I went on the bucket list Alaskan cruise where you spot bear cubs, sea lions and whales from onboard

I’M finally on board with MAGA – now I understand it means Make America Glacial Again.

Despite being fairly well travelled, I’ve never seen anything on the scale of before.

Whale watching in Juneau was one of the wildlife-related highlights of the cruise Nieuw Amsterdam carries a touch over 2,000 passengers and has a nice mix of free dining and speciality restaurants Spotting bear cubs was an unexpected treat

It’s huge and you get the best idea of its scale by looking at it from the sea.

If you’re cruising Alaska’s Inside Passage, hugging the coastline, you need to do it with Holland America Line, which has been sailing these waters for almost 80 years.

It prides itself on its record, working closely with wildlife and environmental organisations and the indigenous people to promote the region’s culture and provide unique, immersive experiences.

We were essentially on the Alaskan introductory tour, the seven-day Glacier Discovery Northbound itinerary, on Nieuw Amsterdam.

We joined the vessel in Vancouver and what an impressive city that is, well worth a couple of days exploration before embarking.

We were bound for Whittier, a tiny port out of keeping with this massive state, with stops en route in Ketchikan, Juneau and Skagway.

But even the majesty of Alaska had some competition — from the cruise experience onboard.

Nieuw Amsterdam carries a touch over 2,000 passengers and has a nice mix of free dining and speciality .

Bear cubs playing

The food everywhere was quality, from the main dining room to the Lido zone, with broad choices of cuisine and excellent, cheerful service wherever you parked your plate.

The clutch of premium restaurants give you that little extra, of course, for which you pay a little extra.

It is money well spent for that special occasion meal, with beautifully prepared food, excellent wines and that indefinable atmosphere that elevates a meal time to a meal moment.

Our ‘humble’ cabin, a spa stateroom, came with a bath and floor-to-ceiling windows on to a balcony perfect for admiring the view — this is Alaska.

While my wife Lucy loved the top-of-the-range Morimoto By Sea with its seasonal fish dishes, luscious lobster and awesome chocolate sphere dessert, I still don’t think you can beat a bit of dead cow at dinner.

So my favourite was the ship’s steakhouse, Pinnacle Grill.

With all that food, of course, you need somewhere comfortable to it off, and Nieuw Amsterdam has a choice of accommodation.

Our “humble” cabin, a spa stateroom, came with a bath and floor-to-ceiling windows on to a balcony perfect for admiring the view — this is Alaska.

The outsized double bed was beautifully adorned with folded towel bears, dolphins or whatever your charming cabin steward decreed was the bed beast of the day.

So as the sun rose every morning (not that it even sets that much in in Alaska) we were well-rested and ready for the main business of the cruise. Critter spotting.

I would have said whale watching, but that seems a bit unfair on the dolphins, sea lions, seals, otters, bald eagles and, most unexpectedly, a couple of bear cubs.

Yes, there were and, wow, what an impressive sight they make, somehow unworldly, yet clearly with more right to be there than we had.

But they weren’t even our favourite sea creatures by the end of the trip, after we burned our spending money on the best wildlife excursions available, where you get off the really big boat, and get on a smaller boat instead, binoculars at the ready.

That honour went to the orcas (can’t call them killer whales any more, whales must have got woke).

We got a lot closer to them on our boat trip from Juneau up past a lovely cat-shaped island, and their sheer grace is a sight to behold.

We were bound for Whittier, a tiny port out of keeping with this massive state, with stops en route in Ketchikan, Juneau, above, and Skagway The food everywhere was quality, from the main dining room, pictured, to the Lido zone, with broad choices of cuisine and excellent, cheerful service Service was always delivered with a smile on the Nieuw Amsterdam

That was the wildlife highlight, even beating the view from our ship balcony of a bald eagle perched on a mini-iceberg, drifting by.

Those bear cubs?

They weren’t lost at sea, don’t panic, we saw them playing at the side of the road as we returned to the ship from a boat trip out to Misty Fjords.

But the best experience was saved until last.

We’d seen glaciers on the way north, and there had been shore excursions to some too, but on the final day at sea the Nieuw Amsterdam made her way into the Glacier Bay National Park.

It’s a massive (of course it is, it’s Alaska) mountainous region, teeming with glaciers you can admire as you sail through to College Fjord, where towering walls of ice reduce deckbound watchers to appreciative silence.

A silence broken by the thunderous crash of glacial “calving”, where chunks of ice fall off the face of the glacier to form icebergs.

It truly is nature’s at its finest. And I’d love an encore.