Best Juneau Alaska excursions that I did (Princess cruise + book Juneau tours on your own) 🏔 Alaska cruise travel blog

Hi there!

went to Juneau on Princess cruise ships, so my experience is looking for excursions for Princess cruises… and booking on my own.

But of course, most of the excursions can apply no matter what cruise line you are on.

For any Princess excursions I mention, copy and paste the title of the excursion into google, and add the name of your cruise line. I have found that often times, the cruise ship excursions all have the same or similar names.

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Here is your quick list of best Juneau cruise excursions you must consider:

• Juneau whale watching tour
• Juneau icefield seaplane tour + Taku Glacier Lodge salmon bake (I have an Alaska-specific pinterest account! These are my pictures from these excursions.)
• Juneau helicopter tour with glacier walk
• Juneau dog sledding tour by helicopter
• Mendenhall Glacier lake canoe tour

The most popular Juneau excursions are whale watching and the Mendenhall Glacier.

Juneau is considered one of the best cruise ports to do whale watching in Alaska.

👆 One of the most popular Juneau cruise excursions is a whale watching tour.

There are a few different types of Mendenhall Glacier excursions you can do, and you can even do Mendenhall Glacier on your own.

The popular way to do Mendenhall Glacier on your own is a bit of a distant view, and so are the cheapest Mendenhall Glacier excursions, which are basically the ones that provide transportation.

But there are also other types of Mendenhall Glacier excursions so you can make it an even more epic Alaska experience!

I did the Mendenhall Glacier lake canoe tour that included a short hike on shore.

This was not an actually hike on the Mendenhall Glacier, but it felt like we got pretty close right in front of it.

It was amazing.

The Mendenhall Glacier is a retreating glacier, which means it looks like it keeps getting back and back from the visitor center.

They say that even from just a few years ago, there’s a noticeable difference on how far back the Mendenhall Glacier is going.

So much so, that we were told that the path we were walking was where the famous glacier ice caves were located! (They no longer exist. They have melted away.)

👆 A Mendenhall Glacier excursion is one of the best Alaska glacier excursions in Juneau.

And then, another popular Mendenhall Glacier excursion is a Mendenhall Glacier helicopter excursion where you actually get to walk on the glacier.

Which bring us to another type of excursion you should definitely consider when you are in Alaska: a flightseeing tour!

You can do flightseeing tours like a helicopter tour or seaplane tour.

And you can do both a helicopter tour and a seaplane tour in Juneau.

Either one will take you to see the epic Alaska landscape from above that you will almost certainly say is completely and totally amazing. (Since that’s what most people say!)

There are flightseeing tours that will take you for a flight and “only” a flight.

But of course, even if you “only” do the flight it will be epic!

👆 An epic Juneau excursion to do is a flightseeing tour. Make it even more epic by doing a flightseeing tour with a landing!

But if you are considering a flightseeing tour, then you really need to consider making it a flightseeing tour with a landing!

Even better if it’s a flightseeing tour with a wilderness landing!

Another cruise port where you can do a flightseeing tour with wilderness landing is Ketchikan. See the best Ketchikan excursions!

A wilderness landing will be something like the Mendenhall Glacier helicopter excursion or a dog sledding helicopter excursion!

Juneau is one of the best cruise ports to do dog sledding in Alaska.

The best dog sledding excursions will be on a glacier.

With these helicopter tours that go to a glacier, there is no specific landing spot, and the helicopter will literally just land in the wilderness on a glacier!

And then in Juneau, another type of flightseeing tour you can do is a seaplane tour that takes you to the remote Taku Glacier Lodge in the Alaska wilderness for a salmon bake!

Although this is not as “wild” as a glacier helicopter tour since there is a dock for the seaplane, the location feels wild and remote.

And even though it’s a group tour, it feels quiet and quaint.

How to search for Princess cruise excursions for Juneau

If you do want to look through the offerings of Princess, you can do so by logging into your account at princess.com.

Once you are logged in, go to: my account > manage this booking > excursions > view excursions for Juneau!

Look for the “customer reviews” for each individual excursion!

You can also look directly at the Juneau shore excursions with Princess without logging in if you just want to browse.

But when you want to book, you’ll need to go into your account.

It’s better to look at excursions directly from your account though, so that way you know that you’re looking at excursions that are offered during your cruise.

Some excursions may not be offered if you are on an early season cruise or a late season cruise.

And you will be able to easily see if there are still tickets available.

Many excursions get booked up if you wait too long, so it’s best to book sooner rather than later.

You can also book through the Princess app, but I personally don’t even like the way the shore excursions show up on the app so I wouldn’t even want to look through them!

And then when you are on the cruise ship, you can book through your stateroom TV, and of course directly at the shore excursions desk.

If you are getting on your Princess cruise ship without having booked excursions but are interested in doing so, then there is also a live shore excursions presentation with recommendations on shore excursions to book for Skagway and all the other cruise ports you’ll be going to.

