Meandering down the Tenn-Tom

 

If there’s one section of the waterways that we should know by now, it would be the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway.  We first cruised this northbound from Mobile to the Tennessee River way back in 2009 when the rivers were in flood stage (and we found out what NOT to do).  Then we saw how bare the trees could get when we traveled south from Chattanooga to New Orleans in December 2011.  So now, we’re on our 3^rd trip down the waterway, stopping at some familiar spots and avoiding others.

The first lock on the Tenn-Tom has an 84' lift (or drop).
It seems like we're in the bowels of the earth!

Our travelling companion inside the lock

When the lower lock gates open, daylight comes in.
Sometimes we're surprised to see a tow boat and barges waiting outside the gates!

Our anchorage one night just off the river channel,
with the ubiquitous towboats passing by

Another anchorage at sunset, in a quiet cove

We departed the marina near the intersection of Tennessee, Mississippi and Alabama on Nov 8 with another boat named “YOLO” (You Only Live Once).  He was a retired Army guy, so we let him travel with us so he wouldn’t get lost.  We enjoyed having them along, since we have cruised most of our 6000+ mile Loop by ourselves.  Since we had been to most of the marinas up & down the river, we decided this time to try to anchor most of the way.  Since it takes about 7-8 days to get to Mobile, we will be that long between setting foot on solid ground.  We’re on Day 5 now & for the most part it’s been a cold 55 degrees & we have seen the sun only 4 hours since we left.  We’ve been in winter jackets & gloves most of the time.

North of Demopolis AL, we pass under the I-20/I-59
bridge, which we had driven over about 1000 times
as we went from New Orleans to Chattanooga

Our biggest challenge has been going through the locks in a reasonable time.  There are 12 locks total to pass through (all of them let us down towards sea level) & we’ve had to wait for towboats & their barges at nearly all of them.  Right now this morning, we’re waiting for 1-1/2 hours at our next lock).  There were some times when the lock operator says to get to his gates within 20 minutes & we might get through before the tow arrives.  So we race (as much as a trawler can race) to the lock, arrive 5 minutes too late, and then wait for 1-2 hours.  Then we have to find another anchorage for that night because of the delay.  Ah well, the joys of boating!  Good thing we’re salt-encrusted experienced boaters possessing a wealth of knowledge!



All along the 450 mile waterway to Mobile,
the river banks are so different

Tree roots searching for that soil which has been
washed away during high water

We have about 3-4 more days of travel before we hit Mobile.  Most of our anchorages are remote without phone or wifi connections, so this blog may not be updated for a while yet.  I’m starting to look at weather in Mobile Bay & Mississippi Sound towards New Orleans, & it doesn’t look too nice.  Since we’re heading back into salt water, I’ll have to get back out my tide tables & re-learn all that.  Who says you can’t teach old dogs new tricks!?

With all these river bends, turns & twists, it's no wonder
that it takes 7-8 days to get down to Mobile!

Miscellaneous

(Did I spell that big word correctly?)

We made our trip to Chattanooga by car, and Sue’s mother is doing pretty well.  We drove back to Southport NC to retrieve our personal car & rediscovered that it is a heck of a long way there and back.  Our car will live at John & Susan’s house until we return to Chattanooga in a couple weeks for our Thanksgiving family reunion.

Our trip across Tennessee was at the height of color of the autumn leaves.  Driving over the mountains just full of the browns, yellows, reds and greens of the leaves was breathtaking.  I guess this is one good thing about being delayed in our boat travels.

A week or so ago, the remnants of a hurricane which came through Mexico, passed through here and went north.  The winds kicked up on the Great Lakes so I decided to see what’s happening on Lake Michigan.  With gale-force winds of 45 kts, the waves were 14-16 feet, with occasional 20 foot!  Can you think of any other reason NOT to be in Lake Michigan?!?

We came back to the boat a couple days ago to find a familiar boat on the next dock.  Kenny and Kathy aboard M/V “No Zip Code” had just returned from cruising to Chattanooga & were getting ready to head south down the Tenn-Tom.  We had last seen them in May of this year, when we docked next to them at both Cape May NJ and then again in Staten Island NY.  That’s a common event for all the Loopers during the year, meeting again and again somewhere farther down the road (or waterway).

We finally found a slip in New Orleans to stay for the winter, and it was the last one available in the marina.  Another marina we had tried to get into had no space available.  For some reason, there are a lot more boats around there, compared to 3 years ago when we were last there.  We’ll be staying on the south shore of Lake Pontchartrain at South Shore Harbor Marina, a marina where we had stayed in early 2012.

