The Mississippi River
The Mighty Mississippi
The Big Muddy
The Mississippi River, otherwise known as the Mighty Mississippi and the big Muddy, runs for over 1700 miles from Minneapolis MN to New Orleans LA. Fortunately for us, we don't have to travel all that way on this most difficult waterway of the entire trip! Our portion consists of 218 miles, with a possible heavy current, anywhere between 2 and 8 knots. Thankfully we are travelling downstream!
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| Record breaking speeds….usually we travel 7.5 mph |
Known to overflow its riverbanks from time to time, huge levies have been constructed along the banks and also wing dams into the river beds. The wing dams are mostly submerged and tricky to learn how to spot. They are man made and redirect the river flow to minimize silting in the main channel. As a result, silting of the areas occurs around spaces that once were islands, leaving it difficult to find places to anchor. It is said that the town of Grafton has been flooded so many times that they moved the entire town uphill the last time it was rebuilt.
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| Wing dams are visible until river levels rise. |
Actually, there are only 2 places you can loosely refer to as marinas along this portion, until you meet up with the Ohio River at the end of the 218 miles. There are many more tows, quite a bit larger than we've seen on the Illinois River. Navigating is more difficult as currents have been known to remove or just move buoy markers from their places. Barges have been left 'parked' on the riverbanks. They are entering and exiting the many industries along the river. Debris in the river is not only trash and dead fish but entire trees. The largest piece we dodged around was about 30 feet long. Just watching for them kept one person busy all day.
Tows have grown from what we're used to seeing to the largest one at 28 barges!
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| This combination is 1,825' long x 78' wide!! |
We leave Alton IL on a muggy Friday morning, Sept. 18th. We contacted the lock early, and after his commercial traffic was through, he called us to que up about 8:15. Sunny days are ahead of us! Literally, we are following our friends on Sunny Days, and we are feeling a bit petrified of what is ahead of us. We have made the only reservation available for the next week, for tonight, and are headed 44 miles to Hoppies.
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| The river version of a cruise ship |
After passing under the bridge and through Lock 29, we enter the Chain of Rocks canal. This is a man made canal that veers off the main channel of the Mississippi to avoid the rapids, and all boat traffic uses it. We were in our first traffic jam, and just had to sweat it out, floating between the banks and other boats without getting too close to any of them. We were moving about 3 mph, then waited about another hour for the next lock!
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| Fugitive's bow (foreground) sit's higher than the traditional cruising boat bow. We will be glad for that when we reach the Gulf of Mexico and beyond. |
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| Waiting patiently at the Chain of Rocks lock. |
We were impressed by the fantastic waterfront and famous arch of St. Louis MO. However, we had to be satisfied with just a picture, as there is no place for pleasure craft to stop there. Interesting that it was Illinois on one side of the river and Missouri on the other.
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| The famous St. Louis Arch. |
We pulled in to Hoppies and followed her docking directions with care, as it was a windy afternoon and it's tricky on the best days to turn upstream and dock in a 4 mph current. Hoppies is a world renowned location consisting of ancient, rusted floating barges, anchored in the riverbed. Some say you Must stop there, others say don't waste your time! We decided to see for ourselves what all the chatter was about.
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| Fern's (in the light blue shirt) boater briefing. |
Her deck hands were experienced and Fern was on hand to give orders.
You Never ignore Ferns orders on her turf. We met Plane to Sea, Tika and Valentine, who were also there for the briefing, and the night.
Last stop for fuel everybody... But not us!
The highlight of the stop was the daily afternoon Boater Briefing, in which Fern shares her extensive local knowledge, the recent conditions of the river, the anchorages, and any changes that are occurring because of the water depth, recent weather, upcoming warnings, closures or delays.
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| Fern says the water level has been up to the eaves trough on the yellow building!! |
The bridges have the air draft clearance marked on their piers to let mariners know how much clearance they have. We noticed the difference between the new bridge piers and the ones that have seen high water levels.
After a hot sticky night at Hoppies, we headed downstream to one of the anchorages recommended by Fern, at Kaskaskia lock and dam. We checked with the lock master for permission to tie up overnight, and he granted that, as long as we did not walk on the dam. We were allowed to walk between the boats only, on the outside of the safety railings. It was narrow, but rules are rules.
We set chairs out on our sun deck and everyone came over. Only our friend Lola brought a snack to share, which when added to mine, was still sparse. I headed deep into the storage locker and managed to come up with extra snacks. As boats arrived at the dam, 6 in total, they joined us on the sun deck until we were hanging off the railings. The dog and cats that belonged to the people, couldn't be left out of the get together, and soon it felt like a circus! Brian finally had to hint that it would soon be dark, and he still needed to BBQ some supper, then the stragglers cleared out, and we heaved a tired sigh!
