The headline is this: Alaska is amazingly, breathtakingly beautiful.
It is the pure, natural kind of beautiful that you can’t quite fathom, but that your soul soaks up. I think the only real question is whether to visit via cruise or some other means.
I’m eager to go back in another capacity, but loved the cruise method for taking in the magnificent nature and views while spending some quality time with family, and keeping relatively warm! We went in mid-June and couldn’t have had a better experience.
If you’re more interested in getting to know the personalities of the small towns, I would recommend taking another route. The port towns are beautiful and have wonderful history, but like it or not, with ships in port, they’re somewhat similar and feature main streets riddled with jewelry stores and souvenir shops. That said, everyone on and off board the ship was wonderful and hospitable.
We were aboard the Celebrity Solstice and took advantage of a few “excursions” including hikes and a scenic train ride that went up into Canada and back. I’d recommend both.
My favorite cruise-specific moments were those the morning that we cruised slowly in the fjord, taking in incredible sights of the early morning.
A nice perk of an Alaskan cruise is that there’s a maritime law that ships must dock internationally before returning to Seattle, so we spent an afternoon in Victoria, Canada. We’ve visited before via the Clipper, and it was beautiful as ever.
In summary, Alaska is a place unlike any other I’ve been. This was the perfect introduction to a part of the country I’d never experienced before.