So now we’re waiting for the cold front to come through tonight, and for the thunderstorms to cease, before we cast off our lines to head south.  We’ll need to watch river levels carefully, since the Tenn-Tom can get into flood very easily (we were caught in flood waters the first time we came up the Tenn-Tom).  Even if water levels don’t rise much, the dams will be spilling lots of water, which can lead to shoaling and shallow water in common anchorages.  I guess that if this were easy, most anyone could do it!  But travelling this waterway requires a crusty old sea dog with nerves of steel and salt water in his veins.  As soon as I find someone like this, I’ll let him drive my boat!

Crossing Our Wake

For the past 7 years or so, we have been members of America’s Great Loop Cruisers’ Association, with the goal of traveling around the 5000+ miles of waterways circling the eastern part of America.  The boaters of AGLCA (the “Loopers”) show their membership by flying a pennant or burgee on the bow of their boat: a white one for doing a “loop in progress”, and a gold one for “loop completion”.  On October 22, we completed our circumnavigation and qualified for the Gold Burgee.

Look! There's our wake from 4 years ago!!

The phrase we use for completing the loop is to “cross our wake” which we created some time ago when we were last at this exact spot.  Almost 4 years ago, we moved the boat from Chattanooga back to New Orleans, and passed through the junction of the Tennessee River and the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway (at the common border of Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama).  Wouldn’t you know it, but our wake from 4 years ago was still there (yeah, right) & we happily crossed it to complete our circle.

Our white burgee was so old, faded & torn that I told
Sue that we had to either buy a new white one
or just go ahead & earn a gold one!

Because we live full-time on the boat, we traveled some extra miles during our 4-year loop.  I’m guessing that we went over 6000 miles cruising north for the summer & south for the winter, and all of it at 10 miles per hour!  We traveled from the Tennessee River, down the Tenn-Tom Waterway to Mobile Bay, across Florida to the east coast, up the Atlantic ICW, through the Chesapeake Bay, past New York City up the Hudson River, across the Erie Canal and through the Great Lakes, south from Chicago into the Illinois River, the Mississippi River, the Ohio River, the Cumberland River, and finally back to the Tennessee River.

We feel we did something "above & beyond the call of duty"
to earn this gold burgee.

Probably the biggest thing I learned during these travels is how different are the geographic areas of cruising.  Cruising on the Tennessee River is totally different from the knowledge and skills needed to cruise on the Atlantic Intracoastal Waterway, or on the Great Lakes.  And even though some areas were relatively easy to cruise, there were many situations which challenged our seamanship skills and endurance.  I feel that we’ve really accomplished something by reaching this milestone.

But it all doesn’t stop here.  When we finish being landlubbers for the next 2 weeks, we’ll take the boat south to New Orleans this winter, and then over to the Florida Keys and to the Bahamas in the spring.  There’s more sights to see & we aim to see them!

The Beautiful Tennessee River

The bridge to nowhere.  Guess they needed a couple
million more to finish it!

If there were a river that was the direct antithesis (pretty big words for a retired guy!) of the Mississippi River, that would be the Tennessee River.  What a joy it was to be on the scenic, calm, quiet river with minimal head current and very few towboats.  It was just as we remembered it from 4-6 years ago when we lived in this neck of the woods.

 


An abandoned dock along the Tennessee River

Hey, TowBoatUS, I think I grounded on a sandbar!



We're in either Kentucky or Tennessee

We only spent 3 days on the Tennessee before we arrived at the turn onto the next waterway.  The first night out, we stopped at a quaint marina that was adequate, but nothing special.  That is, until breakfast the next morning, when the marina served free coffee and fresh-baked cinnamon rolls.  Did I mention that it was all free?  I had read about this marina on the Looper website, and it was an enjoyable stop.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Typical scenery along the Tennessee River

 

Our second night out, we anchored where the river split around an island.  As the sun was setting against the cliffs at water’s edge, the scenery was drop-dead gorgeous.  The river was calm & quiet, the birds were squawking, and the goats on the island came down to the river’s edge.  Yup, there were wild goats on the island.  Just another day cruising through America!  We really enjoyed our last night on the Tennessee River at this special anchorage.

The view out our "back door" at the anchorage

 

The next morning at anchor with wisps of fog on the river

Our friendly goats at our anchorage

Our last lock upbound.  From here to Mobile AL, it's all downhill.

