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bettyboop

Guest
Hi, I am Betty, my life partner is Ray. This is the first time I have made a post. I have been reading Cruise
Addicts for about 2 yrs. now.
We are going on the Princess Coral to Alaska May 14thru 21. I have a few questions to ask.
1. Since we are staying 1 night in Vancouver, Do we need to have Canadian money?
2.Will we tender in any of the ports? (Juneau, Skagway, or Ketchikan)
3.Once we are in port, Can we walk directly into town?
This has been a great site for information I read it daily.
Thanks,
 
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BSeabob

Guest
Well most business will take the US $ but the rate that you will get will vary from poor to worse...same as in the Caribbean and other places. You can get CA$ easy at bank machines or do what we do in the States just use a Credit card and get your card/banks rate at the end. If you are just here for a short stop all cabs and tips can be done easy with us$ and noone will argue thats for sure.
It depends on what ship you are on and their pecking order for docking but Junea and Ketchikan have lots of room and we never saw one tender. I have not been to Skagway.
J & K (Skagway ???) you are in town when you dock. Juneau does have some a bit far from down town though.
 
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PEB

Guest
1. Since we are staying 1 night in Vancouver, Do we need to have Canadian money? You can US dollars but wherever you use it they will give you whatever exchange rate they wish. You are better off using a credit card seeing you will be there a short time. With a credit card you will get the true exchange rate.

2.Will we tender in any of the ports? (Juneau, Skagway, or Ketchikan) Princess will dock at a pier in these ports and you can just walk on and off the ship.

3.Once we are in port, Can we walk directly into town? Yes you can walk directly into town in all these ports. Ketchikan you will dock right downtown, in Juneau you will walk about 3 blocks and be downtown and in Skagway you will have about a 6 block walk into town. There will also be a shuttle bus in Skagway and Juneau to get into town if you do not want to walk the few blocks. The bus ride cost a dollar.
 
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skagwaypilot

Guest
Your ship may have to tender in either Juneau or Ketchikan. I've never seen a ship tender in Skagway.. And you dock right in town at Skagway - no problem walking. The National Park Service has a number of free offerings in Skagway, assuming that their budget hasn't been cut.
Juneau is a bit spread out so you may have to take a cab to some of the attractions - the taxis act as less-expensive tour buses so its no problem to get to the Mendenhal Glacier. There are also a number of independent tour operators with kiosks at the cruise ship pier if you have a last minute change of plans and want to see a bit more than the downtown area.
 
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Anonymous User

Guest
Bettyboop you are on the wrong sailing :lol

Thanks for the great info folks.

Edited to add, are these short or long blocks ? :grin Remember it is me folks :lol
 
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BSeabob

Guest
Hey Blondie.....

If you are walking from the last berth in Juneau its a LONG 3 blocks. but I think that Princess has a pretty good pecking order and you shud be able to walk right off into downtown. The Blocks downtown in all Alaska towns (coastal) are very small.
 
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Anonymous User

Guest
At least I will have my sneakers. We are the first ship in port that day but knowing my lucky we will be docked at the last berth. Thankx for the insight. Off to Wegmans for another pair of sneakers. :lol
 
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cruisegary

Guest
Welcome NEW POSTER.

In the future, you might want to be descript in your subject line saying what you are asking about.
 
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Hikini

Guest
As far as tendering in any of the ports - I haven't been on the Coral, but I have been on NCL ships when the Coral is in port. In all 3 ports (Ketchikan, Juneau and Skagway) the Coral did not tender. In Ketchikan, if nothing has changed, you literally walk off the ship and right to the shops. Same street. Of course there are other shops on other streets! :)

Same thing in Juneau. You come off the ship near the library, and lots of shopping.

In Skagway, it depends on which dock you are put at - but I've found Skagway to be the least shopping accessible of these ports. There is a shuttle bus which costs very little and I would recommend that because there is too much walking to do otherwise. If you do want to walk from the ship into town it's about a mile, again, depending on which dock you are put into.

One store I will highly recommend is Del Sol. It is in all 3 of these ports. I love that store and go to each one of them every time. It's a great place to buy gifts for people of all ages, but particularly young people. Everything in the store is sensitive to sun (or just natural light.) It may look plain white, then take it outdoors and it changes to another color, or colors.
 
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