9-15-18 9-16-18 Big Muddy to the Big Muddier

We left our anchorage and were flying down the Mississippi River. Our cruising speed is about 8 miles per hour. If we push the engine we can maybe get 11 mph, BUT with the current it pushed us to 13 miles per hour.  Whoo Hoo! Saving fuel.  That was great until we got to the Ohio where we were going UP river.  Our speed immediately dropped to 5 mph.  Not saving fuel anymore. In fact burning more than normal.

We were looking forward to getting on the Ohio to have less debris.  Two years ago, when we turned up the Ohio the water was clean with very little debris.  This year we went from the Big Muddy (Mississippi) to the Big Muddier (Ohio.) The water line was brown instead of clear as we crossed from one river to the next and much to our dismay, there was tons of trees and debris.  Worse than the Mississippi.

The Ohio is flooded and very wide.  We had a funny comment from a tow driver.  We called to ask where he wanted us to pass him.  He said “We got lots of water. Pass me bank to bank, just don’t hit me.”

We anchored at Bean Branch Creek.  I didn’t even recognize it the water was so high.  Bob N Along was with us and they couldn’t believe this was the anchorage.  We anchored well off the channel, and fortunately were in a spot that the debris field was just off where we anchored.  We heard of some boats having debris hit their boat all night and had a large collection of wood tangled on their anchor line.  We lucked out, we both had just a tiny branch from a willow tree and no bumps all night.

On up the river is a new Municipal Dock in Paducah. We had power to run the air conditioning.  It has been blistering hot everyday.  High 90’s. Ugh.  We walked into town.  It looks like this town died but is being revived. Many empty storefronts are being renovated.  There are neat old buildings that when redone, will be quite attractive.  It was Sunday and we didn’t have much time so we didn’t go to the National Quilt museum, which is supposed to be impressive.

The town has a flood wall, which is a cement wall apx 12” tall with closing doors to keep the water out of town. The wall was beautifully painted with mural depicting the history of the area.  There was a guy on scaffolding painting one of the panels. Turns out he is the original artist and comes each year to restore two panels. That way it isn’t such a big project.  It takes him about a month to do one panel.  It was neat to meet him. He is quite gifted.

It was so hot we wanted to get back on our boats for some reprieve from the heat.  That evening three other boats came in.  I was washing dishes, Scott ran out to help catch lines and there were other people there also to help so I kept at my dishes.  Spectators would come down on the dock periodically.  I happened to notice a couple standing near our boat when suddenly their eyes got as big as saucers and mouths dropped open.  I turned to see what was up just in time to see a fellow looper coming into the dock, who got caught in an unexpected current and missed hitting our boat by inches.  Glad I didn’t see it coming.  Due to great skill,the Captain of that boat punched the power while his wife frantically tossed lines to people on the dock. They landed like they planned it that way.

On the dock we all met exchanged cards with the new people and talked about our travels the next day.  We have two options because we are at a fork in the river.  Option 1) Take the right fork onto the Tennessee River to the Kentucky Lock  or Option2) Take the Ohio a short ways and take the Cumberland River to the Barkley Lock.  Both of these locks dump you into the Kentucky Lakes area. Option 2 is 24 miles longer than Option 1, but Option 1 is notorious for getting stuck hours at the lock due to commercial traffic. The group decided that first thing in the morning, I would call the lock master at Kentucky Lock and use my womanly wiles to see if I could sweet talk the Lock Master to let us all go through if we all came together so It was only one lock.  I called him he said he didn’t have any tows waiting up or down so the prospect of us getting through in timely manner is good.  He said the most he can make us wait is 3 lock throughs. New rule?  In the morning, we had a captain’s meeting on the dock. I filled everyone in on the details I was given, like stay below the bridge until you are cleared to come up or you may meet a tow, tie up to the wall assignments etc.

Two of the boats decided to go the other way seeing it was supposed to be more scenic.  Four of us headed for the lock with Last Call leading the way.  When we arrived, we waited 5 minutes for them to get a diver out of the way and bam we were in and locked through in no time.  A few days later we were anchored near the other lock and noticed the door stuck partially opened and didn’t move all day.  Come to find out many Loopers were stuck on the other side for 8 hours and had to come into the marina in the dark.