The third day, we made our marina at the junction of the Tennessee River and the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway.  This junction is right at the common boundary of Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama.  Our next leg of our trip will be down the Tenn-Tom for 450 miles to Mobile AL.  But first, we’ll take about 2 weeks to rent a car, drive to Chattanooga for dentist appointments & to visit with Sue’s mother, and then drive back east to Southport NC, where we started our journey this year, to retrieve our personal car.  Then we’ll drive to Birmingham AL to our storage unit to pull out some winter clothes.  We’ve been pretty much freezing these past few weeks with only our summer clothes.



When we arrived at this marina, we reached a major milestone in our cruising adventures by completing the “Great Loop” of the waterways around the eastern part of America.  More about that on my next post, after we’re presented our “gold burgee”.

Mississippi & Ohio Rivers

Our chartplotter shows our path waiting
at one of the locks

Just when you think you’ve seen it all, there’s the Mississippi River.

We’ve had terribly bad luck getting through all the locks (if it weren’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all), having waited 2 hours on average for the tows & barges to go through, and as much as 5 hours wait time.  When we left Alton IL the first time, we were delayed at the marina to take fuel and get a pumpout, and then delayed at the nearby lock for 2 hours, at which time we cancelled our plans for the day & returned to Alton Marina to stay another night.

Some of these towboat captains need big signs to
see which way to go

The Arch at St Louis, from a view rarely seen

The leaves, they are a'changing

The next day, we made it through the two locks in a reasonable amount of time (timing is everything in arriving at the lock between the tows).  As we approached St. Louis, the turbulence in the river, the debris in the river, and the amount of towboat traffic increased dramatically.  From this point all the way south to New Orleans, there are no locks on the Mississippi to control water flow or flooding, so the river runs where it wants to.  Luckily, we came through in relatively low water, so turbulence and current were reduced, but we saw high water marks on the shore where the water had been 25 feet higher.  Even so, this river is not for the faint-of-heart.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One of the many many wing dams along the MS River

Our omnificent US Army Corps of Engineers built hundreds of stone wing dams along the river in order to control all the mud & silt from settling at the wrong place.  In doing so, these dams create considerable turbulence in the water, which is constantly present along our route, sometimes causing us to almost lose control of the boat.  And this is at low water with minimal current!

Our boat at Hoppie's Marina along the MS River

Our other bit of excitement was dealing with towboats with barges as much as 6 across by 7 deep.  It was like trying to pass an island that was moving.  And the upbound tows had to overcome a 4 mph river current, so they were pushing massive amounts of water as we passed.

We ended our first day at the famous (or infamous) Hoppie’s Marina in Kimmswick MO, the only “marina” along the rivers for 200+ miles.  And I use the word “marina” rather loosely, since Hoppie’s consists of 4 river barges tied together, anchored at the river’s edge.  But it is a common stopping point for all the Loopers, and we met two other boats which we traveled with during the next couple days.



Close quarters to anchor in the Diversion Canal.
Looking out the narrow entrance towards the MS River

The highlight of our 2^nd day on the Mississippi was finding and entering our night-time anchorage at Little River Diversion Canal.  This narrow canal, about 85 feet wide at low water (remember that our boat is 48 feet long), had to be entered from down river, since the river current was about 4 mph.  We set the throttles to slowly overcome the current, and then carefully angled the bow towards the canal entrance.  As soon as we got out of the current, we had to quickly cut throttles & turn hard to port to keep us from running aground on the canal banks.   And then we needed a stern anchor to keep us from swinging at anchor & sticking our rudders in the mud in the narrow canal.

Sunset on the Ohio River, still steaming to our anchorage

The next day we got underway before sunrise, made it through more turbulence on the Mississippi, and finally made the turn east onto the Ohio River.  After dodging numerous tows we became stalled at Lock 53 and the construction area for the new Olmsted Lock & Dam, as we entered their “security zone”.  After a 5-hour delay, we came out the other end of the zone & ran hard to make our anchorage for the night.  It was after dark when we dropped the hook on the side of the Ohio River, hopefully out of the way of the omnipresent towboats.  Quite a long & tiring day.

Tows stacked along the Ohio River waiting for the locks

And then we came to the really long delay on the Ohio – Lock 52.  Because of construction, maintenance of the lock chambers, and downriver construction, the tows are taking 3-4 DAYS to get through Lock 52.  They were stacked all along the river bank, having run their lead barge aground in the mud to wait their turn.  We ended up anchoring next to the lock to wait the 4 hours before our turn to lock through.  But the delay meant that we’d have to spend one more night at anchor on the river before getting to our marina on the Cumberland River.

