Our day started early once again – we pulled out of our slip at 6:40 a.m. and I got to see a pretty sunrise. We took the lead and the third boat in our trio sent me the photo of all three boats headed down river.
There was a bridge just a couple of miles from our starting spot. that we weren’t sure we could pass under without lowering our radar, so we asked to have it opened. It was a railroad bridge and the bridge tender said there was a train coming that was just a few minutes away, so we would have to wait until the train passed. The train did indeed cross the bridge a few minutes later but it was incredibly long. It turns out that this was just the beginning of waiting all day long.
There was a lock about 10 miles down river from our starting point which unfortunately was quite busy. We were able to tie up to the wall of a restaurant just above the lock and wait for word from the lockmaster that we could enter. A boat that had left Heritage Harbor a day before us was also waiting for the lock so they joined our trio. We finally got through the lock and we said good bye to the other 3 boats. We can travel about twice as fast as they can, so we wanted to move along and get to our next destination more quickly. The scenery through this part is rather monotonous and tends to make us want to take a nap – not a good idea when you’re driving a boat!
At least there were some interesting sights as we passed Peoria.
There are still plenty of industrial buildings along the river banks
And lots of barge traffic. We lost track of how many barges we passed today – and it seems we had to wait for most of them to maneuver around bends before we could get past them safely. It was a slow day – it took us 8 1/2 hours to go 81 miles.
We arrived at Logsdon Tug Service in Beardstown IL about 3:15 and tied up to a wall with 3 tugs in front of us and 2 barges behind us. There’s no power or water, just a safe place to spend the night, so we fired up the generator, turned on the A/C, used the water from our water tank to shower – we can be very self-sufficient when we need to be. We were talking to one of the guys who works on the tugs and asked about places to get food. He had just met us but he offered us the use of his Jeep if we didn’t want to walk – small town hospitality at its best! We decided to walk and found La Familia Taqueria just a few blocks away. We ordered way too much food, got 2 bolillos (a type of roll that’s great for sandwiches), and 2 paletas (a type of popsicle) for $27!
Tonight’s sunset – with another looper boat and two barges behind us
Let’s do some math here…. 81 miles in 8 1/2 hours figures you averaged 9.5 mph (8.25 kts). If you were sailing that distance at an average 5 mph (4.35 kts which is probably on the high end) then it would have taken at least 16.2 hours!
So many questions…. for starters, is the current very strong or an issue? What is the average drop when you go through the locks? Have any of the other Loopers you have met done this before or is it their first? I imagine there is a lot a VHF radio traffic with all the barges/tugs. Too bad you don’t have an HF radio so we could have tried to keep in touch with radio. I know it is old fashioned but much more exciting to talk on the radio than using a cell phone (I know I am weird!)
Love reading your posts. Keep having fun and be safe.
Current didn’t really pick up until the last day, and even then,, it wasn’t really an issue. Getting into marinas from the river was often easier than getting into our slips in Saugatuck and Holland!
Lock drops ranged from 1-2 ft ( our first lock which we just floated in) to 34 feet. Drops were: 1-2, 30-42, 34, 22, 24, 18, 11, 7 (all in feet).
Most of the people we’ve met are first-timers.
There hasn’t been much VHF radio traffic. You hear tows asking about bridge openings and lock info, but that’s it. On several occasions they wouldn’t even respond to our questions about which side they would like us to pass on.
I am fascinated by the degree of skill and courage it takes to do this trip and the amount of information you have conveyed in such an interesting way. I bet you are sleeping soundly at night after all the action during the day!. And you might think of doing a calendar of your wonderful photos of sunsets and sunrises.