Inside Passage to Arctic Circle: Cruise Alaska for a month with this epic new itinerary – The Points Guy

It simply is likely to be probably the most epic Alaska cruise ever.

Holland America on Tuesday unveiled plans for an unusually lengthy voyage to The Final Frontier that may embrace calls in distant areas that almost all cruise ships by no means go to.

The Alaska Arctic Circle Solstice voyage, as Holland America calls it, shall be 28 nights lengthy — 4 instances the size of the everyday Alaska crusing — and embrace stops in additional than a dozen ports.

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Kicking off in Seattle on June 9, 2024, it is going to additionally embrace a passage by the Bering Strait into the Arctic Ocean that shall be timed for the summer season solstice — the longest day of the yr.

The timing will end in 24 hours of daylight, because the ship shall be crusing above the Arctic Circle.

The journey is not like something the road has ever executed earlier than. It’s going to happen on the 1,964-passenger Westerdam, certainly one of six ships that Holland America plans to deploy to the Alaska marketplace for the summer season of 2024. It’s going to be a departure from Westerdam’s regular schedule of seven-night Alaska sailings out of Seattle.

Along with a passage by the Bering Strait to the Arctic Circle, the 28-night voyage will embrace a uncommon name at Nome, one of many northernmost settlements in america. Residence to fewer than 4,000 folks, it is maybe finest often called the end line for the 1,049-mile Iditarod Path Sled Canine Race. It is also identified for its proximity to Russia, which is only a few hundred miles to the west.

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Different uncommon stops embrace the distant settlement of Dutch Harbor within the Aleutian Islands. Often known as the biggest fisheries port within the U.S. by quantity of fish caught, it has been made well-known in recent times because the setting for the Discovery Channel actuality tv sequence “Deadliest Catch.”

As well as, Westerdam will sail into Prepare dinner Inlet for an in a single day name at Anchorage, Alaska’s greatest city. Few ships on Alaska cruises ever go to Anchorage as a result of distance of journey required to succeed in it by Prepare dinner Inlet.

The distant city of Kodiak, Alaska, on Kodiak Island, can be on the itinerary. The island is especially identified for its massive inhabitants of Kodiak bears — the biggest subspecies of brown bears.

Different stops in Alaska will embrace Skagway, Homer, Juneau, Ketchikan, Seward, Sitka, Valdez and Wrangell. The voyage additionally will deliver a go to to Prince Rupert in Canada.

The crusing will embrace scenic cruising in Glacier Bay Nationwide Park in addition to at Tracy Arm, Faculty Fjord, Prince William Sound and Hubbard Glacier — all identified for his or her spectacular Alaskan surroundings together with glaciers.

TPG’s final information to Alaska cruise itineraries

Holland America introduced the brand new itinerary Tuesday to coincide with Alaska statehood day celebrations.

The itinerary announcement comes as Holland America is within the midst of including extra lengthy itineraries to its schedule. At all times identified for a wider mixture of longer, extra destination-intensive itineraries than lots of its opponents, Holland America is doubling down on longer itineraries as a spotlight for the approaching yr and past.

Along with the brand new 28-night cruise to Alaska, the road introduced it might provide two 14-night sailings to the state in 2024 — its first such sailings in 5 years.

Just like the 28-night itinerary, the sailings will deliver uncommon visits to Anchorage in addition to Kodiak, Homer, Valdez and a mixture of different extra conventional Alaska ports resembling Juneau, Ketchikan and Skagway.

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In an unique interview with The Factors Man prematurely of the announcement, Holland America chief industrial officer Beth Bodensteiner mentioned the brand new 28-night Alaska itinerary was one thing she hoped the road may do yearly sooner or later.

“It is a good way to supply one thing distinctive and have us … form of step out of the mainstream for a number of weeks,” Bodensteiner mentioned, including that the itinerary supplied the possibility to “cross one thing off your bucket record.”

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Bodensteiner mentioned Holland America’s itinerary planning staff labored laborious to construct the itinerary round getting passengers into the Arctic Circle proper on the summer season solstice, providing a uncommon likelihood to see a day and not using a sundown.

“That timing is a good instance [of] how proficient our itinerary planning staff is, that they consider that form of factor,” she mentioned. “That is kind of what they began on. They [said] would not it’s nice to be this far north for summer season solstice? After which they again into” planning for the remainder of the itinerary.

Fares for the brand new 28-night itinerary begin at $4,259 per individual, not together with taxes and costs of as much as $645.

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