American Cruise Lines making multiple stops in Portsmouth in 2024: What to expect

PORTSMOUTH — American Cruise Lines has confirmed it will be making four stops this summer and fall at the Market Street Terminal.

The cruise line company’s first stop at the Port of New Hampshire near downtown Portsmouth will arrive on July 8, according to Myles Greenway, the Pease Development Authority’s interim director of ports and harbors.

That will be followed by stops in the popular tourist city on July 22, Aug. 17 and Oct. 2, according to a memo from Greenway to the PDA’s Board of Directors.

“The vessels are expected to be docked from between 24 to 48 hours at each visit,” Greenway said.

American Cruise Lines, headquartered in Connecticut, operates 18 vessels along a variety of waterways nationwide, including Puget Sound, the Mississippi River and the Atlantic Ocean along the East Coast from Maine to Florida.

The stops in Portsmouth will be part of its Grand New England Cruise, which starts and ends in Boston, with other stops that include Portland, Maine, Gloucester and Provincetown, Massachusetts, and Newport, Rhode Island, according to the company’s website.

More visits to come

Alexa Paolella, the public relations manager for the company, said “American Cruise Lines is so pleased to be visiting Portsmouth in 2024 with our small U.S.-built ships.”

Their ships carry between “just 90-180 guests each,” she said. “We look forward to more visits in the years to come."

Eric Dussault, the director of port operations for American Cruise Lines, previously stated the company offers “small ship cruising.”

“When they hear about cruise ships, people get this notion of 4,000 people being dumped into a downtown,” he said. “That’s not us. We’re really a boutique experience.”

For someone who hasn’t experienced an American Cruise Lines cruise, he said there’s a strong focus on “customer service and attention to detail.”

“With only 100 guests on board, you really get to know the people,” he said.

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Reached Thursday, Portsmouth Mayor Deaglan McEachern noted there have been efforts to bring cruise ships to Portsmouth “for a long time.”

“It’s exciting to see this is actually coming to fruition,” McEachern said.

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He called the arrival of the American Cruise Line boats to the Market Street terminal, “a pretty big occurrence for Portsmouth.”

He noted that Portsmouth is a “port city with a working port," adding, “We’ve got a Clipper ship as a mascot.”

“We certainly want to celebrate them coming up,” McEachern said.

He pointed out that with all the historic city has to offer, “sometimes we fail to appreciate how beautiful Portsmouth is seeing it from the (Piscataqua) river.”

“That’s a special thing and it should be celebrated by our seaside community,” McEachern said.

In practical terms, having people come into Portsmouth to visit the city on a boat, means “we’ll have tourists here who don’t have cars,” he said. “So they won’t be taking up parking spots and that’s a win for the city."

He acknowledged “there’s always concerns when something new happens,” but he believes the scale of American Cruise Lines’ boats “seems to fit Portsmouth.”

“I think this is going to be a positive outcome for Portsmouth,” the mayor said.

Portsmouth pleased to be a destination

Ben VanCamp, the president of the Chamber Collaborative of Greater Portsmouth, believes the visits by American Cruise Lines “are going to be a pretty positive thing for our community.”

“American Cruise Lines is pretty selective,” when it comes to adding new stops, VanCamp said.

“It’s a compliment to our community they’ve chosen us,” he said. “The other stops along the New England coast are all great destinations.”

At the same time, he stated Portsmouth hosts groups of people coming into the city for events or conferences “all the time.”

“It’s 100 people coming to town. We do that several times a week,” he said, while adding, “We welcome them and we’re excited to have them here. There’s been a lot of interest in the business community.”

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VanCamp said he’s been in contact with American Cruise Line officials to suggest places for their guests to visit while in Portsmouth.

“American Cruise Lines has been great to work with, they’ve been communicating with us and the city,” VanCamp said.

The cruise line company is slated to transport its guests around the city on a “full-size bus,” he added, so chamber officials told them how to avoid tight turns on some of Portsmouth’s historic streets.

Cruise guests

American Cruise Lines guests come “from all over the country,” Dussault said in a previous interview.

“Typically our guests are folks who are older but have been well-traveled throughout their lives,” he said. “Now they want to stay closer to home and travel domestically.”

“It’s a mature, affluent clientele who comes on our cruises for the enrichment and entertainment,” Dussault said.

And they “enjoy when they come to a location that has such a vibrant downtown area, with shops and all types of restaurants,” he said.

This article originally appeared on Portsmouth Herald: American Cruise Lines stopping in Portsmouth NH in 2024