Alaska Excursions/Concierge

DietCokeMommy

Mouseketeer
Joined
Apr 19, 2017
My husband and I are super planners and we're thinking we'd like to do an Alaskan cruise in 2022 for our 10 year wedding anniversary. We usually choose 3rd party excursions, but I think for Alaska we'll definitely want/need to do Disney ones. Like the Glacier Explorer, and maybe the dog sledding helicopter excursion. I've heard those sell out really quickly. We are debating adding another 3 day cruise in between now and then to get us to gold (we live in FL so it's easy to do) or book concierge so we can make sure to be able to book all the things we want to. In addition to the excursions we'd also want to do a Palo brunch, which we haven't managed to score as first time cruisers or on our last cruise as silver.

So for people that have experience, are these things bookable as gold? Or would all the benefits of concierge (the concierge deck plus booking benefits, etc) be better for a trip like this?
 
We sailed concierge to Alaska last year, but I booked all of our excursions 3rd party except for the Glacier Explorer in Endicott Arm, which can only be booked through DCL. I saw no reason to pay more and all of our excursions went fine, we never worried about making it back to the boat on time. I booked many of them long before booking excursions through DCL was an option, in some cases a year out. (Super planner here too!) Concierge was helpful at getting us our Palo and nursery reservations, along with the Character breakfast and Frozen meet for the kids.
 
I booked both a flight plane, helicopter to a glacier and the Endicott Arm boat tour all through Disney Cruise Line as a first time Disneycruiser, and I had no issues. I imagined having problems, but I was able to get everything. My theory is we were on the first cruise of the season so it was not full, and we were choosing more expensive PAs so there wasn't as much competition.

I often book things through third party, or go out on our own. The one exception is anything with an air flights. The risk of getting stranded somewhere due to weather when using air transportation is exponentially higher then say a car. A little too much wind and you won't be leaving that glacier (they actually prep for tour groups having to stay out on the glacier just in case). I know a lot of people will disagree and book on their own, counting on the fact that the companies make their money by being on time. For me, anything that involves air travel on a Port Adventure is always booked through Disney to be safe. If my helicopter is delayed I want that ship to wait, or at least the assurance I will be reunited with the ship as soon as possible at no cost to me.
 
We were gold cruisers and had no problems booking the glacier excursion tour, which for us was a highlight. The rest we booked third party. I do not like helicopters/flying, so those tours were out for us and I can't comment. Certainly booking concierge, if it is in your budget, would be wonderful. Enjoy your cruise!
 


I think we decided that ~$20k on a 7 day cruise alone is more than we're comfortable with. We'll see when the actual prices come out, but we'd like to be at $20k for the whole vacation. So I guess we'll have to hope we can book the things we want to, and also hope that the rest of the cruises we have booked will still happen so we'll make it to gold, lol.
 
I think we decided that ~$20k on a 7 day cruise alone is more than we're comfortable with. We'll see when the actual prices come out, but we'd like to be at $20k for the whole vacation. So I guess we'll have to hope we can book the things we want to, and also hope that the rest of the cruises we have booked will still happen so we'll make it to gold, lol.
We did another cruiseline for Alaska. No regrets there. The cost savings was certainly worth it for us.
 
We did another cruiseline for Alaska. No regrets there. The cost savings was certainly worth it for us.
We definitely thought about it. Our kids will still be pretty young at the time (5 and 8) and I think Disney is the best choice for all of us as a family. I know we'll want to ship them off the kids club for large chunks of the day some days. We've sailed the Wonder twice so I feel pretty confident they'll be happy there and allow us to visit the adult areas and enjoy the scenery if they have a fun place to go. We're also pretty Disney obssessed as a family and we get a lot of enjoyment out of the characters and restaurants and overall Disney ambiance.
 


We definitely thought about it. Our kids will still be pretty young at the time (5 and 8) and I think Disney is the best choice for all of us as a family. I know we'll want to ship them off the kids club for large chunks of the day some days. We've sailed the Wonder twice so I feel pretty confident they'll be happy there and allow us to visit the adult areas and enjoy the scenery if they have a fun place to go. We're also pretty Disney obssessed as a family and we get a lot of enjoyment out of the characters and restaurants and overall Disney ambiance.
Sounds like a great choice for your family then. I will say that Alaska skews older so with young kids, they might greatly benefit from the excitement of the Wonder.
 

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