Anchorage at the junction of the Ohio & Cumberland Rivers

Steaming up the calm, quiet, clear Cumberland River

But on Saturday 10/17, the moon & the stars all came into alignment, the moon was in the seventh hour, and Jupiter aligned with Mars, when we departed our anchorage before sunrise to travel the 30 miles up the Cumberland River, and the lock at the end had its lower gates wide open for us to steam right in!  Just above the lock we found our marina, where we stayed for a couple days to recuperate & make some minor repairs.  We also found a fantastic restaurant named Patti’s, which featured 2” thick pork chops, cooked slowly & tender as can be.  We made 2 meals out of the leftovers.

 

Inside the Barkley Lock on the Cumberland River

When we gotta dress like this, it's time to head south!

 

 

We are so glad to be off of the Mississippi, which was probably the nadir of our travels so far.  Tomorrow we head out on the beautiful Tennessee River for the 3-day trip to the beginning of the Tenn-Tom Waterway.  We feel that we’re back in our ol’ stomping grounds on the TN, having lived on the boat in Chattanooga for 2 years.  We’ll reach a significant milestone 3 days from now, and have a special celebration.  To be continued…

The Long, Tiring Illinois River

South of Chicago, we pass bridge after bridge
after bridge

We pushed hard to get all the way down the 330 miles of the Illinois River in 6 days, which was one day longer than most boaters take.  We had really bad luck at 6 of the 8 locks, waiting an average of 2 hours at each of the six.  That amounted to taking a day longer.  Most days, we traveled for 10 hours to try to make up for the delays at the locks, and it still took us 6 days.

 

The pathetically narrow Chicago Ship & Sanitary Canal

Each day was long and tiring, especially waiting for the locks to finish with their upbound or downbound tows (a tug boat with anywhere from 1 to 15 barges), which have priority over pleasure craft.  Another frustrating aspect of this trip was not knowing how long we had to wait (the lock operators would just say “I’ll get to you when I can”), and not knowing where we’ll spend the night until we finally make it through the lock.  Each day, we had to come up with 2 or 3 options for spending the night, including some questionable marinas and some really dicey anchorages. 

Some highlights:

The elevation of Lake Michigan is 579 feet above sea level.  Eventually, we’ll end up in New Orleans, at sea level (or maybe even below sea level).  All the locks along the Illinois and Mississippi Rivers will lower us down.  Then on the Ohio, Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers, the locks will take us up.  Finally, on the Tenn-Tom Waterway, we’ll be locking back down.  Kinda like a roller coaster!

At some locks, we waited so long that we could
watch the leaves changing on the trees!

The first day leaving Chicago was busy and stressful.  Numerous bridges to keep track of, calling for an opening when we didn’t think we could get under them.  On at least 2 bridges, I stood on our dinghy deck sighting under the bridge to determine whether we would clear or not, and as we passed under the bridge, I reached up to touch the bridge steel.  We cleared by mere inches.

And there were so many tows you couldn’t count them all.  The Chicago Ship & Sanitary Canal was so narrow that at one point when we met a wide oncoming tow, we had to turn around & go back ½ mile to a side harbor to wait until he passed us.

"Winds of Change" a 30' Lyman from Sandusky

As we waited at the first lock that day, another Looper boat joined us, a wonderfully restored 30’ wooden boat built in 1967 by Lyman from Sandusky Ohio.  I was on Lake Erie during that time and saw many Lymans, with their distinctive bow rake.  Turns out that the owners home-ported their boat in Sandusky, which is only 15 miles from Middle Bass Island, where we home-ported our boat.   Small world!  We ended up traveling with “Winds of Change” for several days on the river, since they too had been held up in Chicago for over a week due to bad weather on Lake Michigan.

At the Caterpillar Visitor's Center, in Peoria IL, I learn how to
operate a front-end loader (I know, don't give up my day job!)

 

A replica of the largest truck that CAT makes, for the mining industry

 

The "City of Peoria" has a river boat, in case we want
to take a ride on the river!

The bridges are more fun to cruise under, if they
have a train going across!

