We finished up our Illinois River voyage on Thursday, entering Grafton Harbor, just a stone’s throw from where the Illinois joins the great Mississippi River for its’ journey to the Gulf. Friday we entered the Mississippi at about 8:00 AM, planning to cover 63 miles that day.
No kidding, we passed Nina and Pinta (again!) in Grafton!
The bluffs along the shore as we entered the Mississippi River
We passed St. Louis, a nice skyline, but not a nice waterfront
This one's for you, Algonquin!
The Mississippi shore
Whoa! While the Illinois reminded me of home, the Mississippi River was a totally new experience. I mentioned the barges on the Illinois previously. Well on the Miss, there are BARGES! Lots and lots of them, and they are HUGE! The towboat drivers speak some strange language that sometimes has a few English words or phrases thrown in. Most of it is a collection of garbled down home river slang or Cajun. They’re really nice, especially if the Admiral gets on the radio (imagine that), but I’ll be damned if we can understand but about half what they say. Wish we were runnin with Billy and Pam on Godspeed so they could translate.
“City of Vicksburg this is the down bound pleasure craft Once Around, we’d like to pass when it’s safe. What do you advise?”
“Turnin’ tight on the greens, no wake if ya’ don’ mind, see ya’on the two whistle.”
Translation: “I’m going to favor the right side of the channel, slow down and pass me on the left.” Got that? Good. Cause if you screw it up, this guy is going to crush you against the bank! It’s really not all that hard, except sometimes they sound like this:
“Bluga don thin wo cayn’t till then, so see ya on the one later”. (Or, something like that).
My favorite was, after a long pause without a response since we tried to contact him:
“OOOKaayyy now, cooome onnn arrroound, Once Around, see ya on the one. Where y'all from, anyway?”
Moonstruck passes a tow with 36 barges (6 x 6) "on the one whistle"
The turbulence the tows throw doesn't look bad here, but it really throws you around if you get caught in it!
And the currents in the Mississippi…unreal. In addition to the 4-5 mile per hour current, the Corp. of Engineers has installed some weirs in many of the turns (locals can’t figure out why) that really screw up the water and make for some interesting swirling eddies. Combined with the turbulence caused by the tow boats and…well, a 45’ boat can get tossed around like a cork. It’s a trip! If you haven’t figured it out by now, the Mississippi River is not exactly recreational boating heaven. It’s an experience, but not one you want to do over and over again. In fact, there are very, very few places for a boat like ours to stop for the night. Hoppie’s Marina is one of those very few, in fact, the only one within a couple hundred miles!
We arrived safely and happy to be off the river at Hoppie’s Marina around 2:00 PM. We and Moonstruck both topped off our tanks, as Hoppie’s is also the last fuel stop for the next three hundred and some miles. Besides the two of us, there were two other Looper boats there, Kadadi and Five C’s. To say that Hoppie’s is not exactly a fancy place is kind of an understatement. It consists of a few old barges tied together end to end. Hoppie and his wife, Fern (age 84!), have run the place since 1973 when they took it over from Hoppie’s parents, who started it in 1934. They are legend on this river of legends.
The end of the day ritual at Hoppie’s is a 4:30 PM “briefing”, my word not hers, that Fern does for all the Loopers. This woman knows the rivers like the back of her hand and loves to share her knowledge with her guests. She holds court under a tin roof next to the fuel pumps and smokes at least a dozen cigarettes (right under her “no smoking” sign) during the lecture. She covers the Mississippi down to the Ohio and up that river to the Tennessee and Cumberland. She then covers the rivers south as far as her guests desire. She has current knowledge of where you can or can’t anchor safely, which can change quickly on these rivers. She does this seven days a week during “the season”, and said she thinks she’s seen about 200 Loopers so far this year. She is a modern day Huck Finn in her love of the river, and the boats that do their best to try and tame her. She gave us a healthy respect for the river ahead.
Hoppie's Marina, from the north end
That's Fern in her golf cart, the "executive suite" beyond
Fern goes over charts with the Loopers (including my Admiral in yellow)
Saturday we left Hoppie’s at dawn and ran what has been by far our longest cruise so far in six months, 111 miles. Of course, the aid of about 4-5 mph current really helps! I know, that doesn’t sound like much to you non-boaters or fast boaters, but when you normally do 9 or 10 mph and all of a sudden you are doing 14…do the math…you can cover lot more ground in 8 hours. And we did.
We pulled into (one of Fern’s recommended stops) Little Diversion Channel at about 3 PM. It is about 200 feet wide and long enough for several boats to anchor. Good thing too, because besides us and our wingman Moonstruck, we were joined by three other Looper boats (Irish Rover, Love Shack and Blue Skies), whose crews we had not met before. Within a few minutes we had organized a cocktail party. At 5:00 PM I launched the dinghy and played water taxi taking everyone to Irish Rover for drinks and snacks. The party broke up about 7:00, as we all have another long day on the river tomorrow.
Once Around at anchor in Little Diversion Channel
Cocktails aboard Irish Rover
As I ferried everyone back to their own boats in the quiet of the night, we heard a lonely bagpipe playing an Irish tune. It was Kevin, the Irish Rover. Just one more magical moment on the Loop!
Kevin, atop Irish Rover with his bagpipe
Tomorrow, 50 more miles on the Mississippi and then turn up the Ohio River headed for the Cumberland River. We hope to make Green Turtle Bay, Kentucky, late on Monday. That will be a challenge.
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