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The Kentucky Derby Cruise
The back story on my vacation goes to 2019, when I was browsing through the Road Scholar catalogue and saw a Spring 2020 program involving the Kentucky Derby The itinerary included visits to horse farms and other behind the scenes things before the race, followed by the Derby itself. I signed up for it - and, well, you all know about 2020. Anyway, they decided not to do it later on, so I used the credit from the cancelled program to go to Costa Rica late last year. But I had gotten the idea of going to the Kentucky Derby into my head.
I tend to browse travel-related websites a lot and I had been curious about Mississippi River paddlewheel boat cruises for a while. When I was looking at the website for American Queen Voyages, I saw that they had a Kentucky Derby cruise on the American Countess, which is a former gambling boat converted to a fairly luxurious steamboat for river cruises. I called up and the 2022 cruise was already sold out. But by booking early I got a slightly less outrageous price on the 2023 cruise. I should note that the Derby package is actually an add-on to the cruise, so the whole thing is absurdly expensive. But, hey, big event and an excuse to wear an outrageous hat - well, why not?
Monday, 1 May: What this meant was that on Monday May 1st, I flew to Louisville, Kentucky. I’d been to Louisville before (notably to go to the Louisville Slugger Factory / Museum) so, after settling in at the Brown Hotel (historic fancy hotel, included in the cost of the cruise), all I really did was take a long walk around downtown Louisville and gawk at the price tags on various Derby hats for sale. Since I am a compulsive reader of historic signs, so I also decided to followed the signs marking sit-in demonstration sites of the 1960’s civil rights movement.
Back at the hotel, I found the check-in table and got my stateroom key and tickets for pre-booked excursions.
Tuesday, 2 May: The original plan for Tuesday had been a “premium” excursion (i.e. one at an extra price) that was supposed to be a “behind the scenes at Churchill Downs” event. A couple of weeks before the cruise, they sent an email that said that, due to the Derby that would be replaced with an excursion to Keeneland to show how Lexington, Kentucky prepares for the Derby. I’d actually been to Keeneland for brunch once (not a particularly interesting story - it was part of a Flyertalk weekend event, that was most notable for bourbon tasting at Woodford Reserve), but I figured I didn’t have anything better to do, so decided to go on that excursion. It was, frankly, not really worth doing. It’s a long drive from Louisville and we had only about 45 minutes at Keeneland. We did see the famous sycamore tree at the entrance to the walking ring.
We also walked to the track and the barns, where we saw a couple of actual horses.
But some of the people in the group were mobility impaired and that meant we didn’t have enough time to see things like where the jockeys weigh in. The only jockeys we saw were in the form of the statues of winning jockeys from last year. Then it was a long bus ride to Claudia Sanders Dinner House. (She was the wife of Colonel Sanders of KFC fame.) We were supposed to have lunch at 1:15 p.m., but it was after 2 by the time we got there, so everyone was pretty grumpy. The buffet was just okay, in my opinion, with the best thing being the corn pudding. There was also a lot of confusion bout whether or not beer or wine were included with the meal and, by the time that got resolved, almost nobody was still interested in it. Back on the bus, the guide handed out derby pie (walnut pie with chocolate chips), which I saved to have for a late night snack. Eventually, We got back to Louisville and boarded the American Countess.
I had an inside cabin, which was cozy but comfortable enough. There was a brief muster drill (basically, stand outside your cabin with your life vest until they check that everyone put them on correctly) and then I unpacked. I was relieved that my hat survived my suitcase intact. There were two seatings for dinner and I had the later one. That meant that I got to see the daily show and hear the shore excursion briefing for the next day before dinner. The American Countess Show Band was pretty good. The first night, they introduced all of the officers and explained to us how the hop-on / hop-off buses at various ports would work. In short, the morning buses should run every 20 minutes with a guide, while the afternoon buses would be every half hour, allegedly with recorded commentary. (The only time I took an afternoon bus, there was no commentary, however.) You needed to get a ticket for the time of your choice for the earlier buses, but that was never really a problem once we figured out how the kiosk for the tickets worked.
I’d say that my table companions for dinner were just okay - two couples who didn’t seem to have anything much to say for themselves and another single woman who switched tables after the first night and was replaced by a woman who seemed a bit dull. (To be fair, she hinted at having some medical issues.) The food was pretty good, with a reasonable variety of choices.
