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!