Could museum’s cruise-ship tours lead to future Toledo port calls?
TOLEDO, OH – When passengers from Victory Cruise Lines voyages on the Great Lakes visit the National Museum of the Great Lakes next year, they’ll reach Toledo by bus, not boat.
But leaders at the museum, Destination Toledo, and the Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority all believe the Detroit-based shore excursions can be a stepping-off point toward bringing passenger cruises to the city.
Victory Cruise Lines vessels are scheduled to stop in Detroit 34 times during that company’s Great Lakes cruising season in 2025, said Kate Fineske, the local museum’s executive director.
Providing Victory passengers with an option to visit the museum as a shore excursion from Detroit “takes a step forward to getting more folks to discover beautiful Toledo by giving cruise passengers whose itinerary includes a Detroit stop an exclusive opportunity to visit the National Museum of the Great Lakes,” Ms. Fineske said.
“We are excited to showcase our community in hopes it is a first step toward cruise ships coming to Toledo,” she said. The excursions will effectively be “one big site visit of our downtown, highlighting our unique relationship with the Great Lakes, and we are putting our best foot forward.”
Victory’s onboard LakeLorian programming for its customers is expected to stoke interest in Great Lakes history. As part of its agreement with the cruise line, the Toledo museum will provide onboard history lecture support for a historian on the ships, onboard temporary exhibits, “and other ways to authentically share Great Lakes history with cruise passengers,” Ms. Fineske said.
Destination Toledo, a nonprofit arm of the Toledo Area Chamber of Commerce promoting local tourism and conventions, is paying for the buses to get Victory’s passengers from Detroit to Toledo.
Lance Woodworth, that agency’s president and chief executive officer, said the shore excursion can be the start of creating “a groundswell of interest and positive feedback” about Toledo.
While he said he couldn’t predict how far out Toledo’s earliest opportunity for a cruise call might be, Mr. Woodworth said the effort to attract one has to get going for that to ever happen.
“The best time to plant a tree is 20 years ago, but the next best time is today,” he said. “This will start getting some of these passengers that are on these boats into our town.”
The next port call by a cruise ship would be Toledo’s first since the late 1990s, when the M/V Nantucket Clipper paid several visits and the M/V C. Columbus made a single appearance to pick up a boatload of German tourists at the start of a Great Lakes itinerary.
But after the Nantucket Clipper was delayed 45 minutes at the CSX Transportation railroad bridge in the Maumee River during a visit, its tours the following year skipped Toledo, and Clipper Cruise Line did not repeat its ship’s visit, either.
Port officials said at the time that the operational uncertainty created by Toledo’s railroad bridges were among several factors that worked against it in attracting relatively limited cruise opportunities. Another was the relative difficulty in adding a Toledo side trip to voyages crossing Lake Erie, as the Toledo Harbor Channel is a multihour journey in each direction to get to the main ship route in the northwestern part of the lake.
But Great Lakes cruising is expanding again, particularly since the decline of the coronavirus pandemic, and that may work in Toledo’s favor, said Joe Cappel, vice president of business development at the Toledo-Lucas County Port Authority.
“I do see it changing. Great Lakes cruising is starting to catch fire again,” Mr. Cappel said.
The cruise lines have a lot of repeat clientele, he said, and “they will be looking for diverse itineraries.” The museum’s initiative will let Toledo “get a foot in the door.”
“They’re starting to do smaller ports, like Muskegon, Michigan. To become part of the itinerary for any cruise line, it takes years of building relationships. We’re starting one,” Mr. Cappel said.
“We’re well positioned for [the role of] that boutique city,” Mr. Woodworth said. “Toledo is clean, safe, and walkable. We just need to be ready when that opportunity presents itself.”
Providing transportation from Detroit to Toledo for the museum tours, he said, was vital to Victory adding those tours to its offerings. “Without us stepping in to do that lift for them, they [the Toledo excursions] just weren’t going to work for them,” Mr. Woodworth said.
Among major considerations for future cruise-ship calls will be where such a vessel would dock. Mr. Cappel noted that both International Park and the dockface near Holcim Cement on Water Street both hosted such vessels in the past.
The museum building itself, meanwhile, was built mainly using federal funds directed toward ferry services and was designed to potentially handle cruises as well.
But after port officials’ efforts to incubate any ferry service there foundered, the museum concept was developed, and in 2014 the museum freighter S.S. Col. James M. Schoonmaker was moved from International Park to the wharf by the museum that might otherwise have been used by cruise ships.
Mr. Cappel said the port authority has a study pending of possible dock-wall improvements in front of International Park, and “there probably would be some dredging as well” if that location were to become the docking spot for cruise ships.
“We would have to work together on how to pay for it,” he said before noting that a cruise terminal also would need to have tour-bus access to support shore-tour transportation.
The LakeLorian presenters aboard the Victory vessels next cruising season will be Victory employees trained by the National Museum of the Great Lakes to give presentations about the lakes’ history, science, and overall significance.
“Victory’s fleet will serve as floating extensions of our museum, delivering dynamic programming to travelers and creating a unique learning experience both on the waters of the Great Lakes and at the museum in Toledo,” Ms. Fineske said. “We look forward to sharing the science and stories of these extraordinary lakes.”
Two of the LakeLorian trainees came to Toledo last month, she said, while others will be trained online. “This is a great step in the right direction,” Ms. Fineske said. “People will get down here and really see what this community is about.”
DAVID PATCH – The Blade
Toledo museum celebrates the Christmas Tree Ship’s legacy
On November 23, 1912, the schooner Rouse Simmons sank while carrying Christmas trees. Known as the Christmas Tree Ship, its captain, Herman E. Schuenemann (a.k.a. “Captain Santa”), was known for giving trees to families in need.
The story of the ship’s history and captain is the inspiration behind the National Museum of the Great Lakes annual Community Giveback Event—The Christmas Tree Ship, presented by The University of Toledo Medical Center. Enjoy free museum admission all day long and make memories that last a lifetime! Watch Santa arrive at the museum’s dock aboard a Geo. Gradel Co. tugboat delivering a Christmas Tree into your hands or the hands of someone in need.
Community Giveback Day Itinerary
10 AM – 5 PM: Museum Admission Free All Day
11 AM: Enjoy the East Toledo Holiday Parade
1:15 PM: Watch the Ship’s Journey to the Museum via Livestream
1:30 PM: Santa Arrives to the Museum’s Docks
1:45 – 3:45 PM: Meet and Greet with Santa
Not able to join in person? Tune into our Facebook page around 1:15 p.m. for a livestream of the ship’s journey down the Maumee River. Get a tour of the Christmas Tree Ship, learn more about the story that inspired our event, and meet the individuals onboard, including Santa!
Read more here: https://nmgl.org/event/christmas-tree-ship24/