Wednesday 3 May: We remained in Louisville on Wednesday, with a hop-on / hop-off tour offered. There was also a Derby related festival (called Fest-a-Ville) which we got Pegasus pins for admission to. Since I didn’t recognize any of the musicians who were playing at it, I pretty much ignored that. I got off the bus at the third stop. which was the Mark Payton Glass Center. while there is a window overlooking the hot shop, allowing you to see people at work on making glass items, this is mostly a place for shopping. Since I am a lover of art glass, I did succumb to temptation and bought a couple of items.
I then walked over to the Frazier History Center (which was actually the second stop on the bus, but just a few blocks). Admission was included. The museum was excellent. The third floor has a lot of material on the Lewis and Clark expedition, but I was more interested in the exhibit on bourbon, which was interesting even to this rum drinker. It includes a collection that includes a bottle of every bourbon currently bottled in Kentucky. Here’s a small sample:
The second floor has a collection of “miniatures,” which seemed to be almost entirely model soldiers and horses. The ground floor had an exhibit about Kentucky sports and an excellent film about the state. I spent over 2 hours there and could easily have spent another hour.
After a stop for lunch, I went on to KMAC, which is a contemporary art museum. I particularly liked this quilt, which depicts Edmund Halley and a lot of dinosaurs.
There were also some interesting felted wool soft sculptures.
After that, I went back to the boat, because I wanted to hear the River Chat at 3 p.m. The “Riverlorian” did several of these chats throughout the trip, all of which were interesting. This one talked about things like channel markers and buoys, how they tie up the boat, going through locks, and tow boats which haul barges (and actually push them, rather than pulling. The term comes from the use of the word “tow” to refer to a shipment of goods. During the course of the trip, we saw some with as many as 16 barges, if I recall correctly.)
The big event of the rest of the day was the Great Steamboat Race, which is the slowest race imaginable, as the boats move about 2 miles per hour. (The normal cruising speed for the American Countess is 6-7 mph upstream and up to 14 mph downstream.) The two boats competing against us were the Belle of Louisville and the Belle of Cincinnati, both of which are local steamboats used for short river tours. The whole thing is rigged, since the Governor of Kentucky rides on the Belle of Louisville, which always wins the race. Frankly, the best part of the whole thing was that the band was playing fun music for it.
After a review of the next day’s shore excursion, there was dinner. I skipped the “Disco Derby Dance Party,” because it’s bad enough that I lived through the disco era.
Thursday 4 May: We left Louisville about 9 p.m. on Wednesday and arrived in Madison, Indiana early in the morning. This is a cute town. There was, again, a hop-on / hop-off bus. The Schroeder Saddletree Factory is supposedly one of the top attractions, but my interest in saddletrees (the wooden frames for saddles) and machinery used for making them and other wooden things, e.g. clothespins, is minimal, so I skipped that. I got off at Stop 4, which was the History Center and Railroad Museum. The latter was small and not particularly exciting, but the History Center was excellent. I am a fan of small town history museums in general and this one had lots of items of interest, ranging from a display of pearl buttons (made from mussel shells from the local rivers) to the history of a nearby proving ground to an exhibit about a railroad incline to the first integrated college in the area to the major flood of 1937, etc. There’s another room where there was a temporary exhibit called “The Art of the Dress.” I spent a couple of hours at the museum before walking over to the Madison Visitor Center where I picked up a walking tour booklet for the Westside of Madison and another booklet about local stained glass. I sort of combined the two, but found the stained glass one not particularly interesting after the first couple. In general, the historic district of Madison is quite well-preserved. Here, for example, is the Schofield House, a Federal style house (originally a tavern and rooming house) from 1817.
The most significant landmark is the Broadway Fountain, which is similar to the fountain in the cemetery in Savannah, Georgia that you can see on the cover of the book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
Beyond that, there is a lot of shopping available on Main Street. Google had suggested that there was a yarn store, but it appeared to have closed. In general, I’d say that the local shops specialized in things nobody needs, e.g. candy and antiques. I returned to the boat for lunch. I ended up eating with a couple from San Jose and discovered that the wife is also interested in Lithuanian Jewish genealogy, which made for an interesting conversation. Later in the afternoon, there was a presentation about future cruises, with a discount offer for anyone who chose to sign up on-board. The only thing I was particularly interested in was a Canadian itinerary that they won’t be doing in 2024. The evening show was by a bluegrass group called “Storefront Congregation,” which was very enjoyable.
