It was such a pleasure to return to sailing with American Cruise Lines! From the minute you arrive, the staff and crew make you feel so welcomed and SPECIAL and you truly are considered honored guests.

In November, my husband and I decided to try an ocean cruise, again. It had been awhile. American Cruise Line has spoiled me. Regardless of the elaborate productions, the specialty restaurants and activities, one thought kept recurring. I MISS THE INTIMACY OF AMERICAN CRUISE LINE.

I understand WHY. With open seating you have the opportunity to meet so many fascinating people and hear their stories. With only 140 passengers onboard, I recognized almost everyone from an excursion or the dining room or as an audience member for the evening entertainment.

The arts and crafts classes became a (mostly) women's club and a chance to create with our "new best friends."

The Melody's entertainment was curated from local musicians, singers - and a fabulous local Southern comedian, Judy Whitney Davis who "uses a blend of storytelling, song and homespun humor to tell her stories of life along the Mighty Mississippi.

With names like CAJUN COUNTY EXPERIENCE, THE BANJOCATS, and THE SOLE SHAKERS you knew the music was authentic to the area.

The onboard entertainer, Steve Merritt, was fabulous. An accomplished pianist, he started working at Tokyo Disneyland in the late 80's and even performed on their first cruise voyages. American Cruise Line struck gold with this entertainer - he can play all genres of music and has a great ragtime special event program.

By the end of the cruise, after touring the antebellum mansions, battlefields, cemeteries, city tours and museums, you definitely felt like you immersed yourself in the southern culture and experience.

The food was amazing - it features al ot of local flavors and specialties while always giving less adventurous eaters choices that they can enjoy.

In addition to the dining room selections, we had the option of enjoying a COCHON DE LAIT (a southern pig roast) while sitting by the water.

Each afternoon, Jim Schweickart gave a 45 minute talk of interesting subjects relating to the Mighty Mississippi - from the fascinating story of the first steamboat to travel from Pittsburgh to the Mississippi (THE NEW ORLEANS) to "Taming the Waters: the Army Corp of Engineers long running battle to keep "old man river right where it is."

The service and experience was excellent, but at the end of the day, it is how the vacation made you FEEL that is what you remember long after you work off the extra calories and forget alot of the facts.

My FEELING is that I cannot wait to CRUISE AGAIN!

I would give American Cruise Lines 0 stars if I could. I was offered a position as a server back in July and trained in Salt Lake City last week. I followed their contract (I didn't drink or use drugs and I didn't smoke) and did above average in training. This training was much more like a military bootcamp than anything else. We barely had time to sleep and were not given any breaks to use the restroom or hydrate.

During the training week, a group of people in training decided to drink in the hot tub at the hotel. I stayed in my room the whole time, as I had no desire to get into trouble. My roommate decided to snitch on some of the people drinking by the pool, and on the final day of training we were ALL interrogated.

One at a time, the trainers accused us all of drinking in some pathetic attempt at playing good cop, bad cop. As I have bad c-ptsd, being interrogated like that when I had done NOTHING wrong was quite triggering and highly inappropriate.

I was told a few days later that I had "failed training" and would not get a position…even though I did above average in training and they had already promised me a position. I asked how I "failed" and they couldn't give me a straight answer. I suspect discrimination or misinterpretation of my reaction to their interrogation because of my disability.

How is it okay to tell people they have a position, get them to quit their current jobs or turn down other job offers, make them drop a ton of money getting prepared for a position (on undershirts, hair products, suitcases, watches, luggage fees, and more) then suddenly be like "jk, you don't actually have a position"?!?

I'm sharing my horrible experience so people maybe think twice before cruising with American Cruise Lines. American tells its crew they pay them really well…but the truth is the hourly rate is ridiculously low. Servers get $4 below minimum wage, which is unacceptable given they don't receive tips. The crew only makes a decent amount because they are worked like slaves. I'm not sure in what world working 110+ hours a week and never getting a day off is acceptable (or legal). It's also pretty obvious that American Cruise Lines' voyages are overpriced for what guests are actually getting out of their packages.

It's too bad this company isn't better run because this COULD be a very positive experience for guests AND crew members. I'd stick with American Queen Voyages, Un Cruise Adventures, or Viking if you're looking to do a river cruise in America. American Cruise Lines is much more concerned with profits than people, and I wish I had known this before wasting so much time, money, and energy.

If you expect any kind of normal cruise experience don't waste you money. We have been all over the world on seas, rivers, canals, bays and the like. This was a Puget Sound trip in WA. We found them to be so disorganized it would be hard to overstate it. The food was spotty at best, from mediocre to pretty good. Nothing was memorable. Their cooking was same. Some days undercooked and others over done. Eggs Benedict were so runny we never ordered again. Many advertised food items on daily menus were unavailable. Every day is a new menu and you list preferences for all day at breakfast. Then find out they did not have it. Our in -room telephone never worked the entire trip despite two maintenance visits. Had a flashing red light indicating a message waiting but it was not true. We finally unplugged it to stop the light blinking all night in the dark room. TV went out day 3 of 11 and could not see ships forward cameras. A channel for the on board entertainment was useless as the picture was black and white with no sound available. No professional bar tenders. All drinks prepared by crew members who knew nothing about drink preparation. I had to give directions how to make common drinks which they appreciated. Ran out of hor'douvres every night at cocktail hour after the first 15 minutes. So served 3 kinds of stale peanuts and small bits of cheese or salami. Guest lecturer had no idea about what areas we were to visit next. Did not know what a "Sound" was on our "Puget Sound" trip. Ships office unavailable in person between 9 am and 7:30 pm. Open four hours of 24. With no phone or other way to contact them. No room service menus ever left. Did not order enough buses for disembarkation to airport so 7 people and luggage could not get on. Excursions Director had not been to some of the cities and had no clue what to visit or see in those. The staff was nice and tried to do their jobs but were not well trained. The wait staff were all young and often did not know what the daily menu items meant if they were not a standard item. I had one waitress who did not know answers go take pictures of the food so I could chose my meal. They ran out of advertised items on the very slim menu every night so we ordered dessert with our dinner order to be sure to get our choice. One night told us had no lemon meringue pie from the menu and another night had no key lime pie. These were both the only select item that night other than ice creams. Had 7 choices of ice cream but after two days only had 3 left, Vanilla, Chocolate or Stawberry. Not replenished for at least several days. I ordered bread with dinner one night and the waitress said they were out of it. The Cruise Director was a young woman promoted the 2nd or 3rd day on the cruise from a ships office position. Nice but way over her head. Her replacement in the ships office was a young man who had never been in that office before. She told us to be "patient" with him as he basically was learning on the job. Wi Fi was useless most of the time so we got on our phones off the ship with roaming. It was basically a daily joke among many of the passengers as to what ACL could screw up the next day.

Our trip was on Sept. 15 through 25 to Grand Puget Sound with booking #******* if you have any question about the authenticity of this review.