Picking An Alaska Cruise Itinerary: Which Glacier Is Best?

If you’re considering a cruise to Alaska or are in the early planning stages, you may be feeling overwhelmed with all the choices and feeling pressure to “do it right” either because this is a bucket list trip or because for three dinners after your best couple friends Steve and Janet returned from their Alaska cruise they talked non-stop about how spectacular it was and it would make for an awkward double-date to Red Robin if, upon your return, their child-like enthusiasm was met with, “we didn’t love it.”

Considerations In Selecting A Cruise To Alaska

Although this lecture is focused on the “scenic cruising” portion of your Alaska cruise, there are some other things you’ll need to consider in selecting an itinerary: cruise line, ship size, date, departure port, and ports of call. We’ve sailed to Alaska from San Francisco, Seattle, and Vancouver on Holland America, NCL, and Princess, with a b2b sailing on Celebrity scheduled in a few weeks (stay tuned). We’ve sailed in July, August, and September and have visited the following ports of call: Anchorage (proper), Homer, Icy Strait Point, Juneau, Ketchikan, Kodiak, Skagway, and Sitka. You can check out all my Alaska port posts here. To save you the suspense, we had a spectacular experience on every one of our Alaska cruises. But here are a few things to think about:

Departure Port: San Francisco, Seattle, Or Vancouver?

The Positives And Negatives Of Cruising To Alaska From San Francisco

If you live in or close to California, are an American without a passport book (although it’s strongly recommend that you get one), or like sea days and longer sailings, you’ll want to consider leaving from San Francisco. The most common itinerary is ten days, with four of those at sea (with one additional day of scenic cruising). However, if you’re prone to sea sickness, you’ll want to avoid it. Mr. Cruise and I spent the first two days of our honeymoon cruise to Alaska in bed. I know what you’re thinking, “ew, gross,” but this blog is rated PG and it was even grosser than that. We were both stricken with a bad case of sea sickness. Because cruisers from San Francisco spend the first two days sailing in the open waters of the Pacific where seas can be rough.

You’ll also want to avoid San Francisco if your preferred line is one other than Princess or Carnival, as those are the only two non-luxury lines currently sailing to Alaska from San Francisco. And note that all round trip Alaska sailings from San Francisco stop in Victoria, Canada so they don’t violate the Passenger Vessel Services Act.

The Positives And Negatives Of Cruising To Alaska From Seattle

First, if you want to avoid Prof. Cruise, don’t sail out of Seattle. That’s where I visit my dog and put my kid on the school bus when I’m not cruising. And if there’s ever a week during the Alaska cruise season that I’m not booked on one, I’ve been known to show up at Pier 66 or Pier 91 flattened and pleated tight like accordion bellows trying to squeeze into unguarded luggage.

Other disadvantages of Seattle include a sea day in the open Pacific ocean where scenery is scarce and rough waters possible and a stop in Victoria to, again, avoid violating the Passenger Vessel Services Act.

You will want to consider Seattle if you’re an American who doesn’t have a passport book (although, again, it’s strongly recommend that you get one), can only take a week off work, and for a wide selection of lines, ships, and itineraries. There’s also a fantastic and affordably priced 14-day sailing on Holland America that includes several less common and crowded ports. I’m tempted to slap a blue ribbon on that one and declare it my favorite cruise to Alaska.

The Positives And Negatives Of Cruising To Alaska From Vancouver

Alaska cruises out of Vancouver sail almost entirely within the inside passage, meaning calm seas, spectacular views, and opportunities to see wildlife. Vancouver also offers a wide selection of ships and itineraries and is the only port that offers one-way cruises ending in Anchorage, if you want to do a combined cruise and land tour. You can also do the reverse and sail one-way from Anchorage to Vancouver. Or you can do what we’re doing for our next Alaska cruise and do a b2b – 7 days from Vancouver to Anchorage and 7 days from Anchorage back to Vancouver. You’ll also spend your entire cruise in Alaska, as ships sailing from Vancouver do not have to stop in Victoria.

The big disadvantage of Vancouver for American passengers is that you will need a passport book and you’ll be traveling to a city that uses a different currency (check with your credit card to see how much their international fees are).

Other Considerations

Hopefully now you have a better sense of which city you’d prefer to depart from. In terms of the best months for an Alaska cruise, June and July will be your best bets weather-wise (although we’ve also had great weather in August and September) and May, late August, or September will have the fewest kids on board. When it comes to cruise line and ship size, those are completely a matter of personal preference. So let’s move on to the topic of today’s lecture: which glacier is best?

There are some Alaska itineraries that don’t including “scenic cruising,” meaning they stop at Alaska ports but don’t visit any of the three areas I’ll be highlighting next. If it were me, I’d avoid those. And if you’re really lucky, you’ll book an itinerary that includes two scenic cruising days – there are a few that hit both Glacier Bay and the Hubbard Glacier. However, most itineraries include one scenic cruising day where you stay on the ship, but visit either Tracy Arm and the Sawyer Glacier, the Hubbard Glacier, or Glacier Bay. So…

Which Glacier Is The Best?

