Alaska Repositioning Cruises: When Ships Arrive, When They Leave and Where They Go

Alaska repositioning cruises are the one-way voyages that bring ships into Vancouver and Seattle for the Alaska season and take them away again when it ends. For 2027, the arrivals run from late March to mid-May and the departures from early September to early November. Most are 4 to 7 night coastal runs to or from Los Angeles and San Diego. The rest go much farther: Honolulu in 8 to 11 nights, Tokyo in 13 to 22 nights, Sydney or Brisbane in 23 to 34 nights, and Florida or the Gulf Coast through the Panama Canal in 16 to 22 nights.

Only a minority of these sailings actually call in Alaska. The ones that do are the North Pacific crossings to and from Japan, which spend their first or last week among Alaska ports. The rest leave from or arrive at the cruise piers of the Pacific Northwest, which is where the Alaska fleet is based.

The 2027 Alaska season in our data

Of the 498 upcoming repositioning sailings in our repositioning cruise finder, each checked on the cruise line’s own website in late September 2026, 33 arrive in Vancouver or Seattle in spring 2027 and 30 leave in fall 2027. Eleven lines run them: Princess, Holland America, Royal Caribbean, Celebrity, Norwegian, Carnival, MSC, Disney, Viking, Oceania and Regent.

Two patterns stand out. The long voyages move first in spring, because a ship coming from Sydney or Miami has to leave in March to be in Seattle for the first Alaska cruise. In fall it is the other way around: the Japan and Australia crossings leave in September, while the coastal ships finish their last Alaska cruises and slip down to California between mid-September and mid-October. The Travel Alaska tourism office describes the core cruise season as May through September, with lines adding April and October sailings, and the repositioning calendar fits around exactly that window.

Where the Alaska ships go in fall 2027

These are the long one-way departures from Seattle and Vancouver as the 2027 season ends. Coastal runs to California are left out of the table; they follow below.

One more fall crossing touches Alaska without starting there: Carnival Luminosa sails San Francisco to Tokyo in 15 nights from October 2, 2027, with calls at Ketchikan and Icy Strait Point on the way north. Ships, dates and ports change, so check the line’s own page through the finder before you plan flights around any of these.

The spring arrivals: how ships reach Alaska

The spring list mirrors the fall one. The earliest arrivals come from far away: Noordam from Sydney (29 nights, leaving March 28), Carnival Spirit from Mobile and Carnival Legend from Tampa (16 nights each), MSC Poesia from Miami (18 nights), Norwegian Bliss from New York (22 nights) and Quantum of the Seas from Brisbane (23 nights). All six end in Seattle between mid-April and early May. Our guide to Panama Canal repositioning cruises covers the canal transit itself.

Then, from April 23 to May 9, seven ships arrive in Vancouver from Japan: Coral Princess, Norwegian Jade, Holland America’s Westerdam, Oceania Riviera, Regent’s Seven Seas Explorer, and Viking Orion and Viking Venus. Every one of them calls in Alaska on the way, at ports such as Kodiak, Homer, Valdez, Whittier, Sitka, Juneau and Ketchikan. If you searched for a repositioning cruise to Alaska, these are the real answer, and the guide to repositioning cruises from Vancouver describes the Canadian end of the trip.

Three Hawaii sailings also arrive in Vancouver in spring: Celebrity Solstice (9 nights from April 23), Anthem of the Seas (8 nights from April 29) and Celebrity Edge (8 nights from May 6), each with a stop at Kona. The last coastal runs from California arrive by May 15.

Alaska to Hawaii: what actually sails

No sailing in our data goes from an Alaska port directly to Hawaii. The one-way voyages people mean by “Alaska to Hawaii” leave from Vancouver, the Alaska season’s southern base, once the ship’s last Alaska cruise is done. In fall 2027 there are four: Celebrity Solstice on September 17 (11 nights, via Hilo and Kona), Anthem of the Seas on September 26 (10 nights), Celebrity Edge on October 1 (9 nights) and Ovation of the Seas on November 8 (9 nights).

The crossing is mostly sea days. Royal Caribbean’s itinerary for the Anthem sailing shows five days at sea after Vancouver, a scenic pass along Kauai’s Napali Coast, an overnight at Kona (a tender port) and then Honolulu. Fares are low for 10 nights: Royal Caribbean listed inside cabins from about $840 per person, taxes included, in October 2026. For the islands themselves and the onward sailings to the South Pacific, see the Hawaii repositioning guide.