Kentucky Lake Ahhh.  Clean water, no debris. Happy to be here.

Thanks for reading,

Karen and Scott,

m/v Last Call

9-14-18 9-15-18 Riding the Raging Mississippi

We left out of Alton with 3 boats with a promise of getting right through the lock.  Well that didn’t work out we had to do the dance.  3 boats doing the Dosido with each other waiting for the lock that was supposed to be ready for us.  Luckily it wasn’t a terrible wait, but still annoying when the lock tender says come on down, I’ll put you through.

The Mississippi was muddy thus her nick name “Big Muddy” and flowing like crazy with lots of trees to dodge.

Our cruising speed 8 mph, but with the current we were going as fast as 14 miles per hour.   You do need to shave some of that time off for all the zigs and zags we did to dodge logs.  Luckily the boats we traveled with and we did not sustain any tree damage.  Phew.   I give Scott tons of credit because it was some tense driving, watching currents, wing dams, trees and tows that may be hiding around the next bend.  I did some driving too, so I can appreciate the tension behind the wheel.  He’s great at it and trusts me to drive too.  I guess we are experienced after 10,000 miles behind the wheel.

Shortly after getting on the river we went by St. Louis.  What a shame that that city does not have a marina.  The famous arch is right on the river.  Many boaters would love to stop there.  I took Pictures of Sea Tiger and Bob N Along as they went passed the Arch.  The sky was an electric blue and they turned out great!

We put in a long day and went to Kaskaskia Lock where we could tie up on their wall.  There were only 5 boats there.  There are very few spots to stop along the river so we were thankful to tie up here for the night.  We had docktails in the tiny bit of shade cast by the wooden slatted wall. It was so hot again.  Argh… Then back to our boat where we turned on our generators and flip on the air for some relief before bed.

Next stop was Little Diversion canal off the Mississippi where Bob N Along and we anchored.  We were feeling adventurous, so we dropped our dinghies and instead of heading up the canal like most sane people we decided to go UP 3 miles on the Mississippi river in our dinghies to a small town Cape Girardeau.

I think we might be a bit dinghy to do this.  We started off with all of us in our dinghy…..too much weight we couldn’t get up on plane.  The we took both dinghies and Bob and Natalie couldn’t get up on plane with 2 people.  So in the middle of the raging Mississippi Natalie crawled into our dinghy and we were off.  All was going well.  Bob’s motor is smaller than ours, but we kept him insight.  Under the bridge we go on our approach to the town wall, the three of us were scoping out our best place to dock.  We found the perfect spot designed just for this.  But with our attention on our docking, we neglected to watch for Bob.  We tied up and immediately turned around to make sure he was right on our tail……oh oh no site of Bob.  We were just getting ready to take off to go find him when we saw him under the bridge.  When he got there, he told us he ran out of gas despite having a full tank.  Thankfully we are all smart boaters and brought extra.  But he did admit it was exciting flowing backwards out of control down the river while filling the tank.  Going against the river eats up the gas. They have a tiny tank on their motor, so this was not a huge surprise.

The town was small but did not fail to provide us with a brewery.  Best part was they were tapping small batch IPA at 4pm.  Bob and Scott couldn’t wait.

We roamed the town and started to head back toward the dinghies to get dinner.

On the corner was a company or two of firefighters that came out of the ice cream store.

We yacked with them and they were amazed at our trip.  We gave them our cards and headed for the dinghies.  Next thing we know they all followed behind us.  I am sure they thought they were in for some entertainment with these crazy people in their dinghies on the Mississippi.  We are glad to say we had no “shitshow” for them.  But what they didn’t know was that Bob ran out of gas again down river and couldn’t get the engine started right away.  We towed him up river.  Scott may have gotten a little carried away with his speed and Bob’s dingy went over our wake and he almost went in the river.  Yes, we all had life jackets on.  No harm no foul.

The engine primed and started and off we went back to our boats.  We kept going up the canal to scope out a dog potty place for some boaters.   The water was like glass. Along side the canal was a soy bean field that was flooded.

