Week 12

Sep 29- Oct 6

Monday

We left Kenosha Wisconsin at 8 this morning for a 45 nautical mile cruise to Chicago. We got in around 1 to the DuSable marina. It's a very nice marina within close walking distance to many things literally right next to Navy pier.

We spent the afternoon with Josh and Emma at the aquarium. It was a really nice, big, aquarium. We ran into our friends from the salty side eye. They were gracious enough to give us a ride back to the marina from the aquarium so we didn’t have to walk the 2 miles back. We decided to all go out to dinner together and walked over to the navy pier for dinner. Then we walked to this really fun bakery called Molly's cupcakes. It was so cute and had the best variety of cupcakes!!! The walk home was gorgeous over the river and to see a lot of the Chicago big city buildings at night.

Tuesday

Josh wasn't feeling well this morning, so Ed and I walked to the planetarium. We spent an interesting couple of hours there.

In the afternoon we went on the architectural boat tour. It was the highlight of our stay in Chicago. We were on a big tourist boat in the Chicago River seeing all the different buildings and getting a little history lesson. Chicago has the most moving bridges in the country. It also is the only city that reversed it's river and it is still reversed today. The river used to flow into Lake Michigan. After years of polluting the lake they built a lock to prevent the water flowing into the lake. Now their sewage runs down to St. Louis. After the great Chicago fire in the 1800s most of the buildings are made of stone. There's a huge Chinatown here. It was a major stop from New York to Los Angeles. Many immigrants got off at the Chicago stop.

We walked to the Vacheron Constantin watch store. It is a very exclusive watch brand that Josh really wanted to see. There are only 4 stores in the U.S. and one is here in Chicago.

We have loved Chicago. It's beautiful and interesting with many things to do.

Wednesday

We left the marina to go through downtown Chicago and then continue on the Chicago River 35 nautical miles to Joliete, IL. We went under about 40 bridges. Most of them we could fit under; barely. See our YouTube videos. One train bridge we had to wait for them to lift it.

We stopped for lunch and had our institute class tied up to an old decaying industrial dock on the river.

We traveled through 300 feet of electrified water. There are Asian carp that are an invasive species. They are keeping them out of Lake Michigan with this electrified water. They can get 149 pounds, many feet long and jump into boats. They have been known to knock people off boats. We didn't see any today but did Sunday.

We went through 2 locks. The second lock we had to wait over an hour while a barge was coming through. We were warned that the waiting time at locks can be really long. On the rivers commercial traffic gets precedence.

We merged into the Illinois River and will be on that for quite a couple hundred miles; 240.

We tied up on the public wall at Joliet Illinois. There are 5 other loopers here on the wall. We said a quick hello to them and 3 couples joined us for dinner in town. It was a very smooth day for our first leg of the rivers.

Thursday

We stayed in Joliete today. We went to 2 small museums. One was a history of musicians from Illinois. The saying is that jazz was born in Louisiana but grew up in Chicago. The other museum was a little history of Joliete.

Back at the boat we had lunch and played some games. Emma and I went for a walk. We were all trying hard to stay awake. We had a terrible night sleep due to the noise the bridge was making all night as it sirens and bells rang and it opened and closed for barges. The barges go 24/7, so the bridges and locks do too. It was super noisy.

This afternoon, Josh and Emma took an Uber to the Chicago Airport an hour away. We were sad to see them go. We had a great time with them aboard. We helped 3 new looper boats tie onto the wall. We went to dinner with Paul and Suzanne Glow from the boat Oma. It was their first day! They have been sailing on lake Michigan for over 30 years and live on their boat full time. Very interesting couple who also have a house near Brighton Utah. They live in Brighton for the winter months and then on their boat for the summer.

Friday

Happy 63rd bday to Ed!!!!

We left the wall and headed down the river at 8:15. We heard they don't raise the bridge until 8:30. It was an Amtrak train bridge. Our first lock was only a 20 min wait. The 2nd lock 3 hours wait at the top. We dropped anchor and just hung out. It was a beautiful warm day and very pleasant. I even took a nap. The 3rd lock there was no wait. We hurried to get through this one as we wanted to get to the marina before dark. Most of the time we cruised around 8 knots but we sped up to 16.5 knots to get to this lock.

The average drop in the locks today was 35 feet. In the commercial locks we use a midship line and hook it around a floating ballard and tie it back to the boat. It's much easier. In the other locks we've had to use a bow and stern line and hold them the whole time. This new way is easier and I don't have to stand in the sun, or rain, holding a line. The locks are also so much wider to accommodate the barges that are sometimes tied together double or triple wide.

We traveled 40 nautical miles to Ottawa, IL and arrived a little after 5. It was a long travel day but smooth. We love it when there is no wind while docking at the marina! We stayed in heritage harbor marina. It was very nice. It's not very close to town, several miles away. They did have a restaurant that we ate dinner in. We went for a walk around the harbor.

Saturday

The fuel dock didn't open until 9, so we had to wait until then to leave after we filled up.

Our first lock was 12 miles down the river. We waited a little over 2 hours. We listened to general conference so it was actually really nice.

We traveled a total of 40 nautical miles to Hennipen Big Bend Marina. It was very small. It was very windy. We considered anchoring but it was just too windy.

The laundromat and grocery were up a pretty steep hill. I was lamenting having to carry laundry up and groceries down, but found out this marina had a couple of golf carts for our use. Hallelujah! I was able to get all our laundry done and get to the small grocery.

We pulled into the marina right in front of Good Karma. Of course Liz invited us for dinner. She's so sweet! I took a Marie calendars coconut cream pie over for my contribution. Another couple also joined us, Eddie and Karen from Windsor Rose. Super nice couple. They traveled on the river with us all day.

Back on our boat we listened to the evening session of conference. It was a nice way to end the day. We particularly enjoyed Elder Jackson's talk. We heard those same stories when we traveled with him in Peru. Reaching out to the one and naming him is a very tender subject to Elder Jackson, and to us. It resonates with us.

Sunday

No locks or bridges today!! We left Hennepin around 8 to cruise 39 nautical miles to Peoria, IL. We arrived at 3:30. It was super windy which is always stressful to dock in. We did it without any mishaps. We helped 2 other looper boats to dock when they arrived shortly after we did.

The three of us are going to travel together tomorrow, so we had a powwow to decide what time to leave to get through the next lock and where to anchor tomorrow night as there are few marinas on the rivers and little fuel! Ughh.