Friday 5 May: We docked in Brandenburg, Kentucky, where there was an included tour called “An American Leader: The Life and Presidency of Abraham Lincoln” for which you chose either the morning or afternoon tour. I chose the morning tour. It was roughly an hour drive to Hodgenville, Kentucky, where we went to the Lincoln Museum. The museum’s a lot of life-size dioramas and wax figures, as well as things like campaign posters and quilts. But, first, we had a talk from a guy dressed as Lincoln, who finished his speech by reciting the Gettysburg address. We each got a picture with him, too.
There was also time to walk over to Lincoln Square where there are two statues of Lincoln - one of him as president and one of him as a child.
Then we continued to the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park, where s symbolic log cabin is preserved inside a memorial building.
You can either climb up a lot of stairs or follow an accessible switchback path through the woods to get to the building. A key point is that for the time and place, Lincoln’s family was not particularly poor but was essentially middle class. You could also walk down to Sinking Spring, where the Lincoln family got their water. All in all, it was an interesting excursion.
Back on board, we had lunch, followed by a talk by Mark Klein about the Kentucky Derby, mixed with his comedy routine about Kentucky, in general. After that, we had an orientation about our Derby package, followed by getting our tickets.
The evening show was Patrick Treadway’s “An Evening With Mark Twain,” which was very entertaining. Dinner was less entertaining. It was Cinco de Mayo, so you’d think they’d have something with some hint of Mexican flavor. Instead, there was the usual vaguely Southern sort of dishes. They did have a “classic margarita” as the cocktail of the day, but it turned out to be the absolutely worst, sickly sweet margarita I’ve ever had in my life.
Saturday 6 May: We’d arrived back in Louisville overnight. There were five buses to take us to Churchill Downs. On the way there, we were assigned to buses, but were told that we’d just get on whichever one was next for the way back to the boat at the end of the day. The buses would park in the Turquoise Lot and it was supposed to be about a half mile walk to our seats in the grandstand, during which we’d be accompanied by escorts with red paddles and red shirts. As far as I could tell, the escorts disappeared somewhere around the gate into the actual racetrack. The signage was not particularly good and I am not sure whether we chose a particularly indirect path, but it turned out to be more like a mile and a half to our seats. This wasn’t a problem for me, but the average age of people on the boat was probably about 80 and there were a lot of people who were mobility impaired. And, while our seats were near the final turn (as advertised) they were in the last few rows, which meant that our views were obstructed by other people, many of whom were standing and holding up cell phones much of the time. The only horse photo I managed to get was of this group from a girls' school parading around the track between races.
We also had access to the Affirmed Lounge, which is in the Kentucky Derby Museum. We were told that this would have a wonderful buffet, but there was not much variety and things were spread out over two floors, with inadequate seating at tables. The food was okay, but hardly as luxurious as we had been told. I had the obligatory mint julep, which was pretty good, but did not come in the commemorative glass that we’d been told it would.
But what about the race(s) you ask? The Derby itself is the 12th race of 14. Did I happen to mention that I had never actually been to a horse race before? My parents used to go to the races every now and then and, while my Dad tried to be all scientific about picking his horses, my Mom chose the ones whose names she liked. She inevitably did better than him. At any rate, as I probably have said before in a different context, I believe that gambling is entertainment. I decide how much money I am willing to spend and confine myself to that for betting. So I decided I could bet on two horses in the Derby and one in another race. There was a horse in the 9th race named Anglophile and I figured that I should bet on him since it was Coronation Day. So much for Mom’s strategy. But I’d already applied the “I like that name” technique to bet on Confidence Game and Hit Show in the Derby, neither of whom did anything notable.
We got conflicting directions on what to do after the race, with one of the escorts telling us to stay in our seats for a while. I gave up and went downstairs, where I immediately saw two of the escorts halfheartedly holding up their red paddles. There was a big enough group that we eventually persuaded one of them we should head to the buses. I think we took an even longer and more convoluted way to get out. I got on the second bus, which was good since just after that bus loaded there was a torrential downpour. The fiasco wasn’t over yet, however. Aside from it taking over an hour to get out of the parking lot, the driver got lost on his way back to the boat and ended up driving over the bridge to Indiana! He did drive back to Louisville and then drove around in circles for a while before figuring out how to get back. Since there were several members of the American Countess staff at the Derby, they should really have had at least one on each bus.
I am still glad I got to go to the Kentucky Derby, but this was definitely not what I expected given how expensive the Derby package was. (It was not included in the cruise price, though I think only about 20 passengers didn’t go.) At least I got to dress the part for the day. And the people watching was fabulous.