We may have taken a few fresh soy beans and had Edamame for our appetizer.

We have the best fun at anchor.

Thanks for reading,

Karen and Scott

m/v Last Call

Unique Random Photo of the Day:

9-6-18 to 9-13-18 Alton waiting for the flood

We pulled into the Alton Marina in Illinois a day earlier than planned due to the predicted heavy rain from the Tropical storm.  St. Louis was predicted to get days of rain and there was great potential for flooding on the Mississippi.  We had a long day but were happy to get pumped out fueled up and put in a covered slip. That night and the next day it did rain steadily.  Thankfully it didn’t rain as much as they predicted.  In anticipation of the rain, they lowered the river. Then they didn’t get as much rain so the river is “wide open” but no major flooding.

Alton Marina is a lovely marina which is designed to take the rising waters.  We felt safe there if the river did rise significantly. They have a pool which we have enjoyed.  Many Loopers are here and more coming in every day.

We rode our bikes out to the dam and to the Pharmacy (Uphill both ways as always) twice. We have enjoyed docktails, haircut for Scott, laundry, wash and wax boat, went to church and a fabulous lunch at Fast Eddies.

Fast Eddie’s needs its own description.

All patrons must be 21. You must eat all food on premises. You must purchase a beverage.  But….they have ½ pound fantastic hamburgers for $1.99.  Brats, Hot Chick on a Stick, Steak or pork on a stick and fries. All 1.99 each. Some of the best shrimp I have ever had at 35 cents apiece. Man, what a place.  I can see why the rules.  They have to make up for the price of the food with a drink and I can see why they don’t do take out.  Very interesting concept and they are busy all the time.  Fun Lunch! On our last day in Alton 12 Loopers went there for dinner.  Great night! If you are looking for a salad forget about it, but they do have a diet plate.  1/2 the food, 1/2 the calories, Full Price. 🙂

We enjoyed our stay in Alton.  At first we didn’t know if we would stay the 6 days which is their special, buy 3 nights get 3 nights free.  Due to the possible flooding and the river supposed to crest on the 11th, we relaxed, yet were busy all the time.  We needed to get back on the river for a rest.

Thanks for reading,

Karen and Scott,

m/v Last Call

Unique Random Photo of The Day:

9-2-18 9-5-18 Lower Illinois River to The Big Muddy

There aren’t a lot of stops along the lower Illinois River. The scenery changes from beautiful wilderness to industry.

We still have locks along the river but they are becoming fewer and fewer. The wait, however still remains.  We had waited several hours for a lock when The American Queen showed up.  She certainly was treated like royalty.  There were three boats doing the dance waiting and the lock master sent the lock down empty to get her.  He wouldn’t even wait 10 minutes for us to zip in and tie up.  He finally locked us through after the queen but now he was really backed up with a tow behind us a  “Light Boat” in front.

Fun Fact:  a “Light Boat” is the pusher alone without any barges.  There is no left or right or port or starboard on the rivers.  It’s all 1’s and 2’s.  Pass me on the one or pass me on the two.  You better know which is which or he just might take you out in the corner.

There is no left or right or port or starboard on the rivers.  It’s all 1’s and 2’s.  “Pass me on the one” or “pass me on the two.”  You better know which is which or he just might take you out in the corner.  We have AIS on our boat.  It is a piece of equipment that emits and receives signal from other boats with AIS.  All the Tows have it.  It has been extremely helpful because we can see them on AIS before we can physically see them.  We call and ask how they want us to proceed.  Sometimes they say something like “stay below the bridge because I will take up all the space.”

Some of the tows push 15 barges at a time.  When they lock through the pusher pushes in about half of the load.  It comes up in the lock.  Then this small thing with a cleat on it runs along a rail and can pull these immense load out of the lock and hold it until the pusher and the rest of the load comes up.

We anchored behind and Island one night.  It was a Sincarte Island.  It was a very long island which left a small river between it and the mainland.  It was beautiful.  We dinghies a long ways up and saw tons of birds.  It was like a bird sanctuary. Egrets, Herons, White Eagles, Golden Eagles and many small birds. There were interesting things to see along the river. Enjoy the photos.

