Dana's Travelogue Oct'18 Mem-NOLA posts#2,3,4, &5

Oct. 22 Monday Memphis and Embarkation

Spent the day at the National Civil Rights Museum at the Lorraine Hotel. Made famous for being where Martin Luther King Jr. was shot, the former motel has been skillfully redone into a massive museum. Fabulous exhibits really cover the history and ongoing challenges of the Civil Rights movement. Some of them were heartbreaking, some a testament to human determination and persistence against odds.

After spending over 3 hours inside...museum and information overload hit all of us so we headed back with a walk along the cliff overlooking the river to the hotel.

After a short wait and snack it was time to catch our bus to the boat, The American Duchess. She is a beauty and just over a year old. She has a capacity of 160 passengers, is 320 feet long and 100 feet wide, 85 feet tall and only draws 8.5 feet of water under the surface.

Our cruise heads downstream from Memphis to New Orleans over the course of this week. Sailaway was around 5 and we had a lovely dinner in the dining room. After that it was time for the welcome variety show in the show lounge. Kim and I then went up and sat in the Library/bar to enjoy the band play some amazing jazz until their last song which was so danceable he had to kick off his shoes and we had a fun dance on the carpet.

Part3

Oct 23rd Tuesday Helena Arkansas

Started our day aboard with a Pilot House Tour where the 1st mate ran us through all the equipment and showed off how the ship is steered and operated. I learned so much about how they navigate the river and the challenges they face to make our cruise smooth and bissfully uneventful. One of the interesting parts of the boat is that the whole Pilot house itself lowers on hydraulics to be able to clear some of the bridges and power lines that cross the Mississippi. They also lower the exhaust stacks. The front decorative ones hing down to a horizontal position and the back ones, that do actually exhaust, telescope down. After the tour we had about an hour to see Helena so we got on the Hop-On-Hop-Off bus tour that goes with our boat. We stopped at the Delta Cultural Center in the old Depot with exhibits about the civil war and the great floods. Then we went across the street to the Delta Cultural Center itself and saw their exhibits on the King Biscuit Flour Hour and Blues festivals as well as the history of the Gospel and Blues that came from the south.

Once back on board we pushed off about 1pm and spent the rest of the day cruising down the Mighty Mississippi towards Vicksburg. Kim and I got in a workout in the tiny fitness center. Then a few lectures, on the ports coming up and on the river itself, along with the evening’s show and music hour filled in the rest of the day. Since we’d gotten up to dance the last song the night before, I made sure we both had our dance shoes before going to the Library for the music hour. I had a feeling they would play more swing for us and I was right. They opened their set with “It Don’t Mean A Thing”... If it Ain’t Got That Swing. So we danced to all the stuff they played that we could, and also enjoyed resting during the Bossa Nova and jazzy ‘Take 5’ songs they played. They are some of the best musicians I've heard aboard any cruise ship.

Part #4 Vicksburg

Oct. 24th Wednesday Vicksburg, Mississippi

A nice leisurely morning, followed by a trip on the tour bus where we stayed on for the whole journey to hear the guide. We got off at the last stop before the boat and proceeded to tour the Lower Mississippi River Museum and all of town by foot. At the museum we walked around the Mississippi iv which was one of the Army Corps of Engineer vessels. Interesting and although we had it to ourselves I went through at high speed because of the musty/moldy ship smell.

We walked the main street with shops and then hit almost all the places the hop on hop off bus had passed. We stopped in at the Biedenharn Coca-Cola Museum where Coca Cola was first bottled!

The Church of the Holy Trinity, with the Tiffany glass windows was a surprisingly great tour and very interesting. I had poked my head in just to see the stained glass however there was no one else there and the guide was so excited to see the four of us that she started enthusiastically as soon as we arrived. It was great though because it was all about Tiffany glass and the differences between it and the traditional windows. Bonus points for catching which one is NOT a Tiffany ;)

Walked on to the famous Anchuca Mansion which is now a B&B filled with antiques and gorgeous reproduction curtains/carpets etc. A stop in the old Train Depot rounded out our tour of Vicksburg with a small museum containing many steamboat models and a huge model train exhibit.

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The entertainment on board is a 4 piece band Drums, Bass, Piano and Sax and they are fantastic. Also the Cruise Director Dustin and his wife Courtney and friend Jeff are also the singers and entertainers aboard. Tonight's show was songs of the Silver Screen. Last night's was all river themed songs like Up a Lazy River and Old Man River etc. After the main show at 8:30 the band moves up to the Library/lounge where they play for an hour. We all went up and listened and Kim and I danced when the jazz was appropriate.

Vicksburg, Mississippi

Part #5 Touring the American Queen and Natchez

Thursday Oct. 25th Natchez, Mississippi

(Evidently I need to explain the puzzled look on my face while sitting in front of the antique TRS80...caption should have read 'Trash 80!? I haven't seen one of these since I was a was a kid, I wonder how I'd do trying to use it today!”)

Instead of spending the morning doing the hop on hop off bus route and several of the included sites/tours, I signed up to get a tour of the American Queen. She is the closest thing to a true steamboat we have. She does power with steam too! So gorgeous, opulent and ‘vintage’ in her looks despite being a modern built boat. After our tour I am now looking forward to taking a voyage on the American Queen.(lots of danceable wood floors!) The Dutchess which we are on is so modern and spacious but I do adore the ‘old world’ feel that the Queen exudes.

When that tour was done we got completely soaked in the rain walking the short distance between the two boats. So a full change of clothes and lunch and off to take the bus into Natchez. Kim and I wanted to go pay our respects to the site of the Rhythm Night Club. We have been swing dancing for about 12 years and one of our favorite tunes that Stompy Jones would play is ‘That Night’ all about the fire that destroyed the club. We toured the informal ‘museum’ with our guide, the gentleman who owns the land and ended up building the museum out of respect for the survivors and to house all the artifacts and articles and pictures that people have been giving him for decades.

After that important stop we quickly toured the Kings Tavern, the oldest building in Natchez. Which is actually saying something because it is one of the only places that is preserved from before the Civil War. They say it ‘surrendered after one shot’ and therefore all the antebellum buildings and mansions survived the war.

We caught the last tour of the Stanton House which was a huge mansion built by Stanton who was a plantation owner, (had 6 at one time) and a cotton broker as well. It is owned and maintained by the Garden Society of Natchez and my impression is they are a very powerful and influential group. Tonight's show was all 'Songs from the Silver Screen'... I enjoyed the library jazz set afterwards more😉