If you miss the live presentation, then there will also be a replay available on your stateroom TV. If you can’t find it, you can call guest services or do a “crewchat” with them on the Princess app to find out how to find it.

Only budgeting for ONE excursion during your Alaska cruise? Also take a look at the best Skagway excursions and best Ketchikan excursions to see if you want to do an excursion in Juneau or Skagway or Ketchikan!

Or, view excursions by type! The best cruise ports for…

• Whale watching in Alaska
• Seaplane tours in Alaska
• Dog sledding in Alaska

More below about the Juneau tours that I did!

🏔

Best Juneau tours that are so Alaska

1. Juneau whale watching tour

There are whale watching tours with different types of boats, and I chose a whale watching tour that had less people. There were around 20 people on the boat.

It was a whale watching tour on a research boat.

Another whale watching tour company I’ve seen recommended a lot is Harv and Marv.

With a pick-up for the excursion from Juneau cruise port, we took a shuttle to Auk Bay to get on a boat to go see whales.

You know the pictures you see in all the whale watching advertisements of the whales jumping out of the water?!

aka breaching

Well, it’s actually quite rare to see whales like that.

Still, I was happy with what I saw.

Especially since I got a picture of a whale with its mouth open!

We also saw sea lions on a buoy.

I talked to someone who went on a different whale watching tour and their boat went past a whole bunch of harbor seals. I saw the picture and it looked really cool. I wish our boat had gone by it!

The thing about wildlife watching tours is that wildlife sightings are not guaranteed! At least, the variety that you will see.

Most whale watching tours in Juneau do seem to have a guarantee that you will see at least one whale. Although this doesn’t mean that you are guaranteed to get a GREAT sighting. 🤪

But this is just how it goes with wildlife viewing!

Patience is required.

And that’s also what makes it so exciting when you do see wildlife, whether it’s in the water or on land!

👆 A whale was spotted. Will it appear again?!

👆 An exciting moment on a Juneau excursion: A whale’s mouth!!!

👆 Spot the sea lions!

See more about Juneau whale watching excursions

• Whale watching in Alaska

2. Juneau icefield seaplane tour with Taku Lodge salmon bake (Taku Lodge Feast & Five-Glacier Seaplane)

I did a seaplane tour in Juneau that included a landing in what felt like remote Alaska.

It was a landing at the historic Taku Lodge (which currently only does day trips and not overnight stays), and it included a salmon bake Alaskan-style lunch.

There was time both before and after the meal to walk around, which I did.

I thought it was a nice quiet leisurely walk through the forest.

Most people stayed around the lodge. If you do the Taku Lodge excursion, I recommend asking how much time you have before food, and then walking around!

From Taku Lodge, you can see the glacier called Hole-in-the-Wall Glacier.

Flying from Juneau, you will get epic views of Alaska on your way to Taku Lodge and on the way back too!

I saw glaciers and blue ice from above!

The tour is advertised as a Juneau icefield seaplane tour, so you will be flying over and seeing part of the massive Juneau icefield with lots of glaciers.

👆 You might be able to see the famous “blue ice” of Alaska during a Juneau seaplane tour!

See more about a Juneau flightseeing excursion

• Princess excursion: Taku Lodge Feast & Five-Glacier Seaplane
• Wings Airways

3. Mendenhall Glacier excursion

The Mendenhall Glacier is one of the most popular things to do in Juneau.

Most people will go to the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center to get a distant view of the glacier.

This glacier is retreating which means that it continues to get further and further away year after year.

I did a canoe tour across the lake to get a closer look at the glacier.

You can’t actually walk on the glacier (it seems you used to be able to), but I thought this experience was so great.

We paddled the canoe to shore near the Mendenhall Glacier which means that we got closer to the glacier than the vast majority of people do.

We also got to see blue ice.

There was another tour group who was there about an hour earlier than us, and they were able to witness a big chunk of ice fall off the Mendenhall Glacier into the water!

Our tour guide was in touch with another tour guide and showed us the video.

This process of ice falling off a glacier is called calving, and calving is one of the best Alaska glacier experiences you can see!

Your best chance to see calving on a cruise if you’ll be going to Glacier Bay National Park is at Margerie Glacier!

You can do a Mendenhall Lake canoe tour without a shore landing, but I think it’s better if you had the short walkaround!

This was one of my favorite tours that I did during my 2 Alaska cruises.

👆 Mendenhall Glacier tour guide.

See more about a Juneau excursion to Mendenhall Glacier

• Mendenhall Glacier lake canoe tour + canoe landing

And those are Juneau tours that you must consider!

I was in Juneau in May of 2023. Your experience may vary!

Juneau on your own:

• Mendenhall Glacier on your own

What I did to give you more ideas for your Alaska cruise:

• Things to do in Skagway
• Things to do in Ketchikan
• Things to do in Sitka

HAPPY TOUR FROM JUNEAU CRUISE PORT!