Priscilla, we're on the same cruise!

I've spent a lot of time over the past several months hanging out in the CC Alaska forum. Not many Regent folks there, but there is a wealth of information about ports and excursions.

In Juneau, I was torn between the helicopter flight or the whale watch. People rave about both. It's incredibly frustrating to me that Regent has this great new advance booking system, but prevents us from doing two things we want in a port. After flip-flopping several times, we decided the whale watch seemed more different an unique and booked the evening whale watch. I'll hope that when I get onboard, I'll be able to book a helicopter flight in Juneau or Skagway, but I know that because they have such limited capacity, the odds are strongly against me. I could book a helicopter trip independently, but we've got four pretty pricey trips booked for our week driving around after the cruise, and I'm not sure I'm willing to add another.

(Hmmm, what we need is to find someone on the cruise who isn't planning to pre-book any excursion in Juneau, and then pay them to book the second excursion we want. Wow, I can see a whole little black market for excursions popping up! ;) Kidding, just kidding...)

Regarding Misty Fjords, we've opted for the flight-seeing over the boat trip. The comments I read from a number of people is that the boat is nice when you're at Misty Fjords, but you spend about 90 minutes getting there and 90 minutes getting back, and that it's a long trip for the hour or so you spend at the destination. I didn't see any negative comments about the flight; it's definitely one of the most popular trips people talk about.

I'm sure some others who have actually been on these excursions in the past will chime in. I'm just sharing what I've picked up from my research.

--Eric