The giant luxury cruise liner was anchored just off Nome, too hulking to use the Bering Sea community's docks on its inaugural visit.

Instead, its more than 900 passengers piled into small transport boats and motored to shore, where they snapped photos of wild musk oxen, lifted glasses in the town's colorful bars and nibbled blueberry pie while admiring Alaska Native dancers at Nome's summer celebration.

The Crystal Serenity's visit to Alaska's western coast is historic. At nearly three football fields long and 13 stories tall, the cruise ship is the largest ever to traverse the Northwest Passage, where its well-heeled guests glimpsed polar bears, kayaked along Canada's north shore, landed on pristine beaches and hiked where few have stepped.