Citing what it said was unprecedented demand for the 2022 season, American Queen Steamboat Company and Victory Cruise Lines, have released 2023 deployment.
According to the Hornblower-owned companies, the announcement marks the furthest out a season has been offered to guests and travel partners signaling pent up demand to “Come Home to America.”
Itineraries for the 2023 season feature the debut of Victory Cruise Lines second expedition vessel, the Ocean Discoverer.
In additional, the American Queen Steamboat Company and Victory Cruise Lines will open a satellite office in a yet-to-be determined South Florida location in 2022, relocating the marketing, sales and operations team to the epicenter of the cruise industry.
Executive, finance and all other functions remain in New Albany, IN headquarters.
“Cruisers yearn to travel again, as evidenced by 2021 and 2022 inquiries and our webinar popularity with guests and travel partners. Opening up 2023 to satisfy that wanderlust had to be done,” said Kari Tarnowski, Senior Vice President of Marketing for American Queen Steamboat Company and Victory Cruise Lines. “It is an exciting moment for our company and valued guests as we grow together with a mutual desire to discover new destinations and rediscover those places special to us once again.”
Among the 2023 voyages, the American Queen will sail Lower Mississippi route with 28 departures between Memphis and New Orleans. She will also sail a Thanksgiving from Memphis to New Orleans and three New Orleans roundtrips over the December holiday season.
The American Countess, the newest edition to the American Queen Steamboat Company fleet, will offer a fall Mighty Mississippi voyage from St. Paul to New Orleans in Sept. and churns up and down the Ohio, Cumberland and Tennessee rivers throughout the 2023 season.
The American Duchess will showcase the Ohio River with six sailings between Louisville and the line’s eastern most point of Pittsburgh.
In the Pacific Northwest, the American Empress will begin her season March 23 and sail nine-day, one-way voyages between Portland (Vancouver, WA) and Spokane (Clarkston) through Nov. 26, 2023
Victory will debut the Ocean Discoverer with a repositioning voyage from Puerto Caldera to San Diego departing May 12, 2023 followed by a season of 11- and 12-day adventures between Sitka and Vancouver or Sitka and Seattle. The Ocean Victory will operate between Vancouver and Sitka throughout the summer with repositioning sailings to bookend the season between Puerto Caldera and San Diego.
The Victory I and Victory II will sail 11- to 16-day voyages embarking in ports such as Chicago’s Navy Pier, downtown Toronto, Detroit and Montreal; and visiting ports such as Marquette, Mackinaw Island and Soo Locks/Sault Ste. Marie. The 202-guest vessels will also visit southern ports including Savannah, Charleston and Fernandina Beach and Victory II will trek as far south as Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula for roundtrip sailings from Cozumel.