That’s like asking me to tell you which of my children I love the most. They’re both shaggy and adorable and equally resistant to baths. But there are some differences between them that, at any given time, might tempt me to choose one over the other. One doesn’t speak, worships me (wag, wag, wag), and can be left alone for hours at a time without the police being called. But he hogs the bed and is allergic to chocolate.

And the other one appreciates my fart jokes, shares my love of cruising and the outdoors, and gets me out of Mr. Cruise’s office Christmas party every year: decline with regrets – we couldn’t find a babysitter. But he refuses to sit on command, “no,” hates my cooking, and grows out of shoes faster than I can hit up my mother-in-law for a new pair.

Like my children, I love all three “scenic cruising” experiences offered on cruises to Alaska and, if feasible, suggest you return to Alaska multiple times to ew and awe at them all. However, if you’re limited to just one, let me give you some information about each to help you decide and I will ultimately weigh in on which child (and glacier/scenic cruising area) I love the most.

Tracy Arm And The Sawyer Glacier

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Tracy Arm is a roughly 30 mile long ice-carved fjord located 45 miles from Juneau. It features mountains covered in trees and sub-alpine vegetation, dramatic rock cliffs with long skinny waterfalls pulled by gravity toward the almost eerily still and quiet jade colored waters below. Your ship will glide slowly and almost silently through a landscape that mimics an artist’s mosaic in progress, with thousands of floating white and blue icebergs like jagged pieces of glass waiting to be fitted into place.

If you’re lucky, you’ll spot a resting harbor seal, floating along like cargo on a frozen barge. And if you raise your gaze and look perplexed at a moving white dot in the middle of the steep face of a mountain, you’ve spotted a mountain goat. Grab your binoculars and stand in awe of their sure-footedness. Maybe they’ll even inspire you to tackle that trail Prof. Cruise recommended for Skagway or provide the perfect excuse to avoid it: “yeah, maybe if I had two toed hooves with rough pads to help me maintain balance and a strong grip.”

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At the end of Tracy Arm you’ll find a twin set of glaciers, the North Sawyer Glacier and the South Sawyer Glacier. If you’re lucky, you’ll be able to view the impressive South Sawyer Glacier from your cruise ship. However, be aware that ice conditions and the limited time each ship is allotted in the fjord (generally 4-5 hours) can limit the ship’s ability to make it to the glacier. If ice conditions are poor, sometimes ships will divert to the nearby Endicott Arm, a very similar channel just to the south of Tracy Arm where you can see the Dawes Glacier.

You can also elect to pay extra to take your ship’s Tracy Arm excursion. You’ll board a much smaller boat directly from your cruise ship that will get you up close to wildlife and both the north and south Sawyer glaciers. If this is a bucket-list trip and your one shot at Alaska, I’d recommend you consider doing this. On Princess this excursion is currently priced at $229.95 per person.

The Hubbard Glacier

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Massive, huge, enormous, gigantic, very large, giant, colossal, vast, immense, tremendous, mighty, stupendous, monumental, epic, prodigious, mountainous, monstrous, titanic, towering, mammoth, elephantine, king-sized, gargantuan, Herculean, Brobdingnagian, substantial, and extensive. In case you missed the takeaway from that last sentence, let me spell it out for you: B I G. And getting bigger – it’s one of the only glaciers in the world that continues to thicken. If the portion of the Hubbard Glacier visible above the waterline were positioned in front of my apartment windows on the 21st floor of my high-rise building in downtown Seattle, I’d still be craning my neck, looking up another 10 stories or so to see the top. It’s also 7 miles wide and 76 miles long, making it the longest tidewater glacier in North America.

And if you’re thinking, “please, Prof. Cruise, for once in your life spare me the extended commentary and just package this thing in a trite expression,” it would be this: you have to see it to believe it! And hear it. That isn’t a thunderstorm rolling in, it’s the glacier calving as giant chunks of ice crash into the bay.

While you’ll get outstanding views of Disenchantment Bay and the Hubbard Glacier right from the cruise ship, with the captain turning the ship around completely so the glacier can be seen equally well from the port, starboard, front, or stern, you can also elect to take an optional excursion, similar to the one offered to the Sawyer Glacier, and get a bit closer from a much smaller boat. Current pricing for the 2-hour Hubbard Glacier Scenic Cruising Excursion on Princess is $259.95.

Glacier Bay

Glacier Bay is a 3.3 million acre national park in Southeast Alaska and is part of a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Cruising Glacier Bay versus Tracy Arm or the Hubbard Glacier is unique for several reasons. First, the number of cruise ships permitted to enter Glacier Bay is limited by regulation. As likely the only ship in sight, you’ll feel even smaller among its vastness.

