Alaska weather is totally unpredictable. Each year is different.
Our landtrip was beginning of August, 2001. Cruise was beginning of Sept 2005. Wunderlust said his 2005 Sept weather was wonderful. Ours was a disaster. 09/01-02/05 we had 2 beautiful days in Anchorage, pre-cruise. We just took buses to go everywhere, $3.00 for a daypass. 09/03 was our sailing day. By the time we reach Whittier just around 2pm, the place Princess cruise departed from, it sarted to rain really hard. Those passengers who took cruisetours arrived Whittier in the late afternoon, they got soaking wet as there was no cover on the pier. Princess already put up temp covers along the way from train station, but between the gangway and the entrance of pier - there was no cover - didnot know why - I am sure if Princess could, they would.
It rained 6 days out of the 7 day cruise - weather did not improve until we reached Inside Passage and entered Canadian Water.
3 years ago, Jul/Aug was almost 100 degree hottest in over hundred years. I heard from my friends that they were scrambling to find T-shirts and shorts as nobody brought any for an Alaska cruise. 2004 Sept was incredibly good. 2005 Sept was incredible bad - for the weather of South East Alaska.
I have a friend did at least 6 times Alaska cruise - her conclusion was, May has least rain.
We were lucky at Ketchikan - the rainiest part of Alaska. It only drizzles a little bit and we were able to walk the river up - Salmons were already swam up but they hadn't turned red yet, just hovering in the river along the rocky beds.
Floatplanes still were able to depart for Misty Fijord sightseeing. A good deal of our video in Ketchikan was for the takeoff and landing (on water) of the various floatplanes.
The ideal way to do Alaska, is to combine a cruise with a land trip.
Reasons for that:
1) You can only go by ship - whether it is a cruiseship, or Alaska Marine Highway (a Ferry type service with sleeping cabin) to visit the South East part of Alaska, including its Capital, Juneau.
2) The only way to see Glacier Bay National Park is by boat. There are only certain number of ships are allowed to go into the NP each day. Currently only Princess and Holland America are allowed to go into NP. There are other smaller boats that are allowed - they depart from various islands at SE Alaska - you cannot do this on a land only trip.
3) Kenali National Park can be done from Seward - that was what we did on our first trip (landtrip) - but it is a big waste of money when you consider the cost. It costed $110 or more per person, on a regular boat, for about 7 to 8 hours trip out to Kenali NP. On the other hand, an Alaska cruise itinerary would include 80% of the scenes you would see at Kenali NP, and an inside cabin may cost you about $600 per person, for a 7 day cruise, incl room and board and transportation from port to port. So you do the math.
4) Inland Alaska - Denali NP, Wrangell NP cannot be done on a cruise - it must be a land trip or a land tour as an extension of a cruise. (either Pre or Post cruise)
5) Airfare to Alaska is not cheap - it goes without saying, you want to make the most of it. The best way is to COMBINE a landtrip with a cruise. Cruiseline all market the CruiseTours. However, you can easily do the land portion yourself with a much more flexible schedule and may be 1/2 to 2/3 of the cost charged by cruiselines.
6) If you have AA miles - this is a GREAT BARGAIN for the 25K award. We claimed our Sept travel in beginning of July. Held the reservations for 2 weeks while I was looking for cruise deals. During that period, I modified the reservations from the initial ONE-WAY FLL/DFW/ANC booking to FLL/DFW/ANC, YVR/DFW/DFW/JAC, JAC/DFW/FLL. In other words, we flew from FLL to ANC via DFW on 09/01. Took our cruise on 09/03 and disembarked at YVR. We spent 10 days in Vancouver - in that 10 days we went to Pacific Rim National Park on Vancouver Island for 2 days, and also did a couple daytrips towards the East side of Vancouver, all the way to Hope. From YVR we flew to DFW for an overnight layover (IMPORTANT, it is a layover, NOT a stopover), and then we flew DFW/JAC the next morning to Jacksonhole. We then did a 5 day trip to Grand Teton and Yellowstone NPs. It was in Yellowstone NP just outside North Gate we sustained hailstorm damage to our rental car. Master card subsequently paid $2282 repair estimate claim, we paid $320 Admin fee and Loss of Revenues claim from Thrifty.
The final segment of the award was JAC/DFW/FLL At DFW we volanteered for bump - they needed 3 seats and got 2 from us. $200 bump voucher each person plus meal voucher plus overnight hotel. Next morning flight was very full too. We could volanteer to be bumped again but we decided to pass.
The 25K awards got us tickets that have an openjaw (ANC/YVR) and a stopover JAC - if purchased, would cost us $1000 to 1200 a person depending on how you fly. Only AA allows you to do both. UA only let you do either an openjaw, or a stopover. A stopover in domestic travel means longer than 4 hours between segment. A layover is less than 4 hours and wont count against you. AA let you take a last flight in and first flight out for an overnight layover and not count it as a Stopover. That is how we did it from YVR to JAC - we took the afternoon flight from YVR to DFW instead of the morning flight. Worked out perfectly.
Key to claim the award on AA: Seats open up about 60 days before travelling time eventhough they were not available before.
Check seat availability by segment using One-Way. AA would not show the availability if only one segment is not working the way computer designed to. but availability would show up if you check it segment by segment. Once you put the itin together, call the AAdvantage desk to "walk" the agent thru what you want, feed her segment by segment. AA is wonderful that it allows you to hold Award booking by 2 weeks and can extend it if there are seats available into the period you want to extend. Agents are most pleasant and helpful if you already did your homework when you call.
