And I could never see much logic in the round trips!!
The purpose of the one-ways is clearly to allow folks to do a "cruise tour"...otherwise, how would one get to see the interior of Alaska--Denali, Fairbanks, Talkeetna, et al...?
The cruise lines market these cruises for people who want to spend more time in Alaska...and see more...than just the 7 nights on the ship in the panhandle...
And, yes, it is expensive...but, for some of us, the cost is not the determining factor...
If I just wanted cheap cruises, I'd be sailing the 3 and 4 nighter to Ensenada ad infinitum...
But, my intent is to travel to exotic and distant places, to spend as much time there as I can and to see as much as I can work into the equation...
So, for my first Alaska cruise (I've cruised the Caribbean, the Mexican Riviera, the Baltic, the Mediterranean...so it's time for Alaska), I'm doing 15 nights total...We're doing a 13 night cruisetour, flying into Fairbanks with 2 nights there before continuing on to Denali, Talkeetna, Anchorage and Alyeska before meeting the Summit in Seward...Post cruise we're tacking on 2 nights in Vancouver...I figure as long as I'm going to Alaska, I might as well see as much of it as I can...I've got the airfare booked through Celebrity...and, as far as I'm concerned, whatever it costs is what it costs...The trip is more important than the cost of the trip...I'm not sure when I'll get back to Alaska again...Next year, my wife wants to do a Norwegian Fjords cruise...
BTW, you might also check into whether the airlines will "split" a round trip fare...They used to do this (I don't know if they do anymore though)...One time we flew to Tel Aviv and out of Frankfurt three weeks later and the airline billed us for one round trip to Tela Aviv and one round trip to Frankfurt...