Cruise passengers arriving in southeast Alaska increasingly step ashore at ports run by Alaska Native corporations, and one of the biggest players is quietly expanding what's on offer. Huna Totem Corporation, a Juneau-based company celebrating its 50th year, owns Icy Strait Point and Chugach Glacier Getaway and co-owns Klawock Island — and it's rolling out new experiences across the board this season.
At Icy Strait Point, the flagship port near the Tlingit village of Hoonah, a brand-new hiking tour route is now available. It's a good fit for a place already known for combining wilderness access with cultural programming: guests can spot wildlife, stretch their legs on shore, and learn about the region's Indigenous heritage without a long transfer from the ship.
Klawock Island, on Prince of Wales Island, is adding two tours this summer. The standout is a self-drive picnic excursion — a rare format in cruise touring, where visitors typically stay herded onto coaches. Driving yourself puts a slower, more independent kind of shore day on the menu, with a picnic as the centrepiece.
Over at Chugach Glacier Getaway, the story is growth on the arrival side: four new cruise lines will be calling there this year. That's a signal worth noting if you're picking an Alaska itinerary — ports that were once niche stops are appearing on more mainstream itineraries, often with smaller crowds than the marquee names.
There's a broader point behind all this. Huna Totem Corporation is the largest employer in Hoonah, so money spent on these tours stays largely in the local community rather than flowing to outside operators. For travellers who care about where their tourism dollars land, choosing a Native-owned shore excursion is one of the more direct ways to support the places you visit. It also tends to come with more genuine cultural interpretation — the people running the experience are telling their own story, not a borrowed one.
Who is this for? Cruise travellers planning an Alaska season who want shore days beyond the standard zip-line-and-souvenir-shop formula, and anyone who'd rather book an excursion owned by the local community. If your itinerary includes Icy Strait Point, Klawock or a Chugach Glacier call, it's worth checking the port's own tour list before you default to the cruise line's shore-ex desk — the newer options, like that self-drive picnic, often won't be the ones the ship promotes loudest.
Story via Porthole Cruise.