Our landtrip was beginning of August, 2001. Cruise was beginning of Sept 2005. Wunderlust said his 2005 Sept weather was wonderful. Ours was a disaster. 09/01-02/05 we had 2 beautiful days in Anchorage, pre-cruise. We just took buses to go everywhere, $3.00 for a daypass. 09/03 was our sailing day. By the time we reach Whittier just around 2pm, the place Princess cruise departed from, it sarted to rain really hard. Those passengers who took cruisetours arrived Whittier in the late afternoon, they got soaking wet as there was no cover on the pier. Princess already put up temp covers along the way from train station, but between the gangway and the entrance of pier - there was no cover - didnot know why - I am sure if Princess could, they would.
It rained 6 days out of the 7 day cruise - weather did not improve until we reached Inside Passage and entered Canadian Water.
3 years ago, Jul/Aug was almost 100 degree hottest in over hundred years. I heard from my friends that they were scrambling to find T-shirts and shorts as nobody brought any for an Alaska cruise. 2004 Sept was incredibly good. 2005 Sept was incredible bad - for the weather of South East Alaska.
I have a friend did at least 6 times Alaska cruise - her conclusion was, May has least rain.
We were lucky at Ketchikan - the rainiest part of Alaska. It only drizzles a little bit and we were able to walk the river up - Salmons were already swam up but they hadn't turned red yet, just hovering in the river along the rocky beds.
Floatplanes still were able to depart for Misty Fijord sightseeing. A good deal of our video in Ketchikan was for the takeoff and landing (on water) of the various floatplanes.
The ideal way to do Alaska, is to combine a cruise with a land trip.
Reasons for that:
1) You can only go by ship - whether it is a cruiseship, or Alaska Marine Highway (a Ferry type service with sleeping cabin) to visit the South East part of Alaska, including its Capital, Juneau.
2) The only way to see Glacier Bay National Park is by boat. There are only certain number of ships are allowed to go into the NP each day. Currently only Princess and Holland America are allowed to go into NP. There are other smaller boats that are allowed - they depart from various islands at SE Alaska - you cannot do this on a land only trip.
3) Kenali National Park can be done from Seward - that was what we did on our first trip (landtrip) - but it is a big waste of money when you consider the cost. It costed $110 or more per person, on a regular boat, for about 7 to 8 hours trip out to Kenali NP. On the other hand, an Alaska cruise itinerary would include 80% of the scenes you would see at Kenali NP, and an inside cabin may cost you about $600 per person, for a 7 day cruise, incl room and board and transportation from port to port. So you do the math.
4) Inland Alaska - Denali NP, Wrangell NP cannot be done on a cruise - it must be a land trip or a land tour as an extension of a cruise. (either Pre or Post cruise)
5) Airfare to Alaska is not cheap - it goes without saying, you want to make the most of it. The best way is to COMBINE a landtrip with a cruise. Cruiseline all market the CruiseTours. However, you can easily do the land portion yourself with a much more flexible schedule and may be 1/2 to 2/3 of the cost charged by cruiselines.
6) If you have AA miles - this is a GREAT BARGAIN for the 25K award. We claimed our Sept travel in beginning of July. Held the reservations for 2 weeks while I was looking for cruise deals. During that period, I modified the reservations from the initial ONE-WAY FLL/DFW/ANC booking to FLL/DFW/ANC, YVR/DFW/DFW/JAC, JAC/DFW/FLL. In other words, we flew from FLL to ANC via DFW on 09/01. Took our cruise on 09/03 and disembarked at YVR. We spent 10 days in Vancouver - in that 10 days we went to Pacific Rim National Park on Vancouver Island for 2 days, and also did a couple daytrips towards the East side of Vancouver, all the way to Hope. From YVR we flew to DFW for an overnight layover (IMPORTANT, it is a layover, NOT a stopover), and then we flew DFW/JAC the next morning to Jacksonhole. We then did a 5 day trip to Grand Teton and Yellowstone NPs. It was in Yellowstone NP just outside North Gate we sustained hailstorm damage to our rental car. Master card subsequently paid $2282 repair estimate claim, we paid $320 Admin fee and Loss of Revenues claim from Thrifty.
The final segment of the award was JAC/DFW/FLL At DFW we volanteered for bump - they needed 3 seats and got 2 from us. $200 bump voucher each person plus meal voucher plus overnight hotel. Next morning flight was very full too. We could volanteer to be bumped again but we decided to pass.
The 25K awards got us tickets that have an openjaw (ANC/YVR) and a stopover JAC - if purchased, would cost us $1000 to 1200 a person depending on how you fly. Only AA allows you to do both. UA only let you do either an openjaw, or a stopover. A stopover in domestic travel means longer than 4 hours between segment. A layover is less than 4 hours and wont count against you. AA let you take a last flight in and first flight out for an overnight layover and not count it as a Stopover. That is how we did it from YVR to JAC - we took the afternoon flight from YVR to DFW instead of the morning flight. Worked out perfectly.
Key to claim the award on AA: Seats open up about 60 days before travelling time eventhough they were not available before.
Check seat availability by segment using One-Way. AA would not show the availability if only one segment is not working the way computer designed to. but availability would show up if you check it segment by segment. Once you put the itin together, call the AAdvantage desk to "walk" the agent thru what you want, feed her segment by segment. AA is wonderful that it allows you to hold Award booking by 2 weeks and can extend it if there are seats available into the period you want to extend. Agents are most pleasant and helpful if you already did your homework when you call.
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