Cruise Reviews, Ship Reviews by The Avid Cruiser

Marigot, Saint Marten, 6 a.m. — The engines are quietly rumbling as Wind Surf makes her way into the snug harbor on the French side of St. Martin. Rising from my bed, I pull back the curtains to peer out of the portholes, only a few feet above the waterline. Across the rippling water are sailboats bobbing in the harbor, and behind them, layers of verdant hills and the rosy tint of the morning sky. Morning has broken in Marigot. Continue Reading »

In September of 2006, I signed on for Cruise West’s 15-day Gold Rush Inside Passage Cruisetour.

What’s a cruisetour? It’s a combination of a cruise and a tour. And it allows you to see and experience the best of Alaska.

The cruise itself sails between Seattle and Juneau, and takes in cities and towns featured on many Alaska itineraries: Ketchikan, Skagway and Juneau. As well as some towns that aren’t regularly featured on Alaska cruise itineraries, such a Sitka, Haines and Petersburg.

There’s plenty of time for watching whales and other wildlife along the way, and on Cruise West’s small ships, the captain will even stop the ship and turn it to give passengers an up close and personal encounter with the splendor of Alaska.

The tour part of our trip took us to Anchorage, Alaska’s largest city; Denali, shrouded in snow and looming majestic over the golden September foliage, and Fairbanks, where the Northern Lights had been lighting the sky shortly before our arrival.

You’ll see all of this and more in this series of “Small Ship Snapshots.”

On a Cruise West “D Tour” we go deep into Denali, 90 miles from the National Park’s Entrance and up close and personal to Denali itself. Want to get away while getting close? Take a look.

From moose to porcupine to caribou to eagles, Cruise West guests saw lots of wildlife in Denali.

Our cruisetour had only nine people. For the summer of ‘06, Cruise West cruisetour groups averaged only 17. The small numbers make for a true “up close and personal” experience.

He’s been on top of Denali five times and plans to summit North America’s tallest mountain again - ambitious, he admits, seeing that he is 72 years old. Tom Choate talks about the mountain he loves.