Note that the plant here was not part of my outfit.
But it’s really all about the hat. I started with a $10 hat from Target and glued on feathers and butterflies. I think it was pretty successful.
Sunday 7 May: Sunday was a relaxing day. There were various activities available on board, but the only ones I went to were Patrick Treadway’s Q&A session as Mark Twain and the chat by the Riverlorian, which featured several interesting stories about steamboat races and great disasters (e.g. the explosion of the Sultana, which killed over 1,100 people in the worst maritime disaster in U.S. history). I was particularly amused by the description of Army Quartermaster Reuben Hatch as "so crooked he could hide behind a spiral staircase.” I found the prospect of bingo and of a demonstration of how to cook biscuits far less appealing, so spent much of the day reading, with laps around the deck to keep me from turning into a total slug. The evening show was “Country in Concert,” which was better than I expected.
Monday 8 May: We arrived in Augusta, Kentucky early Monday morning. This is a cute little town and, while there was a hop-on / hop-off bus available, everything I was interested in was in easy walking distance from the boat. (There were a bourbon distillery and a winery that were further away). Augusta is a picturesque little town, but what it is most famous for is the Rosemary Clooney House, a museum dedicated to the actress / singer who lived there.
There are rooms full of memorabilia and a lot of costumes, including a room dedicated to the movie “White Christmas.”
Rosemary’s nephew, George Clooney, has a house in Augusta, but was not there when we were. I did, however, meet his mother, who owns a store on Main Street, which is a block where most of the stores sell things that nobody things, though I did notice a bank and a tractor store. (I often need money, but have yet to need a tractor, for what it’s worth.)
The other major attraction is the 1811 Jail, which is the oldest jail in the state of Kentucky that still has its original foundation. I was able to escape from the cell, since someone handed me the jailer’s keys.
I went back to the boat for lunch, followed by watching their showing of the movie “Where the Crawdads Sing.” There was a final Riverlorian talk, which was focused on flood control and what a big mistake it was to rely on levees for over a 100 years.
The evening show was “Only the Good,” which featured the songs of Billy Joel and Elton John. This was just okay, largely because they managed to play every Elton John song I hate (such as “Benny and the Jets” and something sappy from “The Lion King”) and none of his songs that I like like “Crocodile Rock.” They did better with Billy Joel.
Tuesday 9 May: There had been three options for the final day of the trip. You could get a bus straight to the airport, a bus to a hotel to stay on in Cincinnati, or you could do what I did and take a morning tour of Cincinnati, which would then drop you off at the airport. I’d been to Cincinnati before, but all I’d done was walk around downtown a little and go to a baseball game.
The tour took us first to the William Howard Taft historic site, the house in the Mount Auburn neighborhood where he grew up. Unfortunately, we had only about 45 minutes there. That was enough time to see the exhibits in the house, which were reasonably informative. For example, I hadn’t known that Taft had been Governor General of the Philippines for a few years, before returning to the U.S. to become Secretary of War. Overall, my opinion of him is that he was a good administrator, which is not necessarily a useful trait for a President (but may have been useful later on, when he became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court). There was not, alas, enough time to see all of the film about Taft’s life at the visitor center. Nor were we able to get photos with the man who plays the role of Taft at the visitor center.
The tour bus drove around Eden Park, which is reasonably attractive, and then meandered somewhat pointlessly around downtown. Eventually we continued across the river to Covington, Kentucky, which I’d been to previously for a conference. After driving through the historic district, we went to the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption, which the guide claimed has the largest stained glass windows in the world. Thirty seconds of google says that it is just the largest stained glass windows with the image of Mary. Still, the cathedral had a lot of attractive stained glass and some interesting mosaics, so was worth the 15 minutes or so we spent there.
And then it was a short way to the airport and my flight home.
To summarize, the American Countess was comfortable enough and the trip was mostly relaxing. The food wasn’t particularly exciting, but there was a decent variety (e.g. there were always vegetarian options for each course). Alcohol was included, but the bartender was terrible and the couple of times I tried the special drink of the day I was disappointed with excessive doses of simple syrup, so I mostly stuck to a glass of wine with dinner. The included excursions (e.g. the hop-on / hop-off bus tours) were good, with enough time to explore a few cute little towns. The premium excursions, however, were not good value. And, in particular, both the Keeneland tour and (especially) the Derby package were fiascos.
