Valley Gem Sternwheeler

In 1788 a group of New England veterans of the Revolutionary War, organized as the Ohio Company of Associates, came down the Ohio River and founded Marietta at the mouth of the Muskingum. It was the first organized American settlement in the Northwest Territory, the enormous region north and west of the Ohio River that would be carved into Ohio and several other states.

The land the settlers arrived on was the ancestral homeland of the Shawnee, Lenape, Wyandot, and other Native nations, later forcibly removed from Ohio, whose descendant nations continue today, largely in Oklahoma. Marietta's founders laid out a town that still reads as a New England grid transplanted to the frontier, and even built earthwork mounds left by the ancient Adena and Hopewell cultures into their town plan. The rivers were the highway that made all of it possible, which is exactly what a sternwheeler cruise puts back at the center of the story.

For much of the 1800s the paddlewheel steamboat was the great engine of American river commerce. Boats driven by a wheel at the stern were well suited to the shallow, shifting western rivers, and they carried settlers, cargo, and mail along the Ohio and its tributaries, tying frontier towns like Marietta to the wider country. The rhythmic churn of the paddlewheel was the sound of the river age.

The Valley Gem carries on that tradition, a working sternwheeler that keeps the craft and the feel of river travel alive for modern visitors. Watching the wheel turn and the water fall away behind it, you get a direct sense of how people and goods once moved through this country before railroads and highways took over.

A cruise glides out from the Marietta dock onto the Ohio, the Muskingum, or both, giving passengers a slow, sweeping view of the town's historic riverfront and the confluence where the two rivers meet. The wooded Appalachian hills rise on either side, and the water reflects the changing sky, so even a familiar stretch of river looks new from the deck of the boat.

The pace is gentle and the mood relaxed, a chance to sit back and watch the shoreline slide by while learning something of the river history that shaped Marietta. Different cruises through the season offer different experiences, from simple sightseeing runs to themed and evening sailings out on the open water.

The sternwheeler operates on a warm-season schedule, so spring through fall is the time to catch a cruise. Spring can run high with river water and greening hills, a dramatic time on the rivers, though the season sometimes affects sailings. Summer is the fullest stretch, with warm evenings ideal for a cruise on the open water.

Fall is a highlight, when the wooded Appalachian hills along the rivers turn gold and red and the color reflects off the water. Once cold weather sets in the boat lays up for the season, so a river cruise here is very much a warm-weather pleasure. Since it runs on a calendar and depends on the weather, check the schedule before you go.

The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.