Sunday, August 23, 2009

Lock and Dam to the left

Rich and I above, Jan and I
below with hat's Kelly gave us

our boats

This is definately the trip of our lifetime, each day is different, it's never boring even with being on the boat several hours a day (usually 8, 9 hours) we look somewhat 'weathered' don't we. We have met more nice people here in the South, more than I ever imagined. Tennessee was very beautiful. We are now in Amory, Mississippi. It is a run down little town, with a very run down Marina that was written up to be a great place. Jesse, the owner, was a very nice 83 year old with the typical Mississippi accent, with one ear chewed off, he brought us for a mini tour of his little town. I'm glad the hotel he picked out for us a really a nice new place. We asked where we could get some dinner. Tiffany, the front desk girl said her sister would be back soon and she could take us whereever we wanted. So, the four of us piled into her car. Amber is a large person of color who is very nice. We're joking around with her, and laughing up a storm. First we ate dinner at Wendy's then Don asked her to go to the KFC so he could get chicken for on the boat tomorrow. (we're sort of sandwiched out) We went through the drive in and all the staff came to the window to check out who Amber had in her car (small town, they recognized her voice) you could see their jaws drop. Amber had a car full of white folk!! She just said, yeh, I'm a taxi driver tonight. We laughed so hard - she'll be the talk of the town for two days.

In the last 24 hours we've experienced the most gorgeous Marina - the Grand Harbor Marina on the line of Counce, TN and Iuka, MS. This place was superb with great customer service, beautiful buildings, gorgeous spot, slips full of million $ boats to Jesse's Marina, the Smithville Marina, with all rundown boats, a building ready to fall down and I could go on but.....Anyway the best and the worst.

The Grand Harbor was the most beautiful we've seen, the second best was the Green Turtle Bay Marina on Barkley Lake/Tennessee River. The third best was the Alton Illinois Marina on the Mississippi and fourth was Catfish Charlie's / American Marine at Dubuque (Iowa) Yacht Basin on Mississippi. Great helpful people at all Marina's in general and we haven't met a bad townsperson yet.

The trip has not gotten boring in any way, shape or form. How could it? It's beautiful on all the rivers. Around each bend is a new experience, a new place to check out. This trip is awesome. It's so hard to believe we've been gone since the 5th and here it is the 23rd.

So far we've traveled 1200 miles by river, averaging about 9 1/2 to 10 miles an hour, we've used 300.41 gallons of gas, used 275 pounds of ice, gone through 32 Lock and Dams the lowest elevation change being 5 feet, and the largest 84 feet. Double the gas and ice to include Don and Jan's boat.

We are now on the Tennessee - Tombigbee Waterway, more commonly known as the Tenn-Tom. It runs for 470 miles. Telephone coverage is spotty at best and the wireless internet is about the same. That is why there are a few days where the blog is not done. We will keep in touch and we send love to all. Bye til later. Patty and Rich