Delta Queen and modern cruise ships

Yes, I have one of the DQ passing the CONQUEST. I'll find it after church today.

In the Sunday, 27 January 2008 edition of the St Louis Post Dispatch, EXPLORE section was a rather interesting commentary by Travel Guru ARTHUR FROMMER. It is well worth the read. It might help to understand the Mind Set of AMIE/MAL.

The gist is that the Industry is going totally wacky with the 3000-4000 passenger cruise ships coming on the market. 20,000 new berths a week, a million a year with such attractions as Rock Climbing, Circus Training, Bungee Jumping and Clown Acts. One new vessel he comments on is on a new build ship Coasta Cruises (Carnival Corp) will bring on the market and introduce a class of "extra charge spa cabins"- a ship within a ship. Those who have access to that class will have access to their own spa restaurant, etc, etc. King features syndicate, 888 Seventh Ave. NY, NY, 10019 [email protected] .

Amen

Reserved For Crew Only

With respect to Capt. Blum's posting. All of the listed attractions use to be reserved for the crew on the D. Q. If you have ever tied off at Cario or Natchez at low water, rock climbing. Getting out of the top bunk in forward crew room #8 required circuis training (Steam pipe was about 18 inches above you). As slip in the wheel could lead to a Bungee Jumping experiance, even before it became popular.
As to the clown acts, I'm going to leave that one alone. Capt Dave Rainbolt often made refereance to the fact that with the crew on board, only a tent was missing.
These are the kind of memories that sometimes do not get shared on this board and yet made Steamboat'n an experiance like no other one will ever have.

Oh, Fred, you are SO right! Remeber the deckhand "Wabasha"? He was from that city, hence the nickname...I don't recall his real name. He bought a silly helmet that had a rotating red light on top - we sent him out on the bank to be the one to turn the headline loose, and at the appropriate moment when the Captain called to "Let the headline go!", "Waba" turned on that red rotating light and with great fanfare turned the line loose and dashed back to the stage to a round of applause where he took a bow before coming on deck. And the rock climbing, yes -- I still have a scar, in fact, on the heel of my left hand from falling on the rocks at Natchez. As Judy said, those were the days!

Beautiful, Fred! From the passenger standpoint, how about the saunas (Sundeck rooms in midsummer in St. Louis)? Or the thrill a minute wondering if your roommate would open the door as you sat on the toilet with the bathroom door open because your knees were in the bathroom doorway(can't remember which Sundeck room that was, maybe the old 313/314 which had been public bathrooms until 1974).

Behind the House Antics

Those stories you allude to are the ones we crew members share with each other, but wouldn't dare shock others who would be totally at a loss of words if they only knew the real story. The pilothouse was a hot bed of such stories told only when the hired help was around, but the moment someone else enter the door, especially bearing cameras and tape recorders, the place became as quiet as the French Quarter the morning after Mardi Gras.

A book could be written about the antics of Cheyenne C. Cheyenne, "where the middle-C stands for Cheyenne". See attachment: Cheyenne C. Cheyenne and Captain Gabe

Clifford Pottorf was another favorite from the early 1970's and was also featured in the film, Rabbit Hash - Center of the Universe.
http://www.rabbithashthemovie.com/cast.htm

http://groups.msn.com/WillieandBustersWhirlwindTouroftheWorld/moreriverrats.msnw?action=ShowPhoto&PhotoID=201

Conquest And Itty Bitty Dq

Here it is Franz. The DQ was just returning from the Mississippi Sound trip. I was on the roof of the NATCHEZ.

And is there some reason why the Mississippi is aquamarine? Or was this picture taken on the DQ trip to Nassau?

And let's not forget the spas located in the engine room and boiler room.

And how well I remember the crew of clowns I was in charge of whilst running as mate, including Ceyenne and his sidekick Half-Baked Alaska, among others. Quite frequently I would come on watch to find that my partner had hired, out of desperation, guys whom one would wonder how they even found the boat in the first place. And they would be on my watch. One genius got on in Cincinnati and was, in the space of time it took to get to Louisville, fired. Yeah, we really had some doozies from the bottom of the barrel of monkeys, in all departments. Way more than just a cruise.

It is about physics not conspiracy.

Lexie Palmore;9398 wrote: And is there some reason why the Mississippi is aquamarine? Or was this picture taken on the DQ trip to Nassau?

The river is not always brown. When the river has been low for a while it does clear up. On the OR, Tenn, Cumberland, and the UMR at pool stages they get get clear and can look some what blue. Bodies water look blue because of the way light refracts throught it. In the ocean salinity intesifies the effect. It is about physics not conspiracy.

Aquamarine Algiers Bend

In this case it was that my printer was low on some color of ink. I couldn't find the original, just that homemade copy, but at least it didn't change the sizes of the DQ and CONQUEST.

Great picture Judy!

Also, I always said that working on the boats was across between joining the circus and joining the military for someone like me.