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

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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.

Industry along the river.
Most homes we saw were on stilts like this.

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.

American Queen. She is huge!

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.”

Here is what our screen looks like. We are the boat at the bottom of the screen. The 2 red triangles are tows that we are potentially on a crash course with and the green triangle we are not on a crash course with. They all show red at some point because of the close proximity we are to them.

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.

That small grey thing on the rail pulls these huge loads out of the lock so the pusher can come up get reconnected then off they go. It is a painfully slow process. We joked….it looks like the yellow cushman is pulling those barges.

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.

With the water down, we see many trees with their roots exposed.
Close up of the roots to give you a idea of the erosion. Amazing they can still stand.
This one looks more like a spiderweb of roots.

Apparently there are homes on the island somewhere. We found this ferry that they must use.
Several times Golden Eagles flew right along with us. Neat to be able to watch them so closely.
Ummmmm shouldn’t this be in the river somewhere?

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?

Each time he saw a fish he took this pose.
With lightning fast precision he dove in after the fish.
Every time he succeeded.

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

Two vast rivers come together. The Illinois on the Right and a small slice of the Mississippi on the left. Our friend Bob N Along are just about the cross to the Mississippi. They are the small boat in the distance.

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

Cliffs along the Mississippi and of course more Tows than ever before.

This one is my favorite!
Ah yes the Mississippi brings many logs to keep you on your toes.

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)

We had a hitchhiker for a while. So beautiful.
Check out the details. His long tongue is out tasting our boat. The antennae are striped and you can see all the hairs on this body.

Thanks for reading,

Karen and Scott

m/v Last Call

Unique Random Photo of The Day:

Who says you can’t put a square peg in a round hole?

2 thoughts on “9-2-18 9-5-18 Lower Illinois River to The Big Muddy”

    1. I finally took some time to get artistic with my photos. Glad you liked it.

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