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We got to spend last week on an incredible trip to Alaska. I have a goal of visiting all 50 states, so I was very excited to see Alaska for the first time. Alaska is very remote and many of its cities are not connected by car, so we chose to go on a cruise from Seattle to see The Last Frontier.  

There were two distinct aspects of this trip, so I’ve decided to break this into two blog posts. This one will focus on the actual ports of call and all the parts that directly related to Alaska (and our last stop of Victoria, BC) and the next will be a rundown of our time onboard the Discovery Princess cruise ship, as most of the activities on board are not unique to cruising to Alaska.

One important thing to note: we booked nearly all of our tours online when we booked our cruise and it turned out it’s a good thing we did as most were sold out by the time we got on the ship. I don’t recommend waiting on these or you may miss out on the activities you really want to do.

Day 1: Seattle

The cruise left Sunday, so we flew into Seattle Saturday afternoon and got dinner at Din Tai Fung (yes, this is a recurring theme in our travels as it’s my favorite restaurant). We stayed at the Sheraton Grand Seattle and were able to get a high floor and a late check out thanks to my Marriot Gold Status (which I got for free with my credit card).

Sunday morning we walked around Pike Place Market and got smoked salmon, figs, a sausage roll, and Ellenos yogurt for breakfast before grabbing our bags and heading to the boat terminal. There’s plenty to do in Seattle and we definitely would have tried to cram a lot more in if we hadn’t spent a weekend there last October. (That first Seattle trip was actually the first trip I wrote a detailed itinerary for and will be writing a post about that trip soon!)

Day 3: Ketchikan, AK

Ketchikan was our first port of call and it was a very rainy welcome to Alaska. We got up early to see the town from the top deck of the boat and got off to walk around the gift shops at the pier before joining our tour.

We had originally booked 2 tours of Ketchikan on the online cruise portal: “Historical Ketchikan & Creek Street Walking Tour” and “Totem Bight State Park & Lumberjack Show,” which weren’t supposed to overlap. Unfortunately, the tour operator of the 2^nd tour moved the tour up so we had to pick between the two. We went with the latter.

Lumberjack Show

From the pier, we had the option to walk 15 minutes or take a shuttle to get to the Great Alaska Lumberjack Show. Despite the rain, we chose to walk so we could see the town of Ketchikan.

The lumberjack show offered some historical information about the timber history of Alaska but was more than anything a piece of entertainment, pitting the 2 teams against one another in a competition between “the United States and Canada” (despite all the competitors being from the US). It was an impressive display of skill and strength that also highlighted the very real dangers of logging activities that real people face every day. This show was great for people of all ages, and they even gave a carved chair to a little girl as a prize.

The lumberjack show was outdoors, but the spectator seats were under a covered awning with heaters, which made for a comfortable viewing experience. We also got lucky that the rain stopped before the show ended.

Totem Bight State Park

After the lumberjack show, we walked down the block and boarded a bus to tour Totem Bight State Park. Our tour guide first drove us through town where she explained that Ketchikan is the rainiest city in Alaska, a fact highlighted best by the gravel baseball field we drove by, as the climate would turn a normal baseball diamond into a mud pit. The island where Ketchikan sits is the size of Rhode Island, but the city only has 4 stoplights. Living in a major city, this town stood in stark contrast to what I’m use to back home.

At Totem Bight State Park, our guide did an excellent job of explaining the history and culture of the native people of Alaska and how totem poles can serve different purposes, from being a family tree to telling a story. These native tribes didn’t have a written language, so totem poles were how they passed down their history through generations. The poles vary in size, with the largest freestanding pole being 173 feet tall and located in Victoria, BC (we saw it on our last day). While the totem poles were impressive, the clan house at the park amazed me the most, as it was built with no screws or nails but was very structurally sound.

Unlike Native Americans in continental United States, the natives of Alaska were never conquered and moved to reservations, but continue to live on their land to this day and have integrated with the towns while preserving their rich culture and history.