The reason these trips start in Canada is the Passenger Vessel Services Act. CBP’s guide to the law explains that a foreign-flagged ship cannot carry a passenger one way between two US ports unless the voyage reaches a “distant foreign port”, and Canada does not count. Seattle to Honolulu would break that rule; Vancouver to Honolulu does not. If you want Hawaii from Seattle, Carnival sells a 16-day round trip from Seattle on Carnival Legend that visits four islands and calls at Victoria on the way back, but that is a round trip, not a repositioning cruise.

Alaska to Japan: a week of ports, then a week of ocean

The North Pacific crossings are the only Alaska repositioning cruises that are also Alaska cruises. In fall 2027, six of the seven departures for Japan call at Alaska ports first. Regent’s Seven Seas Explorer shows the typical shape: it leaves Vancouver on September 15, sails the Inside Passage, calls at Ketchikan, Juneau and Skagway, cruises past Hubbard Glacier and calls at Whittier on September 21. Then come eight days of ocean, including the date line, before Kushiro in Hokkaido on September 30, and three more Japanese ports before Tokyo.

Quantum of the Seas is the exception. It leaves Seattle on September 27 and spends nine straight days at sea before Hakodate, with no Alaska stop at all. It is also one of the cheapest ways across: Royal Caribbean listed it from about $1,310 per person, taxes included, in October 2026. At the other end of the scale, Viking’s and Regent’s crossings cost several thousand dollars per person, with much more included in the fare.

The great-circle track to Japan runs close to the Aleutian Islands, but none of the 2027 crossings in our data lists a stop there, so plan on Kodiak or Whittier being your last American port. The guide to repositioning cruises to Japan and Asia explains the date line, the clocks and the North Pacific weather in detail. You can filter the fall crossings to Japan or the spring crossings from Japan in the finder.

The coastal runs and the long ways south

Most Alaska ships simply sail down the coast. Our data has 32 coastal repositioning runs between the Pacific Northwest and California in 2027, and every one of them starts or ends in Vancouver, again because of the cabotage rule. Princess runs 14 of them and Holland America 8, followed by Disney, Norwegian, Royal Caribbean and Celebrity. The 4-night version is the most common and is often nonstop; the 6 and 7 night versions add San Francisco, Astoria, Victoria or Santa Barbara. Royal Caribbean’s 7-night Serenade of the Seas run from Vancouver to San Diego on September 26, 2027 calls at Astoria and overnights in San Francisco, and was listed from about $630 per person in October 2026.

For the Southern California end of these trips, see the guide to repositioning cruises from Los Angeles.

The two Panama Canal departures are the answer to the search for a repositioning cruise from Alaska to Florida: MSC Poesia, Seattle to Miami in 19 nights from September 27, and Carnival Spirit, Seattle to Galveston in 16 nights from September 25. Both can legally start in Seattle and end in a US port because they call at Cartagena in Colombia, which counts as a distant foreign port. The Australia sailings are the longest of all; the transpacific repositioning guide compares them with the Japan routes.

Vancouver or Seattle: which end to book

Counting Ovation of the Seas’ short November visit, 64 Alaska-season repositioning sailings in our data start or end in the Pacific Northwest: 51 in Vancouver and 13 in Seattle. The split follows the law, not the cities:

• Vancouver gets every coastal run, every Hawaii one-way and most of the Japan crossings with Alaska ports.
• Seattle gets the voyages that end in another country or pass through a distant foreign port: the Panama Canal sailings, the Australia crossings, Quantum of the Seas and Norwegian Jade to Japan, and Noordam’s 13-night run to Tokyo.

The guide to repositioning cruises from Seattle covers the piers and flights. A one-way Alaska cruise between Vancouver and Whittier or Seward, the classic Gulf of Alaska route, is part of the regular Alaska season rather than a repositioning cruise, so our finder does not list it.

How to choose your Alaska repositioning cruise

• You want to see Alaska: book a Japan crossing, in either direction. Spring sailings reach Alaska in late April and May, at the start of the season; fall sailings leave in mid to late September, at the end.
• You want sea days and a low fare: the Hawaii one-ways and Quantum of the Seas to Japan offer the most ocean for the money.
• You want a short first taste: the 4-night Vancouver to San Diego runs are three or four sea days and nothing else.
• You are moving or wintering south: the Panama Canal sailings end in Miami or Galveston, and the Australia sailings in Sydney or Brisbane.

Book the cruise first and the flight second. Japan crossings end in Tokyo or Yokohama on a fixed morning, Hawaii one-ways in Honolulu, and the fares home from both are one-way international or long-haul tickets that cost more than most people expect. Price the flight home before you pay the deposit.