Heading Downbound

Because all the rivers we travel will twist and turn as they flow to the ocean, as boaters we say that we travel “upbound” or “downbound” rather than saying “north” or “south”.  On October 1 we departed Goose Pond heading to New Orleans for the winter, hoping to arrive before October 25, the due date for our son & daughter-in-law to present us with our second grandchild.

We enjoyed a slow easy trip down the TN River and half way down the Tenn-Tom River system, periodically checking with our son to see how things were progressing.  Around October 10, things were becoming more touch-and-go, so we decided to put the boat up for a week or two at Columbus MS marina & retrieve our car.  Four days later, we got the phone call, only this time the call was a joyous one.  We had a new grandson!   We jumped into our car & went to New Orleans for a week to begin to spoil our new arrival.  Mom & Simon were doing quite well, our son was a proud daddy, & Maddy (now 10 years old) quickly got used to being a new big sister.

Joining the mass migration.  Getting underway
before sunrise to lock through before another
towboat arrives.

By the time we returned to the boat, we were in the middle of the “mass migration” southbound.  We had been in this situation before, on the east coast in October 2014, when most Yankees start heading for Florida/Bahamas for the winter.  This time it was the Loopers (America’s Great Loop Cruisers Association), who had just completed their annual fall rendezvous at Wheeler State Park on the TN River.

Playing "follow the leader"

In our 10 years of travel, approaching an estimated 20,000 miles on the waterways, we have normally travelled by ourselves.  Rarely would we travel with another boat.  But from Columbus MS downbound, we were constantly part of a group of anywhere from 3 to 11 other boats.  Quite a sight for us to be one of 12 boats all crowded at one time into a lock chamber.  We got a kick out of one boat named “Ladybug”, home-ported in Luling LA, of all places (we had lived in Luling, a very tiny town, for 30 years)!  They had lived close to our house, knew our neighbors, and we think that their daughter went to the local high school with our son!

Where the hell is Luling LA ?!?

Rafting at anchor with a Looper which we had just met

Leaving the anchorage early in the morning, not knowing
that we were about to run into think pea soup

We agreed to let a boat raft up to us in several anchorages, because he had mechanical problems with his anchor windlass.  Good thing we had heavy ground tackle (anchor & chain) to hold two big cruisers against the river current.  Each day on the river, we encountered fog (warm water with cool air), and ran into some pretty challenging encounters with towboats & barges in the dense fog.  They make quite a large “blip” on the radar screen!  Because there were so many boats travelling different distances each day, we kept running into the same boats at different days, all along the 300 mile trip to Mobile Bay.

Our travel companions take really good pics of us

Just north of Mobile, we had to wait while two tugboats
turned around an ocean-going freighter.  Then we had
to slowly follow him into Mobile Bay.

ZoBe on Mississippi Sound

At our anchorage, we frame the full moon
through the rigging of ZoBe

Once we made Dog River at Mobile Bay, we finally met up with our sailboat friends whom we had met a year ago, Glynn & Jenny aboard “ZoBe”.  They had come down from the TN River earlier & were waiting in Mobile to travel with us across Mississippi Sound to New Orleans.  After waiting 2 days in Dog River Marina, we jumped at a weather window that was unbelievably calm for our 3-day trip.  The first night we anchored off one of the sand barrier islands, let ZoBe raft up to us (a comical sight of a big power boat with a big sailboat rafted together), and enjoyed the full moon.  The thick fog the next morning delayed our departure into Gulfport MS.  Glynn & Jenny liked Gulfport so much that they decided to stay there for the winter, so we made the last leg of the journey to New Orleans alone.

ZoBe shoots the rising sun across our bow

Shortly after sunrise, the fog moves in across the barrier
island in Mississippi Sound

Once the fog finally lifts, ZoBe breaks away from us at anchor

We exchange photo ops

Mississippi Sound is unbelievably calm

This shrimper better catch lots of shrimp, cause
we're back in town!

