St. Louis



Wow 10.5!


Cocktails at Kaskaskia Lock wall

Early morning on the Mississippi

Going over "wickets" - turbulent

Orion after taking a swim




The Mississippi is justly named the "Big Muddy". It's big with a lot of commercial traffic. Clay was a little disappointed in the current - he had hoped for a bigger push as we went down river. I'm not sure what he expected, but we did get a nice ride which lowered our fuel consumption. At one point where the river narrowed, we actually got up to 10.5 knots! The river is definiately an industrial one - not many places for "pleasure craft" to dock. The places that are available are nothing more than old barges with very minimal services. Nonetheless, we enjoyed the adventure. We traveled in a convoy of several boats and after our days travels, we would join together for cocktails and stories of our adventures.

St. Louis was a fun stop - the Arch and museum were impressive. Our next stop was a "marina" called Hoppies, again it was nothing more than several barges on the side of the river. They did have fuel and water, but nothing else. We took our bikes and went to shore with two other couples to explore the little town of Kimmswick, MO. It was like stepping back in time with old log cabins, but boy did they have a really good restaurant! From Hoppies we meandered down stream to the Kaskaskia Lock. The Kaskaskia River meets the Mississippi and goes up to Fayetteville. It was an excellent place to tie up to for the night and it was very protected thank goodness because the storms that were predicted did come. We gathered for our usual 5:00 pm cocktail hour on the lock wall as the skies were turning gray. In the distance we could here the local town's weather alert sirene going off. We gathered around the weather satellite monitor and watched the storms moving around us with tornado warnings. Once again, the good Lord is watching our for us, we got nothing more than hard rain. In the morning we listened to the local news and more than 120 homes in the area had been damaged by the storm. Whew! We had one more stop on the Mighty Mississippi at another barge. It was very high and we had to climb on and off the boat on our bellies. We gathered with the group and planned our attack for the Ohio River. With all the recent rains, the reports are that the river is up and there is a lot of debris. Bright and early the convoy shoved off. We made the turn upstream onto the Ohio at about 12:00 noon. The knot meter quickly went from about 8 knots down to 3.2. The debris field was unbelieveable. Being the slower boat, we were at the end of the convoy. Clay quickly decided he had to get out of the current, so we went to the RDB (right descending bank), the sail line was on the LDB (left descending bank). We were out of the "marked" channel but we still had 20 feet of water. We were able to gain 1-1.5 knots and quickly took the lead of the convoy. It wasn't too long and the other boats lined up behind Clay to get out of the current. The river was up so the first lock had lowered the "wickets" and we could just pass through. It was quite turbulent, but the catarmaran handled it beautifully. We found a little pool to anchor in for the night. In the morning we took for, anxious to get off the Ohio with her current and terrible debris. By 1:00 p.m. we were on the Tennesssee and you could hear everyone take a long sigh of relief to be in calmer waters. After a short ride, we went through the Kentucky Dam and found a nice anchorage, went for a swim and slept soundly.

After a great night at anchor, we went in to Green Turtle Marina to reprovision and relax. It was a great marina in a beautiful area. They provided a courtesy van, so we took it and went into Paducah to a Super Walmart. While we were there we stopped in to Home Depot next door and purchased some wood so Clay could put in some shelves in one of the lockers for me (always finding something for him to do). We went in to town with 7 other couples and had a wonderful dinner at Patti's 1880 Settlement Restaurant. Their claim to fame is a 2" porkchop - with the doggy bag we had two meals from. The marina had a deal for Loopers - three nights and get one free - who could refuse? It was a good spot to regroup and reengergize.

We left Green Turtle and have just gone from anchorage to anchorage, slowly working our way down the Tennessee. We are currently at Pebble Creek marina - already getting supplies. Our plan is to have no plan, but the general consensus at this point is to head up the Tennessee at Pickwick instead of heading into the Tenn-Tom and explore that area. We've been told that it's just beautiful. We'll update again when we get internet access. We miss everyone but we're having a wonderful time!