There’s a part of me that would still like to do a paddlewheeler down the Mississippi, but I would probably look into doing so on American Cruse Lines (which is the other company that does similar cruises) instead.
I tend to browse travel-related websites a lot and I had been curious about Mississippi River paddlewheel boat cruises for a while. When I was looking at the website for American Queen Voyages, I saw that they had a Kentucky Derby cruise on the American Countess, which is a former gambling boat converted to a fairly luxurious steamboat for river cruises. I called up and the 2022 cruise was already sold out. But by booking early I got a slightly less outrageous price on the 2023 cruise. I should note that the Derby package is actually an add-on to the cruise, so the whole thing is absurdly expensive. But, hey, big event and an excuse to wear an outrageous hat - well, why not?
Monday, 1 May: What this meant was that on Monday May 1st, I flew to Louisville, Kentucky. I’d been to Louisville before (notably to go to the Louisville Slugger Factory / Museum) so, after settling in at the Brown Hotel (historic fancy hotel, included in the cost of the cruise), all I really did was take a long walk around downtown Louisville and gawk at the price tags on various Derby hats for sale. Since I am a compulsive reader of historic signs, so I also decided to followed the signs marking sit-in demonstration sites of the 1960’s civil rights movement.
Back at the hotel, I found the check-in table and got my stateroom key and tickets for pre-booked excursions.
Tuesday, 2 May: The original plan for Tuesday had been a “premium” excursion (i.e. one at an extra price) that was supposed to be a “behind the scenes at Churchill Downs” event. A couple of weeks before the cruise, they sent an email that said that, due to the Derby that would be replaced with an excursion to Keeneland to show how Lexington, Kentucky prepares for the Derby. I’d actually been to Keeneland for brunch once (not a particularly interesting story - it was part of a Flyertalk weekend event, that was most notable for bourbon tasting at Woodford Reserve), but I figured I didn’t have anything better to do, so decided to go on that excursion. It was, frankly, not really worth doing. It’s a long drive from Louisville and we had only about 45 minutes at Keeneland. We did see the famous sycamore tree at the entrance to the walking ring.
We also walked to the track and the barns, where we saw a couple of actual horses.
But some of the people in the group were mobility impaired and that meant we didn’t have enough time to see things like where the jockeys weigh in. The only jockeys we saw were in the form of the statues of winning jockeys from last year. Then it was a long bus ride to Claudia Sanders Dinner House. (She was the wife of Colonel Sanders of KFC fame.) We were supposed to have lunch at 1:15 p.m., but it was after 2 by the time we got there, so everyone was pretty grumpy. The buffet was just okay, in my opinion, with the best thing being the corn pudding. There was also a lot of confusion bout whether or not beer or wine were included with the meal and, by the time that got resolved, almost nobody was still interested in it. Back on the bus, the guide handed out derby pie (walnut pie with chocolate chips), which I saved to have for a late night snack. Eventually, We got back to Louisville and boarded the American Countess.
I had an inside cabin, which was cozy but comfortable enough. There was a brief muster drill (basically, stand outside your cabin with your life vest until they check that everyone put them on correctly) and then I unpacked. I was relieved that my hat survived my suitcase intact. There were two seatings for dinner and I had the later one. That meant that I got to see the daily show and hear the shore excursion briefing for the next day before dinner. The American Countess Show Band was pretty good. The first night, they introduced all of the officers and explained to us how the hop-on / hop-off buses at various ports would work. In short, the morning buses should run every 20 minutes with a guide, while the afternoon buses would be every half hour, allegedly with recorded commentary. (The only time I took an afternoon bus, there was no commentary, however.) You needed to get a ticket for the time of your choice for the earlier buses, but that was never really a problem once we figured out how the kiosk for the tickets worked.
I’d say that my table companions for dinner were just okay - two couples who didn’t seem to have anything much to say for themselves and another single woman who switched tables after the first night and was replaced by a woman who seemed a bit dull. (To be fair, she hinted at having some medical issues.) The food was pretty good, with a reasonable variety of choices.
Wednesday 3 May: We remained in Louisville on Wednesday, with a hop-on / hop-off tour offered. There was also a Derby related festival (called Fest-a-Ville) which we got Pegasus pins for admission to. Since I didn’t recognize any of the musicians who were playing at it, I pretty much ignored that. I got off the bus at the third stop. which was the Mark Payton Glass Center. while there is a window overlooking the hot shop, allowing you to see people at work on making glass items, this is mostly a place for shopping. Since I am a lover of art glass, I did succumb to temptation and bought a couple of items.