We tied up at Seabrook Marina on New Orleans’ Industrial Canal, where we had been several times before.  Two days later, we were treated to a close look at a fully restored WWII PT boat, passing in front of our boat.  This boat is owned by the National WWII Museum downtown & was to be hauled out by Seabrook boatyard for annual maintenance.  Not every day you see a PT boat in front of you!

So now we’re done with cruising this season, and maybe longer.  The saying goes, “The happiest day in the life of a boater is when he buys a boat.  The second happiest day is when he sells the boat.”  We’re headed for another happy day.  But, as always, we have our Plan B to go cruising again in the spring, if we still have a boat to do so.  Between now & then, we’ll enjoy our growing family in New Orleans & plan our next adventure.

Our son & his wife took this Christmas photo,
& even provided the baby in the crib!

Enjoying Maddy’s visit

While we looked for another car to purchase (and thanked our lucky stars that we both made it through the car wreck safely), we enjoyed a week visit from our granddaughter Maddy.  We wanted to expose her to as much boating as possible, so we took her on 7 different types of boats that week, and she learned what she liked (kayaks) and what she didn’t like (rowboats).  But her real hot button was rock wall climbing, which we did in downtown Chattanooga.  Being so agile and athletic, she could climb the walls like a monkey.  We tired her out (as well as ourselves) and spoiled her as much as possible, before returning her to her parents.

Our other effort this summer was to begin looking for homes in either Huntsville AL or Chattanooga TN.  Our future boating days are numbered, and we want to begin travel by land to the National Parks in the western US.  The boat will go up for sale when we get to New Orleans this winter.

Cruisin’ with Barefootin’

Our best boating buddies, Clint & Leigh aboard
Barefootin'

In early July we finally arrived at Goose Pond Colony Marina in Scottsboro AL, which was to become our base of operation for the summer.  We chose this marina because our best cruising friends from 8 years ago (Clint & Leigh) keep their boat here.  We planned to finally put all our talk into action, to cruise together as far as we can, up the TN River into the foothills of the Smoky Mountains.  We all had heard how gorgeous the scenery was up there, and were determined to find out for ourselves.

At our anchorage at Little Cedar Mountain, the
morning fog ls lifting above the water

When we first arrived at Goose Pond, the marina office told us about another boater on the next dock, who claimed that he knew us & was looking to say “Hi” to us.  The only people we knew at this marina were Clint & Leigh, so we had no idea who this person was.  When we finally met up with the other boater, and asked each other a lot of questions, I finally realized that we had met this boat here at Goose Pond way back in 2009 on our first trip through this area!  In fact, this friend took photos of our boat departing Goose Pond, and I used his photo when I printed our boat cards.  This was the second time within a month that our past boating experience has come back to us!

Downtown Chattanooga waterfront, departing for dinner

We departed with Barefootin’ for our two-week cruise up the Tennessee River, with beautiful weather making the trip even more enjoyable.  The first couple days, we cruised through familiar waters, since both of us used to keep our boats at a marina near Chattanooga.  The farther north we went, the mo’ betta the river & mountain scenery became.  We were travelling through lands formerly belonging to the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation, and we took the time to learn about their history and how President Andy Jackson had them forced out of their land and “re-settled” in the Oklahoma “Indian Territory”.  Another dark chapter in American history.

Departing Chattanooga at sunrise

We're the little boat ahead of Barefootin'.
Let's see.....red, right, return

Approaching one of he locks, the size of the gates
can be intimidating

Once we locked through the last lock on the TN River, we decided to turn southwest to head up the Little Tennessee River, rather than continuing up to Knoxville.  The scenery and the multitude of quiet little coves in which to anchor, did not disappoint us.  Additionally, the couple marinas that we stayed in were super cheap, so we took advantage of this.  This entire area reminded Sue & me of our travels through the 1000 Islands area of the St Lawrence River, which we visited in 2015. 

