Day 5: Sunday, September 9, 2012
Underway: 8:28 am Motor Off: 5:58 pm Miles Traveled: 35 Stayed At: Anchor
First Things First: First time for Cindy docking the boat while at the helm; first new state border – crossed into Iowa today; first night without cell coverage; first time trying the inverter (used to convert 12v battery power to 110v) to run a small blender (not really powerful enough); first swim in the Mississippi River (Mike only) – very refreshing after a long day in the sun.
Mile 697 to Mile: 662: Another beautiful and quiet day on the river. We still can’t believe we have had the river pretty much to ourselves. Saw the largest tow so far – 3 barges across and 5 barges long – 15 huge barges being pushed upriver by the tug Charlie G to unload something heavy and reload with grain for the trip south again soon (glad we didn’t have to wait for him at a lock). Stopped at Brownsville, Minnesota in the morning to fill our gas containers – the opportunities to get gas are few and far between so we need to try to stay topped off whenever possible. Only a one hour wait at Lock 8 today while a tow was reassembled. The reason it takes so long is that the larger tows can only bring part of their barges through each lock at once so the biggest one may have to make 3 trips to reassemble their entire load – at every lock they go through.
We stopped for gas and ice in Lancing, Iowa – a nice little town with a convenient courtesy dock. Anchored just south of Lancing in a small shallow cove – nice to have a boat that can sneak into shallow spaces (our boat draws about 2.5 feet with the centerboard up). Believe it or not but we made it all the way to Iowa without having to share a lock.
We stopped early enough to enjoy a wonderful meal in the cockpit. We fried some fish Mike’s brother Gary caught and filleted for us recently, added leftover hashbrowns from last night, a gourmet salad and strawberry margaritas (again) and you have a meal worth writing home about.
Wild Things: A large flock of pelicans and more amazing eagles. A 15 barge tow is a pretty wild thing up close (coming around a corner) too.