We got back to the boat and were enjoying sitting on the back when this Egret worked its way down the shoreline snatching up fish. We wondered how many can that little body hold?

We finally finished the Illinois River and entered the Mississippi AKA “The Big Muddy”

The scenery immediately changed to cliffs.  They are really beautiful.

A short distance across from the cliffs is 50″ Shrine “Our Lady of the Rivers. It was built after the disastrous flood of 1951 as gratitude for the water stopping just short of flooding the village Portage des Sioux.  Mid July, each year, the blessing of the fleet is held at the shrine. (Skipper Bob’s Publication)

Thanks for reading,

Karen and Scott

m/v Last Call

Unique Random Photo of The Day:

9-4-18 Caterpillar and Thyme

It has been so hot that we decided to stay one more day and utilize the air conditioning. That also meant we could go to the Caterpillar Visitor Center.  Caterpillar not the crawly things but the heavy equipment company.

We arrived and were getting our tickets.  The clerk asked if we were Loopers.  How could she tell?  Aren’t there all kinds of tourist through here?  She said we were tan and we were either boaters or tennis players? This is the third time in various cities that we have been asked this.  I guess we have a look and didn’t even realize it.

Caterpillar makes the huge Mining trucks. We first watched a movie in a theatre build in the bed of this truck.  This truck is made from wood with plastic tires. A real truck would crush the concrete floor. It was great that we could see the size of these things.  Fun fact…most of the drivers of these monsters are women with a PayScale around $250,000 a year.  They are 16 gear automatics with many computers in them that report right to headquarters. The driver never knows if something is wrong until they pull the truck off for repairs. Often times they have parts already waiting.

On that note, Vernon Unk drew a cartoon in 1930 depicting a flat screen TV video chatting with a person at Caterpillar, which sent his order to a fully automated parts picking system and air dropped by balloon.  Today this is almost exactly how it works.  Except they sometimes use a drone.  It is almost like he could see into the future.

The 797F Mining Truck Stats:

• Payload: 400 tons = 800,000 pounds per load
• Cost $5 million
• Tires: Changed every 3 months costing 1 Million dollars in one year.
• Fuel Tank size: to order up to 2000 gallons
• 4,000 horsepower
• Operating weight 1,375,000 pounds
• Ht 25’ 4” with the body down, 5 stories with the body raised
• Length 46’6”
• Width 32’
• It takes 13 separate trucks to deliver and is assembled on site
• Used to haul ore, copper, iron, goal, coal and oil sands

  

  

  

  

  

  Truly a marvel to see something that big.  We learned they only stop to fuel once a day that is why they offer different size fuel tanks. They are run 24/7 and often make up the cost of the truck in a very short amount of time. The volunteers at the center are mostly retired Caterpillar workers.  They were extremely knowledgeable and still have a passion for their company.

Caterpillar has been involved in the car racing scene for 26 years.  A young man, Kory Russel has an extensive collection of CAT car racing items and has them on loan to the Center for others to enjoy. I was impressed, and I don’t really know anything about car racing.

There were simulators there, so you could try your hand at driving various pieces of equipment. It first told you which thingy to push or pull etc. then let you go at it.  Natalie and I got one scoop of dirt moved before it said to please allow others to use the simulator.

I don’t think I would get a job doing that, nor do I want one, but driving an ore truck might be fun. The guys continued to “work” while Natalie and I went off goofing around taking silly pictures.

I hope I labeled those correctly or my son will let me know.  He was telling me the names of this stuff when he was four-years-old.  Smarty pants.

We had heard that this wasn’t that great of an exhibit, and without taking the time to listen to the volunteers, I might have looked passed many items, that had great stories. We loved it!

For those of you who know Milo, I had to send him a picture of the excavator and tease him that mine was bigger than his new one.  Hee Hee.

Next stop Rhodell Brewery that was highly recommended to us. It didn’t open until 2pm. What??  We moved on and found the Thyme Kithchen  and Craft Beer. We had great food. They had interesting décor including hundreds of bottles of different types of Whiskey, Bourbon and Rye. It made for a great display on the back of the bar, however a ladder was needed to get to most of the bottles. Once again it was steaming hot.  We are ready for some cooler weather.