Before boarding the bus, we had some time to walk around the gift shop and the park and use the restrooms. We quickly learned that a lot of outdoor restrooms in Alaska are just permanent Porta-Potties and had to find an indoor restroom in the gift shop to wash our hands. The gift shop had free coffee and cookies. I also appreciated that they had special stickers on the items that were made in Alaska so you could know what you’re buying wasn’t mass produced overseas.

Anabelle’s Keg & Chowder

After the tour, we had lunch at Anabelle’s Keg & Chowder, which had been recommended by our guide. Unfortunately, after being seated they forgot about us and we waited over 20 minutes to get water and place our order. Luckily, the food was good so we quickly forgot about the wait.

We ordered the bread basket to share and I got the chowder sampler, which came with 1 cup each of seafood chowder, smoked salmon chowder, and clam chowder. They were all great (and honestly all tasted pretty similar), but the seafood chowder was my favorite.

Creek Street

After lunch we grabbed a coffee and headed towards Creek Street, which was formerly Ketchikan’s red-light district (related note: we quickly learned that a lot of the history of Alaska involves brothels). The street is a boardwalk built on pilings that looks over the Ketchikan Creek that runs through town. In the summer, you can watch salmon spawn upstream here. We didn’t see any, but instead got to see some seals and otters.  

Snow Pass

After we got back onto the ship and the departed Ketchikan, we went to the top deck for a while to watch as we traveled through Snow Pass along the Inside Passage towards Juneau. The Alaska wilderness is incredibly beautiful and we soaked in the sights whenever we could.  

Day 4: Endicott Arm & Juneau, AK

We woke up at 5AM and immediately ran to the top deck to watch as the ship traversed through the Endicott Arm fjord and see the icebergs floating by. This early wake up was also critical to give us time to eat breakfast before meeting up for our excursion at 6:30AM.

Dawes Glacier & Endicott Arm

While the cruise ship had to turn around and leave the Endicott Arm, we boarded a much smaller boat and got to get within a quarter mile of the Dawes Glacier. The boat had to navigate through the ice to get there and *thankfully* withstood some hits from floating ice without issue.

We got about an hour to watch the glacier and listen to the cracking. This was my first time seeing a glacier in person and it was unbelievable. Since we stayed with our eyes glued on the glacier for so long, we were able to see a few massive pieces (and several smaller ones calve off).

After we left the glacier, we cruised back through the Endicott Arm following the same path the cruise ship took up to Juneau. The ride back took several hours, but there were free coffee & donut holes on board + more food and drinks for sale (note: they only took cash). At Dawes Glacier, some of the crew scooped up a large piece of glacier ice and used that for the ice in all the cocktails, including the very blue “Glacier-rita.” Because the little boat can travel faster than the cruise ship, we made it back to Juneau right as the ship was docking.

This was our most expensive excursion but was absolutely worth it to get to witness such an unbelievable part of nature. The only small regret I had about it was not bringing gloves, as my fingers froze while I was trying to watch the glacier and take pictures.

Mendenhall Lake Kayaking

To continue our glacier-filled day, after lunch we got in a van and headed to Mendenhall Lake to kayak to the Mendenhall Glacier, which is all located in the Tongass National Forest. There were only 6 of us on the tour + our guide and we were in tandem kayaks. They provided us with rain boots, a spray skirt that kept water out of the kayak, and pogies – neoprene gloves that go over the paddle to keep your hands warm while kayaking.

It was about 5 miles roundtrip past a couple of waterfalls to the glacier (or as close as they let you get) and back, which took a couple hours and was definitely a good workout. We lucked out that it wasn’t raining and the sun even came out on our way back (I wished I’d brought sun glasses since we were paddling right into the sun). Our guide was nice enough to take pictures for us and Airdrop them after we got back to the shore.  

To me, the coolest part about glaciers is that they are constantly moving and changing, so if we come back to the same place in a few decades, it will look very different.

