Our Alaskan cruise was a family event to celebrate my in-laws 50th wedding anniversary. Eleven us of traveled and we ranged in age from 16 to 78! I can honestly say that our trip on the Sapphire Princess was the best vacation of our lives.

We embarked in Vancouver and to avoid any problems we arrived a day early. The search for hotels took awhile because they were all so expensive. We finally decided to stay out by the airport and used priceline.com to book our hotel. What a success that was! We stayed at the Delta Vancouver Airport hotel. It was not your typical airport hotel—it had a beautiful marina and lovely facilities. The bus stop was close by and we used public transportation to go to downtown Vancouver for dinner. Our dinner at Steamers was average but we enjoyed walking around downtown. The only drawback to the hotel was the cost of breakfast--$16 for 2 eggs and toast. So a couple of us boarded the bus again and went to a supermarket and bought breakfast. We had a family picnic in one of our rooms. It actually was very nice!

I booked a limo to take all eleven of us and our 22 bags of luggage to the cruise ship. This I also believe was a great find. The cost was $117 (US dollars) and that included tax and tip! That is less than $11 per person. The driver arrived early with a nice van and trailer to hold all of us and our luggage. Since we had extra time he volunteered to take us on a tour of the city. He was personable, polite and very knowledgeable about the city. He dropped us off at the entry to boarding and drove around and took care of our luggage. The company information is : Classic Limousine Vancouver and their phone number is 866-874-1311. Read more