DaveinCharlotte

Just got off the Countess. Riverlorian gave a nice history and description of how the ship came to be (converted casino boat). She confirmed paddlewheel provides about 40% of total propulsion, with three Z-drives providing 20% each. During Q&A I asked about the pushed-by-a-tug situation described above, and she said yes that was true, except that 2 of the 3 Z-drives had to be replaced. And she confirmed that it cost roughly $12,000/day for the tow-boat.

Just got off the Oct 27 Chattanooga-to-Memphis cruise that got changed to Chattanooga-to-Louisville. The ship is sailing to Nashville next.

Heads up to anyone booked on the three November cruises I mentioned above. Just received this e-mail from AQV: "Due to historic low water on the Mississippi River, we must change the itinerary for your upcoming voyage due to river traffic and closures beyond our control. Your voyage on the American Countess® departing Chattanooga on October 29 will now conclude in Louisville, KY on November 8, 2022 instead of Memphis, TN." I fear those November Memphis/New Orleans cruises are in jeopardy too, unless the low-water problem magically goes away.

59, 262 posts? Good lord!

We have been on the Star three times, Baltimore to Jacksonville once, and Jacksonville-Jacksonville twice. Each time, we embarked/disembarked at the same spot: Downtown Jacksonville, East Coastline Dr, in front of the Hyatt Regency. We stayed at the Hampton Inn across the river, relatively inexpensive room and parking, about a 3/4 mile walk to the ship. The ACL cruise docs will specify where the ship will be.

I see that Countess is running Memphis/NOLA throughout November, but I can't see anything scheduled through Dec, Jan, Feb, or Mar. Wonder if AQV is pulling it out of service for major repairs. Wasn't it the Countess that was photographed being pushed by a tug this summer, and word was engine had failed?

How did AQV notify you or TA cruise was cancelled? Or did you just go on their website and see that it was no longer there? Since it's not on their website now, I can't tell where this cruise was supposed to have been. What a big disappointment, and on such short (or no) notice! We're booked on the Countess end of this month, guess now I'll have to check almost daily to make sure it's still on.

Yep. those are the ones! One other person of note I forgot to mention in my original post was our naturalist/lecturer, Ranger John. He also did an excellent job.

Just a quick report. Back from our Alaska Inside Passage cruise, and happy to report it exceeded our expectations. When we arrived at the pre-cruise Baranof Hotel at 1:30 PM, we got right into our room (despite prominent notices that no check-in before 4:00 PM). The hotel's extensive morning buffet was excellent, and the transfers to the ship and included Mendenhall Glacier excursion were efficiently handled. We were pleased to find that the ship was fully staffed (there were 17 stewards on the crew roster!). Food always came out super fast. Hotel Manager Rick did a great job, and Cruise Director Christopher was a hoot. The excursions were interesting and well organized. We got our fill of whale, eagle, seal, and bear sightings. Unfortunately, we endured heavy rain for almost the half the cruise, and this did put a damper on things -- the glacier views were very disappointing. But of our 15 ACL cruises, this was one of the best.

ACL sent us the following e-mail shortly before we left for our Great Rivers of Florida cruise last week. We arrived to find that the e-mail was correct; no internet service. Since we have no cellular devices with data plans, this was a major pain. Worse, our Hotel Manager said he believed that internet service was being discontinued on ALL ACL cruises. Can anyone who has cruised recently confirm this? "Dear Guest, We look forward to you joining us aboard American Star. We have seen a steady increase of guests bringing phones, iPads, and other devices with them on their cruise. In almost all cases, these devices have better direct connections to the internet than the shared connection of the ship. As guests increasingly utilized their own data, the shared internet became under-used and unnecessary. Knowing this, we have phased out cell-based internet service onboard. We expect this to have no impact on your cruise experience, but if you do not have a data plan already, you may wish to contact your cellular carrier to upgrade."