Salmon Bake

The tour concluded with a salmon bake, which was probably the biggest let-down to me. I had expected a sort of lively festival atmosphere, and instead there were 30 people spread out among dozens of picnic tables eating food from buffet stations. The salmon was good, but the musician providing live music was maybe the worst I’ve ever heard. They had marshmallows you could roast in the fire pit, but no graham crackers or chocolate to make s’mores. We ate our food fairly quickly and got back on the bus to take us to the ship. I would not bother with a salmon bake if I came back to Alaska.

Day 5: Skagway, AK

In the past couple months, Skagway has experienced several rockslides that have made it unsafe for passengers to get off the ship as normal. Instead, we had to board tenders and be taken to shore. This process was a bit chaotic and we sat on the tender for over 30 minutes, despite being only a couple hundred yards from where we were trying to go.

Skagway was the smallest port of call, being the only place without even 1 Starbucks. In fact, they only get grocery shipments by barge once a week and the only chain in the entire town is Wells Fargo. It’s so remote that only one US president has ever visited Skagway – Warren Harding – so they named a mountain after him!

Klondike Summit to Sea Bike Ride

Our first tour of the day was the Klondike Summit to Sea Bike Ride. We got in a van, drove through town and headed up to the top of the Klondike Summit, where we then got on bikes and began our journey down. We were provided the bikes and helmets and they also had optional gloves, jackets, and pants to use (I opted for the gloves). Surprisingly, the top of the Klondike Summit had a lot of fairly large mosquitos that I had not seen lower down, so I was excited to start our descent to get away from them. I recommend bringing bug spray, which we had forgotten to take off the ship with us.

It had been very foggy at the bottom of the mountain, but at the top, it was clear. When we started cycling, we went in and out of this fog all the way down which was very fun.

I was surprised that we went through US customs on our way down, despite never leaving the US. The Klondike Summit is where the US/Canada border is, but in the winter, there is so much avalanche danger there that the customs offices are located 7 miles downhill on either side. We were required to bring our passports with us to join the tour, but ended up not needing them. Our guide gave the border agents a list with our names and passport numbers and the agent just had us say our names as we biked through (note: apparently sometimes they do require everyone to show their passports and it all depends on the day).

We stopped 4 times on the tour to catch our breath, get water, take pictures, etc. The van that we rode up in followed us to the first stop in case anyone needed help with gear or wanted to ride back in the van instead (no one on our tour did). The ride included some fairly steep downhills and we reached speeds of us to 25 mph despite using our breaks pretty much the whole time. There was 1 somewhat challenging hill, but it was pretty short and my Peloton rides prepared me to handle it well.

Lucy’s Bakery

Our tour guide recommended Lucy’s Bakery, which was located right across the street from the bike shop where we finished our tour, so while Thomas was tipping our guide, I went over and bought a vanilla scone and a chocolate chip cookie (our guide’s recommendations). The bike van drove us back to the dock where we ate the treats while waiting for our next tour and OH. MY. GOD. This was honestly the best scone I’ve ever eaten and the *massive* cookie was almost like cookie dough (aka delicious). These desserts didn’t last long between the 2 of us and because we were short on time between tours, they effectively became our lunch.

Rock Climbing & Rappelling

Thomas and I rock climb at an indoor gym every week, so we were very excited to try outdoor rock climbing for the first time. We took a van back up the same road we’d biked down to get to the climbing site. This tour had 3 guides and 12 participants and we were the only ones with real climbing experience. We had to spend a lot of time on safety briefings before we could get on the wall.

I was one of the first to climb and I quickly learned that outdoor rock climbing is very different than indoors, as most of the work is in figuring out where to put your hands/feet since there are no colorful holds like in a commercial gym. However, I found this to be the best part and I was able to troubleshoot my way to the top of the 80-foot wall. Unfortunately, because there were so few guides for the number of people who wanted to climb, Thomas only got to climb 1 route (and I got 2) before they marched us up to the top of the cliff to rappel down the same wall we’d just been climbing up. I enjoyed the rappelling but would have much rather had more time to climb. We also only got to rappel once, so for the length of the tour, not very much time was spent on the wall.

