Week 19

 



Week 19
Nov. 17-23


Monday


 We survived the night just fine this time on anchor. No alarms!! Woot woot! We went through 4 locks today. The Whitten lock leaks and sprays on the boat (and the people on the boat)!


We stopped and got fuel went through one more lock and then dropped the anchor by the Wilkin’s lock for a total of 33 nautical miles today.




Tuesday

We were up at 6 and went right through our first lock before the sun even was up.This part of the cruising is on the Ten-Tombigbee waterway in Mississippi.


We went through 3 more locks today. It went really smooth. After the 4th lock we passed a spot where there's a telephone booth just sitting on the bank of the river. We crossed over into Alabama by the city of Columbus. We got to an anchorage about 3 p.m. That was a 9 hour day and 60.4 nautical miles.
We got the dingy down to go to shore where we could go for a nice walk in a nature preserve The weather was perfect, high 78°. We can feel it's more humid, but it's really pleasant. On our way back to shore we thought we would go around an island. It proved to be too treacherous. We got stuck on a big tree stump under water and bottomed out on a sandbar. We decided to save our dingy prop and not go exploring further tonight.
When we were trying to hook the dingy up to the winch, the pin fell out of the hook clamp thing and fell in the lake. Ed had to put it together with wire for now so we could lift the dingy with the davit to the flybride. There's another part we have to go find!


Wednesday


 We got through our first lock at 7 a.m. this morning. The first leg of our cruise today was nerve wracking. There were a lot of logs and trees submerged.
We dropped anchor for a couple of hours to have our institute class.
We made it through another lock and then anchored at the Tombigbee oxbow anchorage. We traveled 34 nautical miles today.







Thursday


 We woke up at 6 this morning to dense fog. We had to wait 2 hours before we could pull up the anchor. No locks today! We traveled 43 nautical miles to Demopolis AL. We passed by the beautiful white cliffs of Epes. They look like the white cliffs of Dover. They are made of limestone.  It was such a nice day of 80°. It's the first time I've put on shorts and a t shirt in almost 2 mos.  Allison is always cold in the day.  Ed has been wearing shorts and even going shirtless at times it is so warm.


It was so nice to get into a marina and get to a laundry. We walked almost 3 miles to a cute restaurant called the red barn. It's an old converted barn. We hoped to get an Uber ride back to the marina, but Demopolis didn't have Uber and no one from the nearby towns wanted to pick us up. When we walked out the door, the hostess was outside and saw Ed looking at his phone wondering what to do. She asked where we were headed. We told her the marina, but we couldn't get an Uber so we were going to walk. She said, "No you're not. I'm going to get you a ride." She went in and comes back out with her own car keys. She said she had a boat there and knew how far it was. She said this is a small town. This is what we do. Her name was Debra and she was just so kind. This is the epítome of southern hospitality!!!  We were so grateful.  We took a picture of this kind Christlike soul.



Friday


 We got the courtesy van first thing this morning. We did a Walmart run and a hardware run. It started to rain. The lock wasn't going to be ready to let us through until 1pm, but then he called and said if we could be there in 15 min. he'd get us through just after noon. We hurried fast and did it. We traveled 41 nautical miles and dropped anchor in barons anchorage in Coffee lake. We only have 1 more lock to get through on this loop!!!




The fog rolled in at sundown and then was gone a few hours later. It was weird. A barge came by and really rocked us. It felt like the most precarious anchoring we've done.


Saturday


 12 barges came by in the night about 50 feet from us. It was a nerve wracking night until 4 am. They all talk on the radio to each other and we were so close to their channel we had to stay on the radio for safety.  Then it was quiet. We left the anchorage a little after 7 am to travel to the Okatuppa creek anchorage for a 39.6 nautical mile cruise. It's a beautiful peaceful spot. We got the dingy down to go for a nice ride. There are alligators here and 6 types of venomous snakes! We didn't see any though. We ran into some other loopers who came in to anchor nearby. I did our Sat boat chores. We watched a very exciting utah football game against Kansas state. We didn't know who was going to win until the last min! Utah pulled off an amazing win.




Sunday


 We pulled up anchor at 7 a.m. We traveled until 2 cruising 53 nautical miles. We anchored in 3 rivers lake anchorage. We watched football and played games with Josh, Emma, and, Elise over Whatsapp. We laughed a lot. It was good medicine for our souls!






See you next time!


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