Three evening sailings put a live jazz band, a Creole buffet and the city lights on the same two hours of river. This page compares them by boat, band, menu and price, using the ratings travellers actually left.
Three sailings, from $58 for the cruise alone to $190.50 for the VIP evening with the engine room tour. 7,730 traveller reviews between them, and free cancellation on every one.
Short answer
The Steamboat NATCHEZ evening cruise is the classic: a true steam sternwheeler, the Grammy-nominated Dukes of Dixieland in the dining room, and dinner as an optional add-on ($58 cruise-only, $107.50 with the buffet). The Creole Queen runs a quieter, roomier version from Spanish Plaza at $60. The VIP ticket on the NATCHEZ adds early boarding, front-row band seats and a private engine room tour, and its 4.8 rating is the highest on the river. All three board around 6pm and sail about two hours.
An evening on this river solves the usual New Orleans dinner problem: you want the food, the music and the views, but they usually live at three different addresses. The dinner boats stack them. The band plays through boarding and the first stretch downriver, the buffet line opens once you are underway, and the French Quarter turns its lights on somewhere around the turn at the Chalmette bend.
The three sailings are more different than their listings suggest. The NATCHEZ is the spectacle: real steam engines, a 25-ton wheel, and a boat that is itself the attraction. The Creole Queen is the comfortable one, with three private dining rooms and the largest indoor capacity on the river, which matters in August heat and sudden rain. And the VIP evening is the same NATCHEZ sailing with the friction removed: you board first, sit closest to the band, and go below to watch engines built in 1925 do their work.
Fares are the live from-prices per person; evening prices move with the date, so the listing is the authority.
Most reviewed in this category
The evening run on the last true steamboat working this stretch of the Mississippi. The Dukes of Dixieland play the dining room, the captain narrates the harbor, and the Creole dinner buffet is an add-on rather than an obligation. The skyline does its best work after dark.
The Creole Queen's night sailing from Spanish Plaza: a live jazz band, a lavish Creole buffet if you want it, and the working port sliding past in the dark. Three private dining rooms give it the largest indoor capacity on the river, which matters in July and in a downpour.
The upgrade nobody regrets: board early, take front-row seats for the band, eat the Louisiana buffet, and go below to watch 1925 steam engines actually driving the wheel. A champagne cocktail on arrival and an optional open bar round it out. The rating says it plainly: 4.8 from 893 travellers.
Read the meal column before the price column: the $58 and $60 fares are the cruise alone, and the buffet decides most of the real cost.
| Sailing | Boat | Band | Meal | From |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| NATCHEZ Evening Jazz Cruise | Steamboat NATCHEZ, true steam | Dukes of Dixieland, Grammy-nominated | Optional Creole buffet; $107.50 with dinner | $58.00 |
| Creole Queen Dinner Jazz Cruise | Paddlewheeler Creole Queen, 880 passengers | Live jazz band | Optional lavish Creole buffet | $60.00 |
| NATCHEZ VIP Jazz Dinner Cruise | Steamboat NATCHEZ, true steam | Dukes of Dixieland, front-row seating | Louisiana buffet included, champagne cocktail | $190.50 |
| Boarding | The NATCHEZ boards at 6:00pm at the Toulouse Street Wharf and sails at 7:00pm. The Creole Queen boards 30 minutes before departure at 1 Poydras Street by Spanish Plaza. Arrive for boarding, not for departure; the gangway does not wait. |
|---|---|
| Dress code | The operator's own wording: all cruises are casual attire, with dressy casual recommended for the dinner jazz cruise. Nobody needs a jacket; plenty of people wear one anyway. |
| The two wharves | Toulouse Street Wharf sits behind Jax Brewery in the French Quarter. The Creole Queen dock is a 10-minute walk downriver at Spanish Plaza, next to the Riverwalk. They are close but not the same place. |
| Dinner or no dinner | Both main boats sell the cruise alone, with the buffet as an add-on. The buffets are cooked on board and lean Creole: think gumbo, jambalaya and bread pudding rather than hotel banquet fare. |
| Drinks | Bars on every deck of the NATCHEZ, cash bar on the Creole Queen. Louisiana's drinking age is 21 and servers do check ID. |
| Weather | The boats sail rain or shine. Cruises are cancelled only when the Coast Guard calls severe weather on the river, in which case the operator arranges a dockside event or rebooking. |
Not by default on the two standard sailings. The NATCHEZ sells the evening cruise at $58 with the Creole dinner buffet as an option that brings it to $107.50; the Creole Queen works the same way from $60. The VIP sailing is the exception: its Louisiana buffet is part of the ticket.
The NATCHEZ evening slot belongs to the Dukes of Dixieland, a Grammy-nominated New Orleans institution, and they are a real reason travellers pick this boat. The Creole Queen carries a lively traditional jazz band that reviewers praise without naming. If the music is your priority, the NATCHEZ wins on pedigree.
About two hours on the water for both boats, plus boarding. The NATCHEZ boards at 6:00pm and sails 7:00pm to roughly 9:00pm. Listings that say three hours are counting the boarding hour, which is genuinely part of the evening: the calliope plays and the band is already going.
Casual, in the operator's own words, with dressy casual recommended for the dinner cruise. In practice the dining room runs from jeans to cocktail dresses and nobody is turned away for either. Flat shoes help on deck stairs.
Yes. Dining rooms are enclosed and air-conditioned, decks have covered sections, and the river itself stays calm; this is a sheltered stretch 100 miles upriver from the Gulf. Only a Coast Guard severe-weather call stops a sailing.
If the NATCHEZ itself is why you are booking, yes: early boarding, front-row band seats, the champagne cocktail, and above all the private engine room tour, which no standard ticket includes. Its 4.8 rating across 893 travellers is the highest of any sailing on this river. If you mainly want dinner and a view, the standard fare does that for a third of the price.
The same bands and buffets in daylight, at almost half the evening price.
The classic two-hour harbor run, or 75 minutes from $25.75.
The one sailing that goes ashore, with a park ranger waiting.
Reading first: The dinner cruises compared in full · NATCHEZ vs Creole Queen, settled honestly · What the money actually buys