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Second, your ship will be boarded by National Park Rangers who will provide expert narration, programming geared toward both adults and children (my son earned his Glacier Bay Junior Ranger badge while on board), and be available to answer your questions. You’ll receive a park map and guide in your stateroom the evening prior so you can study up in advance and follow along during the narration.

Finally, you’ll have a full 9-10 hour day within the park, including an hour long stop at a tidewater glacier. In this time, you’ll see it all: mountains, fjords, glaciers, waterfalls, icebergs, rugged coastline, and prolific wildlife – we spotted humpback whales, sea lions, and harbor seals on our visit.

I didn’t, uh hum, pee for a full 10 hours (true story) because there was never an obvious “break” point – it was equally spectacular from minute 1 to minute 600. Go easy on the coffee and plan the quickest route to the restroom just in case. “Did I miss anything?” “Oh, just this little glacier/waterfall combo:”

Now that you have a better idea of some of unique aspects of each “scenic viewing” option available on cruises to Alaska, I’ll declare, once and for all, which is the best. But first, a few tips on packing. These apply only to the scenic cruising portion of your sailing, which will trend much colder than your days in port.

Packing List For Alaska Scenic Cruising

If you’re anything like me, you’ll be out on an open deck roughly 12 hours before your ship even enters Tracy Arm or Disenchantment Bay or Glacier Bay because you don’t want to miss a single floating piece of ice – blue to our eyes because it’s so dense it absorbs every other color of the spectrum – or brown rock on the shoreline we could have sworn was a bear: “sorry, another false alarm.” But if there’s on thing I learned the cold way, it’s that glacier viewing is as frigid as it is otherworldly. And this coming from someone who rode her bike though five winters as a graduate student in Michigan – I had to deice my chain between every class.

If you scroll up to the photos from my very first visit to the Sawyer Glacier on my honeymoon cruise, you’ll notice none of the wrinkles I now have 6 years of mommying later. But also my hooded pink waterproof Eddie Bower jacket and fleece gloves. They froze so solidly to my body they remain there to this day as a souvenir of sorts and a reminder to pack a warmer coat and gloves for future cruises to Alaska.

These days I don’t mess around and bring a hooded ankle length puffer coat, requiring its own suitcase (pictured in every subsequent photo of me on Alaska scenic cruising days) and ski gloves . Because we live close to port and don’t have to pay extra for our luggage to fly, I just slap an extra room tag on my coat and shove her under the bed until I need her. But for those of you trying to limit the quantity and weight of bags, I’d recommend a packable puffer coat, designed to be both warm and compact. The two pictured below are affordable and get great reviews on Amazon. Plus they scrunch up teeny tiny. You could probably stuff them inside a hiking boot if you put some muscle into it.

And even if your experience skiing consists of riding around on the chair lift too terrified to get off until finally the fire department had to be called in to assist, you’ll want to dig out or invest in a pair of ski gloves. I recommend these for both men and women. Or you may as well just lob off the tips of your fingers to get it over with. Don’t send them to me though – I tried to warn you.

Warm Ski Gloves (unisex)

You’ll also want a high quality pair of binoculars and a good camera. I finally invested in the binoculars pictured below after word got out that I didn’t have my own pair and my fellow cruisers started scattering upon my approach. I just figured my giant puffer coat made me look like a lumbering paranormal monster, but I guess people tired of me asking to borrow their binoculars every time someone shouted, “whale spout, three o’clock!”

Toss in an insulated coffee mug too. Heed my warning about drinking too much, but it serves additional purposes as an extra hand warmer and an excuse to get your antsy husband out of your hair for a few minutes, “can you refresh my coffee, love?”

Insulated Coffee Mug

Final Thoughts On Scenic Alaska Cruising And The Definitive Answer To Which Glacier Is Best

First, let’s settle the matter of which of my children I love the most. It’s a third one, not previously mentioned, who follows me home at the conclusion of every cruise and affectionately referred to as my food baby. And, drum roll please, the best glacier?

All three scenic cruising options will smell like winter as you breath in misty frigid air and they’ll inspire the best Thanksgiving speech you’ll ever give with a max number of eye rolls from your grandchildren. They’ll expand your view of the natural world (eye roll) and prompt you to ponder your place in it (eye roll). And most of all leave you thankful to have experienced a place so few ever will, especially if they don’t get good grades and go to college (seriously grandpa! Giant Hubbard Glacier-sized eye roll).

But if I only had one shot at Alaska, I’d go with Glacier Bay. Your grandkids can blame me for the accompanying slideshow. And with that…

Class Dismissed.

Homework: If you’ve cruised to Alaska, declare your favorite in the comments. Then check out my Alaska port lectures here and go here for my comprehensive guide to cruising from Seattle.

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