Tending to the navigation aids along the river

The one day I DON’T want to re-live is the day we had to travel on the river after dark.  We had been held up at the lock for 3-1/2 hours, and were trying to make a marina (and a poor excuse for a marina, at that) for the night, because there were no acceptable anchorages along the route.  We knew we were going to be out after dark, so I’m re-installing our topmost navigation light, caulking and splicing wires, as Sue is driving the boat.  We had taken down that light to reduce our height, so we could fit under the low bridges in Chicago.  Meanwhile, our friends on “Winds of Change” went on ahead of us into the destination marina.  Night falls when we’re about 5 miles from the marina (remember that we only travel at 10 mph), so we’re struggling with the chartplotter and radar to pick out the red and green buoys to mark the channel.  That’s when our friends call us to report that a tow just passed the marina & is heading our way!  As we round the bend, we are blinded by the towboat’s searchlight, which he uses to find his buoys.  Then we go way outside the channel into shallow water to avoid the tow’s propwash.  Then we can’t see the entrance to the marina, even with our searchlight, and need our friends to talk us in using their cell phone.  Yes, we had some special elixirs that night to calm our nerves.

 
 

We were surprised to see so many white pelicans
this far north.

It's getting cold in Illinois!

So now, we’re spending 2 nights at a marina in Alton, Illinois, on the Mississippi River.  As we passed the junction of the Illinois and MS Rivers, the river was very wide, calm and pretty.  Much better than I had expected.  We depart tomorrow for hopefully a 5-day trip down the Mississippi 200 miles, up the Ohio River for 50 miles, and onto the Cumberland River about 40 miles.  At that point, we can breathe a sigh of relief.  The Cumberland and Tennessee River should be a lot less stressful.  We’ll let you know.

Erosion from the flooding earlier this year

I hear the tune to "Deliverance"

The junction of Illinois and Mississippi Rivers

When we anchor for the night, we're not far off the channel.
These tows sound really great in the middle of the night!

Sunrise at the anchorage.
We get up at zero-dark thirty

Entering the fog bank on the river.
Time to fire up the ol' radar!

In Alton IL, the American Queen riverboat made a stop
right next to our marina.  As it got underway, they
played the steam-driven calliope.

One Miserable Week in Hammond

Not just because Hammond is the armpit of the nation, but because of this ungodly wind that just won’t quit!

We came into this marina last Monday, knowing that a cold front was coming the next day.  What we didn’t know was that a giant high pressure was to follow, and that high pressure, with gale-force winds, just sat down on top of us for almost a week.  This marina is at the most southern tip of Lake Michigan, so the incessant northeast winds have created 8-10’ waves just outside the marina breakwall.

The winds have not gone below 20 mph since Monday night, have mostly been 25-30 mph, and sometimes gusting as high as 40 mph.  Our boat has been dancing in the dock slip just because of the gusty winds.  But the worst of it is that the waves are crashing at the marina entrance, and large swells are entering the marina exactly on our beam, causing so much rolling that both of us are getting seasick AT THE DOCK!  We’re rolling continually about 20 degrees in our slip, and the dock lines are snapping back and forth, causing jerky motions back and forth, which are totally nauseating.  I have 17 dock lines on the boat, spread out like a horizontal spider web.  With the gusty winds, the nylon lines will severely stretch and then quickly recoil just as a swell rocks the boat from the other side.  I have already punctured another dock fender, but as of yet, haven’t parted any dock lines.

We’ve gotten little sleep at night because of the snap rolls.  It was so bad yesterday that we went to Walmart just to get off the boat.  And going to Walmart was the highlight of our day!  We thought of moving the boat to another slip, but trying to maneuver the boat in 25-30 mph winds is suicide.  Talk about a helpless feeling.


The NOAA report says that this mess is caused by a super high pressure system of 30.8" Hg sitting to the north of us.  To put this 30.8" in perspective, "standard" barometric pressure is 29.92" Hg.  During most of the year, a high pressure system causing real pretty days is around 30.2" Hg.  A strong high pressure is 30.4", causing lots of wind.  A super-duper high is 30.5".  This thing is a monster at 30.8".

And the real frustration is that we’re so near to getting into the river system & getting protection from these winds and waves.  We have a mere 3 miles to go from this marina into Calumet Harbor & into the river.  So near, yet so far.

The weather prognosticators think the winds will start to die tomorrow.  It will take at least a day for the waves to die down, so it’s looking like Monday before we get out of here.  This week delay, coupled with the 2 week delay in northern Wisconsin, is causing us to be way too close to the cold weather.  We had originally hoped to be on the Tennessee River by October, enjoying some beautiful cruising with our friends.  Instead, we’ll just have another sea story to tell over a good stiff drink.