Great Time on SB Coral Princess in June

[RaptorMom]

We took the Southbound cruise from Whittier on June 2nd on the Coral Princess after spending a few days of independent travel to Homer. I learned a great deal from other people on these boards and want to share (answer questions) and thank those people that helped me.

First, we loved Homer (tough decision between Homer or Seward). The bay was beautiful. We did a boat ride around Gull Island and my daughter loved the birds and otters we saw. Our cabin was great - nice, cute, overlooking bay on high cliff. Would stay there again. Driving around Alaska was not hard at all - so for those considering independent touring - do it!!

It rained in Whittier so I can't say much because we just got on the ship and left. It rained the first two days in Hubbard and Glacier Bay but we still got to see/hear the glaciers - beautiful.

But the highlight of our trip was the 3 shore excursions we took. Each one seemed great only to be topped by the next one. We took Chilkoot Charters train/bus out of Skagway and saw a bear on the side of the rode. The dogsled ride was also part of the tour and great!! In Juneau we went with Captain Jack from Adventures in Alaska. I had read about him here and saw him on the Jeff Corwin show. He and his daughter were very friendly and we saw numerous humpback whales and sea lions. And we had a beautiful, sunny day in Juneau. But the best was yet to come - we did the Bering Sea Crab tour booked through Princess and had a "once in a lifetime" experience. My daughter got to hold crabs, shrimp, octopus, etc... We even got to watch them feed bald eagles (on reserve land - no laws broken).

We really enjoyed the trip and hope to get back to Alaska again someday. Next time we want to do land only so that we can see areas we were not able to see this time. Alaska is just too big to see it all. Let me know if you have any questions.

 

Lisa

[stired]

We took the Southbound cruise from Whittier on June 2nd on the Coral Princess after spending a few days of independent travel to Homer. I learned a great deal from other people on these boards and want to share (answer questions) and thank those people that helped me.

First, we loved Homer (tough decision between Homer or Seward). The bay was beautiful. We did a boat ride around Gull Island and my daughter loved the birds and otters we saw. Our cabin was great - nice, cute, overlooking bay on high cliff. Would stay there again. Driving around Alaska was not hard at all - so for those considering independent touring - do it!!

It rained in Whittier so I can't say much because we just got on the ship and left. It rained the first two days in Hubbard and Glacier Bay but we still got to see/hear the glaciers - beautiful.

But the highlight of our trip was the 3 shore excursions we took. Each one seemed great only to be topped by the next one. We took Chilkoot Charters train/bus out of Skagway and saw a bear on the side of the rode. The dogsled ride was also part of the tour and great!! In Juneau we went with Captain Jack from Adventures in Alaska. I had read about him here and saw him on the Jeff Corwin show. He and his daughter were very friendly and we saw numerous humpback whales and sea lions. And we had a beautiful, sunny day in Juneau. But the best was yet to come - we did the Bering Sea Crab tour booked through Princess and had a "once in a lifetime" experience. My daughter got to hold crabs, shrimp, octopus, etc... We even got to watch them feed bald eagles (on reserve land - no laws broken).

We really enjoyed the trip and hope to get back to Alaska again someday. Next time we want to do land only so that we can see areas we were not able to see this time. Alaska is just too big to see it all. Let me know if you have any questions.

 

Lisa

 

Glad to hear you had a great trip. We were on the SB Coral June 2007 and also had a wonderful time.

 

Also glad to see your comment about independent travel. I have posted many times that it is very easy to do and leaves a lot more flexibility!