Join me on avidcruiser.com beginning March 22 as I board Silver Spirit in Acapulco for a cruise up the Mexican coast to Los Angeles.

I’ll be taking a look at Silver Spirit’s outdoor dining venues — and much more. The cruise concludes April 1, so bookmark this page and return each day for something new.

From moose to porcupine to caribou to eagles, Cruise West guests saw lots of wildlife in Denali.

Research shows that most people planning a trip to Alaska want to see two places: Glacier Bay National Park and Denali National Park. You can get to Glacier Bay aboard a cruise ship and admire the national park’s stunning scenery from the comfort of your balcony stateroom. But to get to Denali (a.k.a. Mt. McKinley), you’ll have to get off the ship, lace up your hiking boots, and trek inland. That’s where a cruisetour comes in.
Cruisetours combine a cruise voyage with a fully escorted stay on land. The cruise lines have streamlined their product so that you’ll pay one price in exchange for two vacations ‘“ one at sea, and the other on land in the Alaskan interior.

You’ll also enjoy two completely different travel experiences. While at sea, you’ll gaze out at glaciers, fjords, and lots of marine life. While in the interior, you’ll see snow-capped mountains (on a clear day, you may want to “fly by” Denali, North America’s tallest peak), wildlife, and what some have called “the real Alaska.”

While a cruise offers travelers an excellent taste of Alaska, a cruisetour serves up the complete five-course dinner — the total Alaska experience.

Celebrity Cruises, Holland America Line, Princess Cruises, and Royal Caribbean International are all among the major cruise lines offering cruisetours. Each line employs their own tour guides, owns their own fleet of comfortable buses, and operates private glass-domed railcars that hitch up to the Alaska Railroad for the journey between Anchorage and Denali. The rail journey alone is spectacular — on a clear day, you’ll spot Denali’s dome several times from along the rails.

In total, a cruisetour will last anywhere from 10 days to three weeks. That includes the cruise portion of your trip, and you can choose to add your land stay either before or after you sail. Some cruisetours include two full days in Denali National Park, allowing you plenty of time to spot grizzly bears and admire the mountain scenery.

Travelers can explore Denali via 90 miles of semi-paved road that reaches deep into the park, or take to the skies and see Denali from an aerial perspective. Along the way, you’ll have the opportunity to stay in back country lodges or mountain chateaus, and you’ll likely spend at least one night in Anchorage, Alaska’s largest city.

Some cruise lines offer close to thirty different cruisetour options. With so many variations available, it’s always advisable to speak to your cruise consultant about which option is best for you. Cruisetours also fill up quickly, so plan as far in advance as possible. The greatest number of cruisetour bookings occur in October and November — for the following year’s peak season — but it’s never too late to see what’s available.

Alaska is enormous. At 586,412 square miles, it’s more than twice the size of Texas, and cruise lines skirt only a small portion of the state’s 33,904 combined miles of coastline. For many, the real Alaska lies in the vast wilderness beyond the shorelines — and a cruisetour can take you there.

I enjoyed listening to Episode 25 on Cruise Radio, in which I was interviewed for my article Six Tips For Extracting More Joy from Your Cruise.

I only recently learned about Cruise Radio, which was founded by Doug Parker in the Spring of 2009. Doug is host alongside Matt Basford, who has worked in Top 40 radio, acted in film and television, and was the winning bachelor both times on The Dating Game.

The show airs every Sunday. Previous shows are archived.

While docked in tiny Haines, Alaska, the self-proclaimed “Valley of the Eagles,” we walked to the old Western-style movie set of “White Fang” for a visit to the Haines Brewing Company and a taste of some really good beer.

It is a sunny February day. The distant, snow-laden Alps contrast against a brilliant blue sky. Sprouting from fields of green are quaint homes with terra-cotta roofs.  Italy’s earthy realms juxtapose with heaven’s ethereal reaches. It is a day and a scene that buoys the spirit: What’s more is that such euphoria comes for only 22 Euros.

The journey began at Genoa’s central rail station, and ended less than two hours later in Milan. First class seats only 6 euros more than 2nd class seats, so why not splurge?

I love the clack, clack, clack of the rails, the train’s whistle, the dual illusion of speeding past the landscape and at the same time moving in slow motion. The distant Alps appear to pass slowly, but the trees and houses near the rails zip past in a blur.

As any train traveler will tell you, there is a romance on the rails that has long been lost in the air. (Of course, as any avid cruiser knows, the romance still exists at sea.) On terra firma, when it comes to planes, trains and automobiles, I will choose trains whenever possible.

I stand up to take a photo to share with those who might read this story, but I realize that I cannot capture the scene in megapixels. Better to try to paint the picture with words and let the reader imagine and one day experience it personally.

[Travel Tip: If your cruise ends in Genoa, you may find that you'll save a bundle by flying from Milan's Malpensa Airport rather than Genoa. The rail journey takes 1 hour 45 minutes and costs around 22 euros. Once at Milan's Central Rail Station, look for the signs directing you to the Malpensa Shuttle. The transfer from the rail station to the airport takes about 45 minutes and costs only 7.50 euros. For all flights except for EasyJet, stay aboard the bus until you reach Terminal 1.]

Barista Bar on Oceania Cruises New Marina

You’ll need to use your imagination, as Oceania’s Marina is under construction in Genoa, Italy, but the panorama picture you’re looking at is of a soon-to-be-completed coffee bar overlooking the pool deck (click the photo to enlarge the image).

Typically, this space might be reserved for bars serving beverages with more kick than coffee, but as Oceania Cruises’ CEO Frank del Rio pointed out to press touring the ship today in Genoa, “Our guests aren’t big (alcohol) drinkers.”

Certainly, a coffee bar seems to be the perfect complement for this space; something different anyway. You don’t often see coffee bars at sea with views such as this.

Our cruisetour had only nine people. For the summer of ‘06, Cruise West cruisetour groups averaged only 17. The small numbers make for a true “up close and personal” experience.

Only 25 percent of the people who come to Alaska to see Denali get to see it. But you can improve your chances. If the weather down below is lousy, take to the sky on a fly-by Denali flight.