2B cruise. My family (two teenage boys) was looking for a slightly younger demographic than our previous Celebrity cruises. Will there be a younger age group on this ship, or will it be the same just due to the fact that it is an Alaska cruise.

 

Will there also be more teen type activities and younger shows than what we have experienced on Celebrity. I have seen some really funny looking "adult themed" shows on youtube. Are these also done on Alaska Sailings?

 

Last but not least...is the dress code as formal as with the Celebrity dress codes? We found that things were slightly more relaxed on our previous Alaska cruise. Will this be the same on Royal Caribbean?

 

We are very excited and looking forward to this cruise. We will be Diamond for this B2B and looking forward to better perks than what we have seen on Celebrity.

 

Thanks in advance for your input.

 

Nancy

 

We crused to Alaska on the Radiance this past September. We found the passengers to be older, and in fact the entertainment (shows and games requiring adult participation) seemed geared to an older crowd. I do not remember too many children, but I'm not sure whether it was because the cruise was to Alaska, the length of the cruise (14 nights), or the time of year -- September 14-28 -- when many school years have begun.

We had 3 formal nights, but in general the dress code was more relaxed, although many older couples dressed more even on nights which were not formal. The 2 nights called semi-formal were in fact "smart casual"; in the past I had known on these nights to wear a sport jacket and a tie, but all that was now required was a nice shirt and slacks. In Alaska itself, one dressesonlycasual. Prior to the cruise, we had booked a land tour independently of the cruise, in order to be sure we saw as much of Alaska that we could; we wanted to see what we knew the cruise, even with land excursions would not cover and vice versa. We saw a lot of sights we might not have seen otherwise, but most of the wildlife we saw was on shore excursions as well as several days we spent in Alaska on our own. All in all, I would recomend combining a cruise with a land tour (the latter are often offered by the cruise line, but we booked ours through Alaska Tour and Travel). One suggestion: if you decide to combine a land tour with a cruise, take the land tour first. This was recommended by our Tour Leader as our land tour was finishing. She indicated that the on the land tour you changed hotels every other day and the days were more hectic; on board you can unwind, unpack, and be pampered, even if you do take shore excursions.

I recommend the shore excursions. The ones we enjoyed the most were viewing 4 and landing on 1 glacier in a helicopter (in Juneau), whale watching (we did this twice, in Juneau and Icy Point), and the White Horse Railroad (in Skagway).

We thoroughly enjoyed the cruise and we loved the Radiance. Have fun!:)

[Nancynurse]

Thanks for all of your replies. You guys are great!

 

Nancy