Inside the lock chamber, it seems that we're inside
the bowels of the earth

As we exit the lock, the scenery is just plain beautiful

Passing one of the larger tows on the TN River.
Guess we'll let him have right-of-way

Photo Op at the end of the Little Tennessee River
at the foothills of the Smoky Mountains

Quiet anchorage in the morning mist

Our transportation to get the dog ashore
when at anchor

Flooded farm silos in Lake Tellico.  This was all farm land
before the TVA built the dam & flooded the area.
Creates a nice hazard to navigation

View from our dock at Goose Pond Marina.  Just don't
get much mo' betta.

All in all, we had a very enjoyable time with some of our best friends.  I get a kick out of how two dissimilar boats are able to cruise together, which we originally did together back in 2011.  We are a slow boat (a “crawler” as Clint says), while Barefootin’ likes to get up on plane & run.  So each morning, Clint & Leigh help us get underway before enjoying another cup of coffee, walking the dog, and finally untying their lines, only to pass us mid-way and beating us to the marina for the night.  Then they are there to catch our lines, help us fuel up & tell us where everything is.  For Fruition, it’s just like having our own portable concierge service!

While we were on the TN River, the hurricanes kept coming
into the Gulf of Mexico
(click to enlarge)

Once we finished our cruise together, we were back in Scottsboro only two days before Sue & I came within a second of both being killed in a car wreck, when another driver ran through a stop light & hit us at 55 mph.

Just 'cause you have a green light at the intersection,
that don't mean you're safe to proceed!

2017 Short Cruising Season

Some homes have watch dogs.  We have
Killer Blue Herons!

With all the on-going family activity, we decided to enjoy a short easy cruising season by heading back to the Tennessee River.  Family matters kept us busy through most of May, and then we had to finish varnishing the teak on the sundeck before we set sail.  By the end of May, we were ready to go, but then King Neptune sent day after day of thunderstorms.

At Demopolis Lock, the white egrets were
lined up along the chamber wall
like Gargoyles.

Finally on June 1 we saw a 3-day weather window (kinda), so we decided to make a run up the Tenn-Tom (Tennessee – Tombigbee River system) to see if we could get to Demopolis AL before the next round of thunderstorms came through.  We departed The Wharf Marina at Orange Beach AL (which had been a nice, but expensive, place to keep the boat) in the middle of a thunderstorm & got out onto Mobile Bay where the visibility was terrible in fog & rain.  We got indoctrinated quickly back into cruising, using radar & chartplotter & an occasional break in the visibility to work around the dredge in the middle of the Mobile Ship Channel.  We pushed hard, sometimes running 10-11 hours/day, and made the 250 miles to Demopolis in only 3 days, surprising even us.

Tying to the floating mooring bit
inside the lock chamber.  I think we're
starting to get good at this!

The night before making Demopolis, we got a real surprise when we anchored in the river, literally in the middle of nowhere, and looked across the river to the creek entrance to see another boat anchored for the night – one which we had met 8 years prior along the Tennessee River!  In addition, the home port of that boat was Put-in-Bay Ohio, one of the Lake Erie Islands only 1 mile away from the home port of our boat!  In fact, the owner knows my cousins on Put-in-Bay!

At Demopolis, one of the live-aboards had built
this radio-controlled sailing vessel from a kit.
When he sailed it from the dock, he had to retrieve
it using his dinghy because the wind was wrong.

After pushing hard the first half up the Tenn-Tom, we deliberately went slow the second half because the Wilson Lock on the Tennessee River was closed for maintenance until around June 20.  So we went to places which we had bypassed in our previous 3 trips along the Tenn-Tom & stayed a week at a time at different marinas.  We moved our car with us, so we could visit other sites in the area.  After a hectic year so far, we could actually go slow & realx.

In northern Alabama, one of the highlights to visit
is the Coon Dog Cemetery.  Ya just gotta go!

Who'd a thunk it !?!

Near the junction of the Tenn-Tom and TN River
is "Waterfall Cove", a popular place for the locals

Sunset at our anchorage.  This is what cruising is all about

Our week at Joe Wheeler State Park was very relaxing,
and they only charged us $100 for the entire week!