Bear tour in Icy Strait Point? And gondola?
 

Does anyone have a favorite tour operator? The ship has a 2.5 hr tour that doesn't get good reviews. We will be going in 3 weeks!
Also, I see there are 2 gondolas there - a red ($) and green (free). Any comments on those and how are they different?
Thank you.

I've only been there once and that was more than 10 years ago. ISP is a 'private' port and AFAIK is entirely owned by the local indigenous community. So all excursions are provided by the council/local residents. When my cousin and I were there we spent the time at the Heritage Center at a dance/music/cultural show (that was fabulous), visited a local artist/totem carver, and ate at the Crab House.

I just returned from an Alaska cruise and Icy Straight Point was our first port. The green gondola is more of a free shuttle to get you to some points of interest. The red gondola brings you up the mountain with a lookout on top and a walking trail. That’s what we did. Honestly we found it underwhelming. We thought Juneau and Ketchikan were much better ports. We did run across some folks who took a bear tour and they seemed to enjoy it and saw six bears. I kind of wish we did that but I don’t have information about any specific tours. We were on Celebrity Solstice and our highlights were cruising close to Hubbard Glacier, a Mendenhall Glacier excursion in Juneau, and a kayak excursion in Ketchikan.