I then walked over to the Frazier History Center (which was actually the second stop on the bus, but just a few blocks). Admission was included. The museum was excellent. The third floor has a lot of material on the Lewis and Clark expedition, but I was more interested in the exhibit on bourbon, which was interesting even to this rum drinker. It includes a collection that includes a bottle of every bourbon currently bottled in Kentucky. Here’s a small sample:
The second floor has a collection of “miniatures,” which seemed to be almost entirely model soldiers and horses. The ground floor had an exhibit about Kentucky sports and an excellent film about the state. I spent over 2 hours there and could easily have spent another hour.
After a stop for lunch, I went on to KMAC, which is a contemporary art museum. I particularly liked this quilt, which depicts Edmund Halley and a lot of dinosaurs.
There were also some interesting felted wool soft sculptures.
After that, I went back to the boat, because I wanted to hear the River Chat at 3 p.m. The “Riverlorian” did several of these chats throughout the trip, all of which were interesting. This one talked about things like channel markers and buoys, how they tie up the boat, going through locks, and tow boats which haul barges (and actually push them, rather than pulling. The term comes from the use of the word “tow” to refer to a shipment of goods. During the course of the trip, we saw some with as many as 16 barges, if I recall correctly.)
The big event of the rest of the day was the Great Steamboat Race, which is the slowest race imaginable, as the boats move about 2 miles per hour. (The normal cruising speed for the American Countess is 6-7 mph upstream and up to 14 mph downstream.) The two boats competing against us were the Belle of Louisville and the Belle of Cincinnati, both of which are local steamboats used for short river tours. The whole thing is rigged, since the Governor of Kentucky rides on the Belle of Louisville, which always wins the race. Frankly, the best part of the whole thing was that the band was playing fun music for it.
After a review of the next day’s shore excursion, there was dinner. I skipped the “Disco Derby Dance Party,” because it’s bad enough that I lived through the disco era.
Thursday 4 May: We left Louisville about 9 p.m. on Wednesday and arrived in Madison, Indiana early in the morning. This is a cute town. There was, again, a hop-on / hop-off bus. The Schroeder Saddletree Factory is supposedly one of the top attractions, but my interest in saddletrees (the wooden frames for saddles) and machinery used for making them and other wooden things, e.g. clothespins, is minimal, so I skipped that. I got off at Stop 4, which was the History Center and Railroad Museum. The latter was small and not particularly exciting, but the History Center was excellent. I am a fan of small town history museums in general and this one had lots of items of interest, ranging from a display of pearl buttons (made from mussel shells from the local rivers) to the history of a nearby proving ground to an exhibit about a railroad incline to the first integrated college in the area to the major flood of 1937, etc. There’s another room where there was a temporary exhibit called “The Art of the Dress.” I spent a couple of hours at the museum before walking over to the Madison Visitor Center where I picked up a walking tour booklet for the Westside of Madison and another booklet about local stained glass. I sort of combined the two, but found the stained glass one not particularly interesting after the first couple. In general, the historic district of Madison is quite well-preserved. Here, for example, is the Schofield House, a Federal style house (originally a tavern and rooming house) from 1817.
The most significant landmark is the Broadway Fountain, which is similar to the fountain in the cemetery in Savannah, Georgia that you can see on the cover of the book Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil.
Beyond that, there is a lot of shopping available on Main Street. Google had suggested that there was a yarn store, but it appeared to have closed. In general, I’d say that the local shops specialized in things nobody needs, e.g. candy and antiques. I returned to the boat for lunch. I ended up eating with a couple from San Jose and discovered that the wife is also interested in Lithuanian Jewish genealogy, which made for an interesting conversation. Later in the afternoon, there was a presentation about future cruises, with a discount offer for anyone who chose to sign up on-board. The only thing I was particularly interested in was a Canadian itinerary that they won’t be doing in 2024. The evening show was by a bluegrass group called “Storefront Congregation,” which was very enjoyable.
Friday 5 May: We docked in Brandenburg, Kentucky, where there was an included tour called “An American Leader: The Life and Presidency of Abraham Lincoln” for which you chose either the morning or afternoon tour. I chose the morning tour. It was roughly an hour drive to Hodgenville, Kentucky, where we went to the Lincoln Museum. The museum’s a lot of life-size dioramas and wax figures, as well as things like campaign posters and quilts. But, first, we had a talk from a guy dressed as Lincoln, who finished his speech by reciting the Gettysburg address. We each got a picture with him, too.
