- Moderate
- 8+ years old
- 3.25 hours
The Walkabout offers a personalized experience and the unique opportunity to get up close and personal with some of the Mendenhall Glacier’s most stunning features.
Quick Details
Wild Alaska by Air, Water & Ice
This tour offers the unique opportunity to explore wild and remote Alaska by helicopter, airboat, and foot. The adventure begins with a van shuttle from your cruise ship dock, or other pick-up location, to our seaside base on Douglas Island. You will be outfitted with glacier overboots, rain pants and a floatation device before receiving a pre-flight safety briefing and loading into one of our A-star helicopters.
Your pilot will choose one of many scenic routes to fly you to Taku Point, providing stunning views of the Juneau Icefield and Tongass National Forest along the way. You might even get lucky enough to spot a calving glacier or local wildlife during your Juneau helicopter tour!
Upon landing at Taku Point, you will be greeted by our friendly staff and provided with floatation jackets, hearing protection, and an airboat safety briefing. This is an ideal location for photos and to ask questions before boarding the airboat.
The boat is covered, with open sides for the best possible views and photo opportunities. During your airboat adventure on the river, experience up-close views of the Taku Glacier as you cruise its five-mile terminus.
While gazing from the river, the immense size of the glacier becomes evident as you zoom by within arm’s reach of the ice. The airboat captain will stop the boat in various locations for photos, and to provide informative narration about the glacier and the river basin that it has carved over the years.
Once back at Taku Point, you’ll rejoin your pilot who will fly you up to the Juneau Icefield for your guided glacier walk. You will have at least 10 minutes on the ice for photo opportunities and to take in some of its majestic features.
Don’t miss this unique airboat and helicopter glacier tour! Book online.
Please see FAQ’s page for general information about our tours and safety, here.
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- The total tour duration is 3.25 hours
- Tour includes approximately 30 minutes of helicopter time, 1 hour of airboating, and at least 10 minutes on the glacier
- Please book your tour at least one hour after your ship’s arrival time. The tour should conclude no less than 45 minutes before your ship’s departure time. If your ship’s port time changes after you have booked your tour, please contact us.
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Enjoy sweeping views of the massive Juneau Icefield and Tongass National Forest on your helicopter flight to and from Taku Point.
View the towering face and terminus of the Taku Glacier from the water aboard a spacious airboat.
Experience an ever-evolving winter wonderland atop the glacier on a guided walk led by your professional pilot.
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Must be at least 7 years old to participate.
Must be able to ascend and descend two flights of stairs.
For liability reasons, our NorthStar employees cannot lift guests into or out of the helicopter. Our staff will be there to assist, though guests are responsible for handling these steps on their own.
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We will provide you with over boots and rain pants during your tour.
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You should dress for a 10-15°F temperature decrease from sea-level (at the cruise ship docks ) to the glacier. We recommend that you dress in sturdy shoes, long socks, warm layers, gloves, and sunglasses.
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NorthStar’s policies prohibit the following items on our aircraft/tour:
- Bags or cases of any kind
- iPads or tablets, tripods
- Selfie sticks or other extendible items
- Drone
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Due to weight and balance limitations, as well as guest safety and comfort, passengers weighing 250 pounds (113kg or 18 Stone) or more will be charged an additional $150.00 to reserve adequate space on board the helicopter. Total weight includes shoes and clothing. Surcharge must be paid at time of booking.
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We arrange seating based on the weight, balance, safety, and comfort of the whole departure, and cannot guarantee that we will be able to keep groups together on the aircraft. Please note that we will do everything possible to keep groups together for the flight portion of the tour, but we are sometimes required to split a group between multiple helicopters. All groups will be together for the glacier portion of the tour.
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If you decide to cancel more than 24 hours before departure, you will receive a refund minus a 10% cancellation fee. If you cancel less than 24 hours before departure, you will not receive a refund.
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Weather in Juneau can often be overcast and rainy. Decisions to operate tours are based on safety and tour quality. Should we decide not to operate your scheduled tour we will do our best to reschedule. If this is not possible, you will be refunded in full. In most cases we will not make the decision to cancel a tour until within an hour of departure, as the weather can quickly change and we do not want to preemptively cancel a tour – if it is at all possible it will run.