Thanks for reading.

Karen and Scott

m/v Last Call

Unique Random Photo of The Day:

9-2-18 9-3-18 Peoria, Hot Hot Hot

We pulled into Peoria where they have free dock and some with power. The upper section is reserved for smaller boats and the lower section is where they want the larger boats.  We go right to where we are supposed to be. Bob N Along and Last Call are all tied up only to find out there was no electric at the power stations.  Bob and Scott took the Volt meter and found there was no power at any of the lower slips. They talked to the guys on the fire boats next to the dock and they said when they put their power in they took it out of the marina.  What a shame. While they walked the docks, an Asian Carp jumped on the dock right in front of them. They scooted him back in the water.  Crazy fish. Power was found on the upper docks, so we took turns helping each other get docked because the slips were very small and not intended for our size boats.

Once hooked up, we immediately turned on the air conditioning.  It was mid 90s with heat index in the 100s.  Natalie was a dream and cooked us all a great dinner. Other boats came into the marina that evening, they were not tiny. We were impressed with their ability to slide by us and back into their slips.  Twin engines make that much easier.  They were quiet and left the next morning. We were crammed in like sardines all searching for a little power.

The next day was Labor Day was another hot one.  We all dropped our bikes and went riding before it got any warmer. Bob and Natalie planned to go to the parade, we went to the other side of the river to pick up some photos I had printed for a Scrapbook for my daughter and son-in-law. They said the parade was all unions.  Neither of us are from an area where Unions are a big thing, so this was new for both of us.

Fun Fact:  “Labor Day, the first  Monday in Spembert is a creation of the labor movement and is dedicated to the social and economic achievements of American workers.” from the US Department of Labor. We got back about the time the first groups from the parade were getting done and heading to the community picnic.  We were so hot, there was no way we were going to stand in the sun and watch the parade.  We almost didn’t stand in line to get food but were glad we did.  The vendor we went to had homemade tamales. After getting our food we went immediately to the air-conditioned boat and ate. The tamales were delicious! Shortly after, it started to rain on and off and we didn’t mind having an excuse to stay in our cool boat.  Later in the afternoon we took a walk and were melting again, so we HAD to get ice cream in order to make it back.

Peoria has a 31” tall painted bronze statue depicting “Abraham Lincoln presenting the contemporary “Common man” with the Gettysburg Address, underscoring its continuing relevance in today’s society.” Here is your history reminder lesson for the day. “The Gettysburg address reminded people what they fought for. Lincoln believed “common folk,” not the wealthy should control the government for only they would guarantee that laws would continue to enable everyone to prosper.” Funny how these lessons in my 50s mean so much more than when learned in school. Did you know Illinois is known as the Land of Lincoln?

The next day we went to the Caterpillar Visitor Center, see my next blog on that. When we returned to the marina, there were other Looper boats and as usual we all met on the dock exchanged cards and got to know each other. Great fun meeting other people.

Thanks for reading,

Karen and Scott

m/v Last Call

Continue reading 9-1-18 9-4-18 Peoria Hot Hot Hot →

8-27-8- 8-31-18 Upper Illinois River

We are on the Illinois River running into fellow Loopers and loving it.  It is so interesting learning about the different people doing this trip.  Everyone has their own style. We met a couple on Bob N Along, Bob and Natalie that love to anchor as much as we do.  We have been staying on free walls with power, which has been nice with the warmer weather as we can run our Air Conditioning.

Joliet Wall was our first stop. Enjoyed a few docktails as is what happens when Loopers get together.  Dropped the Bikes. I spent some time in Library catching up on my blog and Scott ran to Walgreens. Other than that we just enjoyed the company and air conditioning at night.

Ottawa Wall was next. But to get there you have to go through the dreaded Marseilles lock. Dreaded because there is usually several hour wait.  It’s a bigger lock so it take time to fill and empty.  On the Rivers, pleasure boats don’t pay for locks, but the Tows do and they are commerce so they get priority.  While waiting, we call it “doing the dance.” Puttering around trying to stay out of the way while waiting.

