Day 6: Monday, September 10, 2012
Underway: 7:40 am Motor Off: 5:43 pm Miles Traveled: 42 Stayed At: Anchor
First Things First: First morning with fog – beautiful; saw our first river dredging operation; first time Cindy locked through while floating in middle of a lock instead of holding ropes on the side (with only calm verbal guidance from Mike).
Mile 662 to Mile 620: Long, sunny, windy and tiring (but still fun) day. We are traveling almost directly south between Iowa and Wisconsin and the wind was blowing 15-20 mph most of the day right on our nose. I’ll take the wind over rain and clouds any day though.
The river kept us busy today (as it seems to do everyday). It’s a fulltime job to navigate the river and not go off course or out of the channel where there are lots of things to hit (like logs, wing dams, rocks and mud). We didn’t have a snack for lunch until 2:30 pm – there always seems to be something that has a higher priority like navigating, steering, planning our route, fixing something, organizing, getting gas, taking pictures or cleaning. We’ve talked about napping but have not had time to actually do it yet.
We stopped in a quaint little town – McGreggor, Iowa – to top off our gas and get a few essentials. Towns are surprisingly few and far between right now – especially ones that have docks and facilities right by the river. Makes getting important things like gas a constant challenge. We met Mike (Animal to his friends) – another interesting traveler at the dock. He had everything that was packed in his canoe piled on the dock while he fixed his only seat. He started his journey in June in Itasca Minnesota at the headwaters of the Mississippi. He hopes to travel the entire length of the river – no motor or sail – just arm power. I suspect he will make it – he hiked the entire length of the Appalachian Trail last year – an amazing accomplishment.
It is interesting how fast you can find something in common with a perfect stranger. Mike (Animal) has spent time in our hometown and we knew people in common. He told us a story (probably pretty infamous on the river this year) about two girls from New Zealand traveling the Mississippi by kayak – frequently in bikinis. Amazingly, we had already heard this story earlier from our friends Cliff and Caroline. They saw the girls (in bikinis) passing Slipperies in Wabasha on a log raft towing their kayak. At the time, they were traveling with a guy they met from France trying to float the river on a homemade log raft (a very slow way to travel). I suspect we will here this story more than once.
We passed the 200-mile mark today – we are now 1/30th of the way around. That sounds a lot better than 1/60th of the way around a couple days ago. We also finally finished the last of our daughter Sarah’s delicious banana bread – it has sustained us every day – thanks Sarah.
