Muddy River, Ohio River, Clumberland River

• We traveled 44 miles down the Mississippi to the town of Kimmswick, MO, and a place called Hoppie's. On the Mississippi the places to spend the night and get fuel are few and far between. You can not just pull over and anchor because the barges travel 24 hours a day and they can not just stop if you're in the way. We were told to be very careful when we anchored because a barge can break loose and because of the speed of the current you could get hit and God help you if this happens. It's a silent threat because there are no motors and you can not hear it coming.
• Hoppie's is several barges tied together. A wonderful and interesting woman runs the marina. You can not help but like her, she's a little bit mother and a lot Tugboat Annie. From the moment you pull up you know who's the boss. She tells you where to tie up and how she wants you tied up. The next thing she does is tell you to meet her at whatever time she picks because she wants to go over some information with you. At first you say to yourself, who is this woman? You do as you are told and attend the meeting. The information she gives you is invaluable and worth every minute it takes . As I mentioned you have to be very careful where you anchor. This woman gives you her knowledge of the Mississippi and what is happening at that time. She told us that a heavy rain storm was coming and not to take any chances. She said that you can not just anchor in a narrow opening because with the heavy rain a "wall" of water will come down from the little tributaries and you will be swept away and a lot of damage is caused...if you survive. She went over a list of common places to stay and told us which ones to stay away from.
• We left the next morning with our tanks full and ready to get ahead of the heavy rain storms that were due. We rode 110 miles, this makes for a very long day. Between watching for the debris (tree trunks) and the many barges you are totally exhausted after traveling 10 hours. We anchored at Little Diversion Channel. This narrow channel gives you plenty of protection from the current and passing traffic. We were in a valley and it was a very hot spot. We ate and fell asleep early.
• We left at the crack of dawn the next morning and decided to go all the way to the next marina - Green Turtle Bay Marina. We continued down the Mississippi with the current giving us an extra 4 knots. As I mentioned earlier, we had to be careful of our fuel because there's no place to stop. Forty miles down river there's a popular anchorage called Angelo Towhead. Fern, the lady from Hoppie's, told us not to stay there because when the Army Corps of Engineers cleared this land they cut down the trees and left the stumps, with the water low, you can damage your props.
• We made our way to the Ohio River, we not only lost the 4 extra knots but because we were now going upstream we had the current against us and now were losing 2 knots. This river is so much cleaner than the Big Muddy, it's more like the color of the canals at home. There are lots of tows working in this area and you must keep alert. We will have to go at least 60 miles to the Cumberland River. On the Mississippi the green markers were on our starboard and red on our port, we are now back to the red on our starboard because we are going upstream.
• Now the trouble begins. At the locks the barges are taken first. Pleasure crafts don't count. We had less then a 30 minute wait. You pull in and the lockmaster drops down a hook to you, you put your line on it and she (this time the lockmaster was a female) loops your line around a fixed buoy and then passes it back to you. No big deal, we're on our way again. We have now traveled 68 miles. Next lock... we had to wait 3 1/2 hours. Just circling around, against the current using fuel. I'm getting anxious. It's getting late and the fuel gauge is on 1/2. We get through and decide to speed it up a little because it gets dark around 7-7:30.
• We still had 60 miles to go. We had a talk with Dennis and Ruth and decided to just keep trucking, we started to speed up. Mike felt we had enough fuel, what we wouldn't have is daylight to travel unknown waters with barges around bends that we can't see. At home we often drive the boat at night, it's our way of getting every last minute at the club, even there it can be nerve racking because it's hard to see.
• Today we have traveled the Mississippi River, the Ohio River and now the Cumberland River. We were in Missouri, Illinois and Kentucky.
• We are on the Cumberland River; it twists and turns and at some points is very narrow. We only passed 2 barges. We are going quite fast, the moon is shining bright. I thought this would be a good thing, instead it created a shadow that made it hard to tell what was a real tree and what was a reflection. We had to slow down, it was just too hard to see cause it's really dark and right off our port was a huge tree sticking out of the water. If we had hit it we would have put a hole in the boat. We came to our last lock for the day, we called the lockmaster and he said come right in, no wait. We pull up but could not see the green light. The lockmaster called us and said "What are you waiting for, come on in." We told him we could not see the opening, he then directed us in, we were able to go right through. When we got out of the lock we were in Grand River, Kentucky.
• We had to go 1 mile to our final destination. It's very dark, we had the search lights out looking for any marker, these markers are private for the marina, we see one and follow it in. Now it is 9 P.M. We pull into the marina, the place is very quiet, no one around. We got lucky, our slips were not in a tricky spot, we were able to just pull in. Another long day, around 13 hours. A hot shower and we slept like babies.
• The next morning we saw a couple we knew. Their boat was on the hard. They did not stop at Hoppie's and went to Angelo Towhead. They needed new props...