After the tour we were given trail mix and driven back to the dock. We had some time before we had to get back on the boat and the town was only about a 10-minute walk away, so we decided to stroll through downtown Skagway with its historic wooden sidewalks. We bought ice cream and souvenirs before making it back to catch a tender back to the ship.

Day 7: Victoria, BC

Our last port of call before heading back to Seattle was Victoria, BC. We had to fill out the ArriveCAN app and fill out a customs declaration form ahead of time and have our passports ready, but we just walked through the cruise ship terminal and no one checked anything.

We got to Victoria after 7PM and there was a delay with getting clearance for the boat to dock, but the tour buses waited.

O’Canada Victoria Highlights Tour

By 8PM, we boarded our tour bus and drove around the city. Our guide lovingly referred to Victoria as “Canada’s Florida” and “the place old people go to visit their grandparents.” Along the ride, the guide quizzed us and gave our prizes for correct answers – we won a deck of cards and a “moose crossing” sign.

Victoria was absolutely beautiful. The bus took us to a lookout where we watched the sunset over the city. After the sunset, we drove to Tim Hortons where we enjoyed hot chocolate and donut holes (aka Tim Bits).

Around 10PM, the bus gave us the option of getting off downtown or being driven back to the boat terminal. We didn’t have to be back on the ship until midnight, so we got off. When we did, we were surprised with a goodie bag of Canadian snacks, candies, and maple syrup.

Empress Hotel

We got off the bus right across from the Parliament building, which was lit up with Christmas-like lights. We were also right next to the Empress Hotel, which is the namesake of my favorite Gin, Empress 1908, so we stopped by the bar and ordered Empress 1908 gin & tonics before walking ~25 minutes back to the ship.

North to Alaska Enrichment Presentations

The only on-ship experience I’m going to touch on in this blog is the Princess Cruise’s North to Alaska series of enrichment presentations. There were several presentations from a “naturalist” about what it’s like to live in the Alaska wilderness, plus a presentation from an author who wrote a book about a female trucker on Alaska’s most dangerous highway. These lectures were very insightful and helped bridge the gap between the 2 very different worlds we were living in – the natural beauty of Alaska and the adult summer camp that was the cruise ship (more on that in the next blog).

Tips & Tricks

• Southeastern Alaska is in the Tongass National Rainforest which is a temperate coastal rainforest. We lucked out on weather and didn’t have much rain and sun came out in Juneau and Skagway, but prepare for rain.
• The towns are mostly deserted close to all-aboard time. Some shops are closed, so it may not be the best shopping time, but it’s peaceful and quiet.
• Alaska is 1 hour behind Pacific Time, so it was like going through Daylight Savings between Seattle and Alaska.

What I didn’t need to pack:

• As much bug spray as a I brought. We only needed it for Skagway at the Klondie Summit, but we didn’t even bring it off the boat with us so it was useless. Our “after bite” stick was more helpful. The naturalist did say that there’s tons of mosquitos between Anchorage and Fairbanks this time of year, so be warned if you’re going there.
• Baseball cap – never wore it

What I wished I packed:

• Warm hat, more warm clothes, and gloves – all of this would have been nice for the Endicott Arm & Dawes Glacier excursion, but I did survive without them.
• Go Pro – it would have been cool to capture our bike ride, rock climbing, and kayaking, which was difficult to do with just our phones

What I’m glad I packed:

• Rain coat!
• Packable backpack to bring on excursions – it folded up super small to put in our suitcase but held everything we needed each day
• Portable charger – my phone died extra fast due to trying to connect to limited Wi-Fi and cell reception, so this was very valuable