The “Juneau Whale Watching & Mendenhall Glacier Tour” is a great way to experience
two of the most popular sights on your cruise to Juneau, Alaska.
Our tour started with a visit to Tongass National Forest and Mendenhall Glacier, a 13-mile long
glacier that is viewable from both the nearby Visitor Center and several walking trails.
Our tour concluded with a roughly two-hour ride on a whale-watching boat with many opportunities
to see diving humpback whales and other wildlife.
We purchased the “Juneau Whale Watching & Mendenhall Glacier Tour” through Alaska
Shore Excursions.
The company offers discounted shore excursions that are similar to excursions offered by
the cruise lines and guarantees you will be returned to your ship before departure time.
After our ship docked in Juneau, we met the tour operators at a large tent on the wooden
dock, near the large, red Mount Roberts Tramway building.
A tour representative was holding an “Alaska Tales Whale Watching” sign for easy spotting.
Take note that the tramway building has restrooms available, which we highly recommend you take
advantage of before departing.
After boarding the tour’s school bus, we rode for about 25 minutes to Mendenhall Glacier,
which is named in honor of Thomas Corwin Mendenhall, a noted scientist and former Superintendent
of the US Coast and Geodetic Survey who served on the Alaska Boundary Commission.
Before dropping us off, the bus driver informed us of the time and location to meet for pickup,
which gave us about one hour to explore the Visitor Center and surrounding area.
An information kiosk near the dropoff location shows nearby hikes and walks and also provides
directions to the three options for getting to the elevated Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center.
The closest option is the series of ramps that start near the information kiosk.
The next closest option is the stairs.
And the furthest option is the elevator, which is located just past the stairs.
You’ll need to look for the overhead sign to find it.
The Visitor Center features a large, indoor panoramic observation area,
several exhibit areas,
a film auditorium,
a gift shop,
and restrooms.
Free Visitor Center brochures are available in English, Chinese, French, German, Italian,
Japanese, and Spanish.
The brochures contain helpful information and have a map of the area, including nearby
short walks and hikes.
The Visitor Center’s observation area provides great views of Mendenhall Glacier, Nugget
Falls, and much more, although tall trees do block some of the view.
During our visit, a few monoculars were available for visitors to see the sights more closely.
The Visitor Center’s exhibit areas provide an abundance of information about the glacier’s
history, as well as its future.
A central display invites you to “Please Touch” 200-year-old ice from the glacier!
For kids, the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center provides Junior Ranger booklets.
Kids completing the activities in the booklet are sworn in by a US Forest Service ranger
and receive a Junior Ranger badge and certificate.
To get a closer look at Mendenhall Glacier, we took the one-third of a mile round-trip
walking path to Photo Point.
The walking path is paved and Photo Point offers beautiful, unobstructed views of the
glacier, Nugget Falls, and the surrounding area.
Unfortunately, due to the time constraints of our tour, we were unable to take the much
longer, 2-miles round-trip, walking path to Nugget Falls.
Take note that in addition to the restrooms located in the Visitor Center, there are also
restrooms located near the bus drop-off and pick-up area, but they were a bit more crowded
during our visit.
After boarding the tour’s school bus again, we rode for about 10-15 minutes to Andrew’s
Marina at Fisherman’s Bend for the Whale Watching tour.
Our boat crew provided a quick introduction before we walked for about 5 minutes along
the marina’s floating docks to our boat, the newly delivered George Ryan.
The boat had plenty of seating and viewing areas for everyone to easily get a good view
of the wildlife, including outdoor seating as well as indoor seating in the heated cabin.
There was also a bathroom available on board.
After leaving the marina, it wasn’t long before the boat’s Captain, Spotter, and
Naturalist were finding many humpback whales for us to see, easily satisfying the company’s
“see a whale or get your money back” guarantee.
All three crew members were readily available to answer guests’ questions and consistently
provided detailed information about the diving whales we were watching.
Take note that government regulations prevent any boat within 200 nautical miles of Alaska
from approaching within 100 yards of a humpback whale, which is the closest you’re likely
to get to any of them.
On the other hand, if a humpback whale approaches within 100 yards of a boat, that
boat is not allowed to operate while the whale is nearby.
Midway through our tour, the crew received a tip about a lunge-feeding humpback whale
nearby and quickly took us to the area, which provided another opportunity to see Mendenhall
Glacier in the distance.
After arriving, it wasn’t long before we enjoyed an extremely rare, up-close experience
with the lunge-feeding humpback as it wandered within the 100 yard limit of our boat.
The experience was so uncommon that even the Naturalist grabbed her camera to take photos.
Our once-in-a-lifetime Whale Watching tour ended after approximately 2 hours on the water
and then we all boarded the tour’s school bus for the 20-minute ride back to the port.