It was a beautiful evening nonetheless, and a spectacular sunrise the next morning.
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| Early morning mist |
Onward downstream, always vigilant for debris and gargantuan tows, we sailed 69 miles to another recommended anchorage at Little River Diversion Channel. This was our first experience with severe current. We continued downstream 300 yards, and did a u-turn, and hugged the shoreline back to the mouth of the chanel. Full speed up stream was 3mph at best. The timing of the turn into the entrance was critical, as the force of the current could easily toss our 32,000 lbs onto the shore.
It was a beautiful spot and we headed over to Sunny Days to hang out for awhile.
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| Note the calm waters at the mouth of channel vs. the Mighty Mississippi current |
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| Sunny Days |
We got a little local entertainment, as a family out for an evening boat ride would rush past then slow down for the carp to jump. Their kids would then attempt to catch a carp jumping past the boat, and the daughters screamed with surprise when she actually grabbed one by the tail.
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| The girl with turquoise pants grabbed the jumping Asian Carp |
Continuing on today, we join into the Ohio River at Cairo (Cay-ro) junction and on the GPS there are dotted lines going every which way.... The river quickly takes on a blue hue and we are now headed upstream and covering ground at only 7 mph flat out!
The junction is extremely busy with fleeting yards, barges being switched around to different waiting tows and so much loading and unloading that we didn't know how to stay out of the way!
We were asked by one tow to keep over to the Kentucky side of the shore, so Janice quickly referred to the map for the state names since he was on the Louisiana side and we had just come from Illinois. As we hugged the KY shoreline it became too shallow for our comfort, so we headed more towards the centre of the river and had to sneak between 2 rows of empties parked in the middle of the river. To our relief, when we peeked around the corner the oncoming tow was close enough to the LA shore to give us lots of room! Never a dull moment!!
Ahead of us was the incredible sight of the construction of the new locks being built at Olmstead. It looked as though they were building pieces on the shore then using massive rail systems to place the parts into the river to construct the dam. There were so many tugs and cranes, it was nearly impossible to imagine getting through the traffic. After waiting about an hour we were allowed passage through. From there it was only 3 miles to Lock 53.
These are the locks that had closed their large chamber for repairs leaving the smaller auxillary chamber for locking through. This resulted in backups and delays for the large tows that were forced to break into two pieces to get through the smaller auxillary locks. When we passed through these locks, there was an 8 day delay for the barges. As we were pleasure craft, they locked us through in groups once or twice a day which we were grateful for.
After lock 53 we ran in the dark to an anchorage at Bean Branch Creek for the night.
The next morning we weighed anchor around 7:30 and travelled only 21 miles to Lock 52 where we waited from 10:30 until 4:30 to lock through.
It was 7:30, and almost dark when we pulled into the Cuba Towhead anchorage for the night.
More lights tonight as the barge traffic continues throughout the night. The tree toads were plentiful, and obviously so were the raccoons? Can raccoons swim? Late in the night, we felt the boat tip to one side, and I said to Brian, "There's someone on the boat!" As the sun deck was right above the bed, we could hear 4 paws on our roof and then something that sounded like foil crinkling. "Brian, what did you do with the foil wrapping from the salmon you BBQ'd for supper? Any chance you left it upstairs?" "Um hmmm, I think maybe..." Quite the mess! They sure enjoyed the crusts!
One more day before civilization, and we head up the Cumberland River towards Grand Rivers Kentucky. The Cumberland is a squiggly, narrow river, that offers beautiful scenery, and a little entertainment.
We came upon a tow, tight in the corners and we needed to pass it. We naturally assumed that one whistles and two whistles were the same whether meeting or passing, but not so??!
The tow operator requested a pass that made no sense to where the shoreline and corners were, but our friend and amazing captain Terry was able to safely make the pass.
We're so slow that when it was our turn, we had to sit back and wait for a kinda straightaway to overtake and pass the tow.
As we rounded the next corner, we heard the tow captain say "Ah, houseboat, what are your intentions?" He can't possibly be talking to us can he? We understand his question as we round the bend!
The last Lock at Barkley rises into view, and we know that we have survived the Mighty Mississippi and Ohio Rivers and all their challenges.
We have endured 6 days and 5 nights on the river!
Finally we have arrived at Green Turtle Bay with a warm welcome and about 30 other Looper boats. It's great to see our friends from the first 'pod' that we haven't seen since Lake Michigan, and know that all are doing well too.
Whew! We feel that we are ready for a break. The Mississipi and Ohio Rivers are behind us!