There was also time to walk over to Lincoln Square where there are two statues of Lincoln - one of him as president and one of him as a child.
Then we continued to the Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park, where s symbolic log cabin is preserved inside a memorial building.
You can either climb up a lot of stairs or follow an accessible switchback path through the woods to get to the building. A key point is that for the time and place, Lincoln’s family was not particularly poor but was essentially middle class. You could also walk down to Sinking Spring, where the Lincoln family got their water. All in all, it was an interesting excursion.
Back on board, we had lunch, followed by a talk by Mark Klein about the Kentucky Derby, mixed with his comedy routine about Kentucky, in general. After that, we had an orientation about our Derby package, followed by getting our tickets.
The evening show was Patrick Treadway’s “An Evening With Mark Twain,” which was very entertaining. Dinner was less entertaining. It was Cinco de Mayo, so you’d think they’d have something with some hint of Mexican flavor. Instead, there was the usual vaguely Southern sort of dishes. They did have a “classic margarita” as the cocktail of the day, but it turned out to be the absolutely worst, sickly sweet margarita I’ve ever had in my life.
Saturday 6 May: We’d arrived back in Louisville overnight. There were five buses to take us to Churchill Downs. On the way there, we were assigned to buses, but were told that we’d just get on whichever one was next for the way back to the boat at the end of the day. The buses would park in the Turquoise Lot and it was supposed to be about a half mile walk to our seats in the grandstand, during which we’d be accompanied by escorts with red paddles and red shirts. As far as I could tell, the escorts disappeared somewhere around the gate into the actual racetrack. The signage was not particularly good and I am not sure whether we chose a particularly indirect path, but it turned out to be more like a mile and a half to our seats. This wasn’t a problem for me, but the average age of people on the boat was probably about 80 and there were a lot of people who were mobility impaired. And, while our seats were near the final turn (as advertised) they were in the last few rows, which meant that our views were obstructed by other people, many of whom were standing and holding up cell phones much of the time. The only horse photo I managed to get was of this group from a girls' school parading around the track between races.
We also had access to the Affirmed Lounge, which is in the Kentucky Derby Museum. We were told that this would have a wonderful buffet, but there was not much variety and things were spread out over two floors, with inadequate seating at tables. The food was okay, but hardly as luxurious as we had been told. I had the obligatory mint julep, which was pretty good, but did not come in the commemorative glass that we’d been told it would.
But what about the race(s) you ask? The Derby itself is the 12th race of 14. Did I happen to mention that I had never actually been to a horse race before? My parents used to go to the races every now and then and, while my Dad tried to be all scientific about picking his horses, my Mom chose the ones whose names she liked. She inevitably did better than him. At any rate, as I probably have said before in a different context, I believe that gambling is entertainment. I decide how much money I am willing to spend and confine myself to that for betting. So I decided I could bet on two horses in the Derby and one in another race. There was a horse in the 9th race named Anglophile and I figured that I should bet on him since it was Coronation Day. So much for Mom’s strategy. But I’d already applied the “I like that name” technique to bet on Confidence Game and Hit Show in the Derby, neither of whom did anything notable.
We got conflicting directions on what to do after the race, with one of the escorts telling us to stay in our seats for a while. I gave up and went downstairs, where I immediately saw two of the escorts halfheartedly holding up their red paddles. There was a big enough group that we eventually persuaded one of them we should head to the buses. I think we took an even longer and more convoluted way to get out. I got on the second bus, which was good since just after that bus loaded there was a torrential downpour. The fiasco wasn’t over yet, however. Aside from it taking over an hour to get out of the parking lot, the driver got lost on his way back to the boat and ended up driving over the bridge to Indiana! He did drive back to Louisville and then drove around in circles for a while before figuring out how to get back. Since there were several members of the American Countess staff at the Derby, they should really have had at least one on each bus.
I am still glad I got to go to the Kentucky Derby, but this was definitely not what I expected given how expensive the Derby package was. (It was not included in the cruise price, though I think only about 20 passengers didn’t go.) At least I got to dress the part for the day. And the people watching was fabulous.
Note that the plant here was not part of my outfit.
But it’s really all about the hat. I started with a $10 hat from Target and glued on feathers and butterflies. I think it was pretty successful.