Last time we went through there was an old barge to tie up to.  Darn it, they cleaned up the place and there was nowhere to tie. We were with Bob N Along and the voice on the radio said we were going to have to wait for a whole other tow to go through.  This is after waiting 2+ hours already.  The lock master told us what sides we were going to tie on, so we took our time and moved all our fenders the the right (starboard) side.  Bob N Along dropped anchor. As the tow went into the lock there was extra room. At 6 pm a different voice came on and asked the Tow if he minded if we went with him.  He was fine with that.   Bob N Along had to quickly pull up anchor and we had to change our fenders again to the left (Port) side, but we were moving and very happy for that.  Once in the lock the tenders were wonderful throwing us lines because there were no bollards available. The one tender told us there was just a shift change (thus the change in voice) and this Lock Master lets pleasure boats go through with Tows as long as there is room and the Tow doesn’t mind.  That explains a lot.  It was 7 pm before we got to Ottawa Wall.

Ottawa is a neat little town with everything a Looper needs within walking distance.  brewery, laundry, library, hardware, and grocery. We stayed on the free wall with power.  Bob N Along went into the marina because they needed water, pump out etc.  There were a lot of loopers there.  It was tempting to go but our budget got blown in Wisconsin marinas, so we need to be frugal for a while.

We got a wonderful surprise.  One of the boats in the marina is one we knew from our last Loop.  Eddy and Linda from Sprirus and other loopers saw us from the bridge and they surprised us by stopping by.  It was so wonderful to see them!

Bob N Along, Natalie and Bob came and stayed on the wall with us.  We walked to the Brew pub which was quite nice.

nk

We got ribs at the ribfest in town and enjoyed being grounded and not moving for a few days. We also enjoyed air conditioning especially at night.

We called the lock before leaving the dock to try to avoid another long wait but no one answered. Just then a big tow went by.  We had our engines revved up already.  We shut them down and had another cup of coffee.  Finally we got ahold of the Lock Master.  He was putting a double through then had this one to put through.  He suggested we wait a half at least a half an hour before leaving.  Bob N Along noticed a water leak on their boat, so while we waited Scott and Bob ran to the hardware store and for a three dollar part it saved them a lot of headaches, mess and water loss. While the guys were gone another tow went by.  Oh brother!  We decided we had to just go down and “get in the cue” as the lock masters say.  Fortunately the second Tow pulled off for loading and the barges from the first Tow were already on their way down, but the pusher still had to be brought down.  It is a big lock, and the lock master  TOLD the pusher we were going in with him.  He was not too happy to have us “riff raff pleasure boaters” in with him.  Loved that Lock Master.  He didn’t give him a choice.  We went in first and went all the way to the front of the lock and rafter next to each other. The pusher came behind us.  When we got down, they could only open the one lock door because we were so close to the other one. We pulled out and bam, right in front of us was a wall of barges with only 20 feet on the left for us to squeak through.  It was intimidating but not a problem.

We spent the night on Hennepin wall which is basically an old barge dug into the side of the hill.  It wasn’t that great and was quite high above the deck of our boat.  There were guardrails like you see along the road on the barge to tie to.  I couldn’t reach them, so I jumped off the boat after attaching the one I could reach to get the rest.  Later I marveled at my must have been ninja moves for this klutzy girl to have been able to leap onto the wall and get us tied up.  Sometimes it’s better not to think.  We helped Bob and Natalie get tied.  They were grateful we were there to help.

It was hot.  After cooling off on the back of the boat with cool cloths and ice water we all went for a walk.  By now we are all hot again so we stopped at the Tap House just above our boats.  We walked in and they asked if we wanted the bar or food.  I said “where ever it is coldest, but we just want cold drinks.”  They humored us as we pulled up to the very cool bar.  Girls just had Ice tea and guys had a beer.  The bill for all of us was only $8.  What???  That is great.  We enjoyed chatting with the locals and the bartender.  We mostly enjoyed the cool knowing we had to go back to hot boats with no electric to run our air.  We won’t run our generator all night.  So we turned on a 12 volt fan and were sticky but slept well once we fell asleep.

Thanks for reading,

Karen and Scott

m/v Last Call

Unique Random Photo of the Day: