Cruises From Whittier

Whittier is a strange little place even by Alaska standards: a year-round population of roughly 270, and per widely reported figures (including NPR's own reporting and Wikipedia's entry on the building), around 85% of them live in the same 14-story building, Begich Towers — a former U.S. Army barracks converted to condos, with the town's post office, health clinic, and church all inside it too. The town began as a secret WWII-era military port, built because Prince William Sound stayed ice-free and hidden from view in bad weather, and it's still only reachable by road through a single tunnel, by the Alaska Railroad, or by boat.

That isolation is also exactly why cruise lines use it: Whittier sits roughly 60 miles closer to the open Gulf of Alaska than Seward does by sea, which shaves real time off a Gulf of Alaska itinerary between Alaska and Vancouver, B.C. Two docks have handled that traffic — the original city terminal, and a newer $80 million facility that opened in September 2024. On September 14, 2026, a fire destroyed that newer dock. Where each later sailing berths is up to its line, so check yours. Volatile — read the current block below

Whittier isn't a homeport in the Seattle or Vancouver sense — it's a turnaround point. Nearly every sailing here is a one-way "Voyage of the Glaciers"-style Gulf of Alaska itinerary running between Whittier and Vancouver, B.C., in either direction, rather than a round trip that starts and ends in the same port. That changes the planning question from "where can I go from here" to "what's on the other end of my cruise" — so instead of a destinations grid, here's how the pattern actually breaks down.

Not a destination grid on purpose: because Whittier itself is the embarkation point rather than a stop on someone else's itinerary, this page doesn't carry a destinations module the way a round-trip homeport guide does. If your itinerary calls at a port with its own guide on this site, look it up directly rather than treating this list as exhaustive.

Two docks have served Whittier’s cruise trade: one long-standing, one opened in 2024 and lost to fire in September 2026. Here’s the status of each, as of this writing.

There's exactly one real option in town: a supervised lot on Whittier Street, a short walk from the dock. It's not free and it's not huge, and most Whittier passengers skip driving altogether in favor of a transfer from Anchorage. Review periodically

The lot's rates, RV space, and how it compares to just leaving the car in Anchorage get the full page.

Whittier has exactly one road connection to the outside world, and it's a genuine engineering oddity: the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel, 2.5 miles long and the longest highway tunnel in North America, confirmed via alaska.org's own detail page on the tunnel. It was built to withstand -40°F temperatures and 150 mph winds, and its single lane is shared with the Alaska Railroad's tracks — cars and trains take turns, with jet-turbine ventilation clearing the tunnel between passages.

Traffic alternates on a fixed schedule rather than flowing continuously in both directions. In the summer schedule, departures toward Whittier leave on the half-hour (5:30 a.m. to 10:30 p.m.); departures back toward Portage and Anchorage leave on the hour (6 a.m. to 11 p.m.). Each opening lasts around 15 minutes, and the drive through takes 20 to 30 minutes, so alaska.org recommends arriving at least 10 minutes before your scheduled opening. Alaska DOT sells round-trip tickets only: $13 for a car, $22 with a trailer; oversize vehicles are restricted to Monday through Thursday.