Sunday 7 May: Sunday was a relaxing day. There were various activities available on board, but the only ones I went to were Patrick Treadway’s Q&A session as Mark Twain and the chat by the Riverlorian, which featured several interesting stories about steamboat races and great disasters (e.g. the explosion of the Sultana, which killed over 1,100 people in the worst maritime disaster in U.S. history). I was particularly amused by the description of Army Quartermaster Reuben Hatch as "so crooked he could hide behind a spiral staircase.” I found the prospect of bingo and of a demonstration of how to cook biscuits far less appealing, so spent much of the day reading, with laps around the deck to keep me from turning into a total slug. The evening show was “Country in Concert,” which was better than I expected.
Monday 8 May: We arrived in Augusta, Kentucky early Monday morning. This is a cute little town and, while there was a hop-on / hop-off bus available, everything I was interested in was in easy walking distance from the boat. (There were a bourbon distillery and a winery that were further away). Augusta is a picturesque little town, but what it is most famous for is the Rosemary Clooney House, a museum dedicated to the actress / singer who lived there.
There are rooms full of memorabilia and a lot of costumes, including a room dedicated to the movie “White Christmas.”
Rosemary’s nephew, George Clooney, has a house in Augusta, but was not there when we were. I did, however, meet his mother, who owns a store on Main Street, which is a block where most of the stores sell things that nobody things, though I did notice a bank and a tractor store. (I often need money, but have yet to need a tractor, for what it’s worth.)
The other major attraction is the 1811 Jail, which is the oldest jail in the state of Kentucky that still has its original foundation. I was able to escape from the cell, since someone handed me the jailer’s keys.
I went back to the boat for lunch, followed by watching their showing of the movie “Where the Crawdads Sing.” There was a final Riverlorian talk, which was focused on flood control and what a big mistake it was to rely on levees for over a 100 years.
The evening show was “Only the Good,” which featured the songs of Billy Joel and Elton John. This was just okay, largely because they managed to play every Elton John song I hate (such as “Benny and the Jets” and something sappy from “The Lion King”) and none of his songs that I like like “Crocodile Rock.” They did better with Billy Joel.
Tuesday 9 May: There had been three options for the final day of the trip. You could get a bus straight to the airport, a bus to a hotel to stay on in Cincinnati, or you could do what I did and take a morning tour of Cincinnati, which would then drop you off at the airport. I’d been to Cincinnati before, but all I’d done was walk around downtown a little and go to a baseball game.
The tour took us first to the William Howard Taft historic site, the house in the Mount Auburn neighborhood where he grew up. Unfortunately, we had only about 45 minutes there. That was enough time to see the exhibits in the house, which were reasonably informative. For example, I hadn’t known that Taft had been Governor General of the Philippines for a few years, before returning to the U.S. to become Secretary of War. Overall, my opinion of him is that he was a good administrator, which is not necessarily a useful trait for a President (but may have been useful later on, when he became Chief Justice of the Supreme Court). There was not, alas, enough time to see all of the film about Taft’s life at the visitor center. Nor were we able to get photos with the man who plays the role of Taft at the visitor center.
The tour bus drove around Eden Park, which is reasonably attractive, and then meandered somewhat pointlessly around downtown. Eventually we continued across the river to Covington, Kentucky, which I’d been to previously for a conference. After driving through the historic district, we went to the Cathedral Basilica of the Assumption, which the guide claimed has the largest stained glass windows in the world. Thirty seconds of google says that it is just the largest stained glass windows with the image of Mary. Still, the cathedral had a lot of attractive stained glass and some interesting mosaics, so was worth the 15 minutes or so we spent there.
And then it was a short way to the airport and my flight home.
To summarize, the American Countess was comfortable enough and the trip was mostly relaxing. The food wasn’t particularly exciting, but there was a decent variety (e.g. there were always vegetarian options for each course). Alcohol was included, but the bartender was terrible and the couple of times I tried the special drink of the day I was disappointed with excessive doses of simple syrup, so I mostly stuck to a glass of wine with dinner. The included excursions (e.g. the hop-on / hop-off bus tours) were good, with enough time to explore a few cute little towns. The premium excursions, however, were not good value. And, in particular, both the Keeneland tour and (especially) the Derby package were fiascos.
There’s a part of me that would still like to do a paddlewheeler down the Mississippi, but I would probably look into doing so on American Cruse Lines (which is the other company that does similar cruises) instead.
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