2026 American Patriot Great Lakes Cruise This two-week cruise on the Great Lakes was a fantastic trip that I completely enjoyed

For the last five years, I've been collaborating with American Cruise Lines.  They invite me aboard for a cruise on one of their ships, and I make YouTube videos about the experience.  It's great publicity for the cruise line, and it gives me a chance to travel all around the USA, as well as provides good content for my YouTube channel.  A win for both me and the cruise line!

This 2026 Great Lakes cruise was our 14th collaboration.  That should give you a pretty good idea about how pleased I am with the arrangement, and how pleased the cruise line is with it.  You don't do 14 variations of the same thing unless it's really working well!

I'm financially comfortable in retirement, thanks to the great union job I held for 28 years in California...  but I definitely am not affluent enough to travel at my expense as much as I would like to.  So, being sent all around the country at the cruise line's expense is just an ideal situation for me.  I would never pay to go to Niagara Falls, for example...  but I loved being able to go there as part of my Great Lakes cruise with ACL.

I could basically say the same thing about every city I visited during this two-week cruise.  Buffalo, New York.  Toledo, Ohio.  Detroit, Michigan.  Sault Ste Marie.  Mackinac Island.  Muskegon, Michigan.  Holland, Michigan.  Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  Those aren't places I would have paid to go on vacation...  but I loved getting to know each and every one of those places while creating videos on my Great Lakes cruise.

Buffalo, New York

Detroit, Michigan

A lot of my best photos are shot from a drone.  The drone shoots photos with a much more interesting perspective than a regular camera at ground level can.

Muskegon, Michigan

Video Highlights

Still photos are great, but videos are so much better!  If you have time to sit down and watch a 35-minute travel video, this video will show you all the highlights of this two-week Great Lakes cruise.  I recommend that you watch this video full-screen, to best enjoy the big scenic views.  And if you have a high-speed Internet connection, you might also want to double-check that the video player is set to show them to you in 1080p resolution.

To start the video playing, click the triangle in the middle of the video screen
To make the video fill the screen (recommended) click the little symbol in the lower right corner of the video player

 

Need A Travel Agent?

Booking a cruise can be confusing, especially if you haven't been on many cruises before.  There are lots of first-time cruiser mistakes that a travel agent can keep you from making.

If you're interested in booking a cruise with any cruise line...  please feel free to use the services of my travel agent, Caitlin Gallagher.  She's extremely pleasant to deal with, easy to talk to since she lives in the United States and speaks without any kind of an accent, and quite experienced and knowledgeable about different types of cruising.  Caitlin is the owner of Ambren Travel.  Visit her web site, check out the Ambren Travel Facebook page, or contact her using the information below.

The Cruise Ships We've Been On

If you've enjoyed this page, you would probably also enjoy reading the stories about some of the other cruise ships I've traveled on.  Click here to see the complete chronology of all the cruises we've ever taken, and to read the full story of any that look interesting to you.

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