Prince William Sound is famous for its calving glaciers and abundant wildlife, including whales, and there are several tour companies that are eager to show you all that the 10,000-square-mile ocean inlet has to offer. Essentially none of these companies offer whale watching cruises in particular – as in, cruises that are focused almost exclusively on seeing whales – but seeing whales is a component of a great deal of cruises that explore Prince William Sound. For reasons we will come to shortly, it is not always easy to find the tours that feature whale watching, so we’ve tried to compile all the information we have found in one easy guide. If you are interested in seeing whales in the Prince William Sound, this guide should provide you with several promising leads.
The first reason why finding whale watching cruises in Prince William Sound is difficult has already been implied, namely, there are no such things as “whale watching cruises” in Prince William Sound, at least strictly speaking. Rather, the exploratory cruises around the inlet are called something like “glacier tours” or “wildlife tours,” so searching for “whale watching cruises” will only get you so far. Second, Prince William Sound is fairly massive – with surrounding inlets included it constitutes a major indentation in the south central Alaskan coastline – and how you approach it will depend on where you are or planning to be. The two main places to sail from are Valdez, on the east side of the sound, and Whittier, on the west, but you could potentially come from a more distant port if you are part of a longer tour. It is therefore helpful to look for not only tours of Prince William Sound, but tours of Prince William Sound that depart from a specific town, which will likely be Valdez or Whittier. Finally, there are any number of people who charter small boats for basically any purpose, including tours of the sound that could focus on whales, and if these small boats are advertised at all, they won’t consider themselves “whale watching cruises.” So, even after considering the larger tour companies, keep in mind that there might be local boat chartering companies that are worth considering.
There are at least five companies that offer tours of the sound that in one way or another feature whale watching. Phillips Cruises and Tours and Major Marine Tours are based in Whittier, and Lu-Lu Belle Tours, Stan Stephens Glacier & Wildlife Tours, and Valdez Outfitters are based in Valdez. All five are tour companies that simply provide passengers with the opportunity to sail around the sound looking at glaciers and wildlife, including whales, and thus they are good, straightforward options to consider if you are in either city.
In Valdez, there is also a company called Sound Eco Adventures, and this company can also give you the opportunity to see whales. Their tours are a bit more complex – they might involve kayaking and a helicopter ride instead of only a cruise around the sound – but they are worth considering. In Whittier, there are two additional companies you can book with to see whales – Lazy Otter Charters and Prince William Sound Adventures – but neither is a tour company exactly. Lazy Otter is something of a Jack of all trades, offering a number of different services in the sound ranging from kayak transporting to film crew support, but they do offer tours, including customized tours that could focus on seeing whales specifically, so they are worth looking into. Prince William Sound Adventures is even harder to define because they are wrapped up with two other entities, the Prince William Sound Taxi and Eshamy Bay Lodge, and they all appear to be operated by the same company. Regardless of how the enterprise is arranged, all that really matters is that they have a boat to hire that will take you around the sound to look at whales. You can do much more with Prince William Sound Adventures/Prince William Sound Taxi/Eshamy Bay Lodge because in addition to tours, they also offer transportion, lodging, fishing, and hunting services, but for the purposes of this article, we are only interested in their boat chartering to see whales.
As you can see, there aren’t simply a few whale watching cruise companies whose sole mission is to sail around the ocean to look for whales (like there are in so many other places in the U.S.). Instead, whale watching is part of larger nature tours, or it is an activity that can be done with companies that do much more than offer tours. For this reason, it hard to find these “whale watching cruises,” but the information above should help point you in the right direction.
