6/29/18 - Friday - Wolf Creek ancharge to Tellico Lake and Ft Loudon Marina TN

We awoke to a cloudy, cool morning; no rain in site or forecasted though 😛  After a brief stint of fishing and a couple cups of joe we pulled anchor at about 7:30am and headed upriver.
The cruising is nice since the sun was not blazing this morning.  The landscape is average but nothing spectacular.  It has actually turned to a rural farm type setting largely.  At about 11am we made it to Ft Loudon Lock Na Dam which will likely be our last upriver lift....from here forward the remainder of our trip will be downriver (better gas mileage!! 🤩).   Up the 76’ lift and out onto the Little Tennessee Ruver and Lake Tellico we went.   The landscape began to get much more mountainous and the homes on the one shore of this lake are redonkulous!  They have ourselves asking "where do all of these people get this money?".  The probably just don’t cruise for hundreds of miles and burn up all their savings on gas 😂
As we continued up Lake Tellico 20 miles or so the fort hills of the Smokey Mountains came into view...gorgeous!  Our pics definately will not do it justice.  The water up here is crystal clear and much cooler.   We found a good anchoring spot in a large finger of the lake with a spectacular view and floated there for 4 or 5 hrs.  The sun was hot and the water was perfect!
We then motored back downriver/lake to Ft Loudon Marina.   We are going to stay here two nights because Renee has a proctored online mid term test she has to take Sunday morning and we want to ensure that we are somewhere with good internet access.  Plus we are in need of some re provisioning at the store and this marina has a courtesy car we can use to get there.
We had dinner at a delicious BBQ joint right here at the marina (Calhoun’s) which is a small chain here in Tennessee.  After the late dinner we walked the docks and socialized with a few friendly folks.  One couple informed us that we stopped just short of where we should have gone up to in order to get some even more fabulous views of the Smokies....Will we go back up even further tomorrow???  Hmmmm....

Wow!  15 degrees cooler

Saw these two Marinetes, We aren't the only ones that can't have just one!

Last lock going up the Tennessee, Fort Louden Lock.

Tellico Lake has some cute little homes....😮

Love this "little" boat house!  Yes its bigger than our house!

Fort Louden restored or recreated???

Smokey Mountains.  WE learned later that we should have gone up just a little further and we would have been in them!

The water was amazingly clear!

Mountains!

Picture taken through the lense of the binoculars.

Cooling off!

pictures do not do this view justice.

6/28/18 - Thursday - Terrace View Marina (Spring City TN) to Wolf Creek Anchorage (mm578 Tennessee River)

We awoke to the skies opening up with buckets of rain....again!   Fortunately we were in a covered slip so the boat and us stayed nice and dry.
We made omelettes with the leftover fajitas from last night.....score!   The rain let up a little so we went up to the marina office to talk with Mark, the owner, about ordering us a new alternator (starboard engine alternator only reads that it’s putting out 12.7 volts).  He ordered one for us and it will be in when we are on our way through coming back down the river in a few days.
We noticed that there was a Marinette On the docks across from usSo we walked over to talk to the owners were on the boat.  They had just bought their boat last year and were preparing it to live aboard.   They just sold their houseboat and were also selling a house and cars to prepare to travel.
At about 1pm the rain finally moved out and the skies began to clear.   We gassed up and headed on upriver.   We made it a short mileage day (about 45 miles) to an anchorage at Wolf Creek.  It is a beautiful, quiet spot.  Erik fished while Renee studied.  Dinner on the grill (is there any other way to cook on the boat ?).

This is an alternator!!! We think it might be acting up :-(

Whitestone Inn

One of many fishing boats through this area

The mountains and rock sides take on such amazing forms.

That's some smooth water!!!

Studying math!!!  Love this life!

Erik caught a pretty catfish!

Renee has some competition!

Click the link to view the video of the fish jumping!
https://youtu.be/Iq1scm4bFXY

6/27/18 - Wednesday - Chattanooga to Terrace View Marina

After Renee spent some time on math homework, we headed to the gas dock and filled up(again!!!💲💲💲)  We traveled most of the day in rain on and off.  Went through Chickamauga lock fairly early. The middle of the day was filled with rain and storms, at one point we stopped because the rain was coming down so hard we couldn't see 20 feet in front of us!  While we were waiting out the worst of the storm for a very brief moment the winds kicked up to some major gusts. We though we might blow away!!!  Luckily the worst of it passed within a half an hour or so and we made our way on to Nickajack Lock.  Shortly after Nickajack we made our way into Terrace View Marina where we were welcomed by Jim and Carol McDonnough catching our ropes.  Jim and Carol used to boat the Muskingum River and know our neighbors, Mike and Barb.  We had also been following the blog for their loop that they recently finished.  They took us into Spring City for dinner at a wonderful Mexican dinner.
Back at the boat we were both exhausted, as usual, off to bed!

Chattanooga Riverfront, Tennessee Aquarium

The Bluffs, Hunter Museum of American Art

Just a few beautiful golf courses along the way.

Chickamauga Lock, They are building a new chamber.

Sailing lessons anyone?????

This is the beginner class I think!

The pool at Terrace View Marina

Yep that's a sunset!

6/26/18 - Tuesday - Hales Bar Tn to Erwin Marine (Chatanooga Riverfront)

Two mornings in a row of Erik sleeping in past 6am!  This boating business must be tiring 🤪
We got the day started with Renee doing some more school work while Erik cooked breakfast of omelettes, bacon 🥓 and toast.   We wanted full bellies so that we could make the fairly short cruise (32 miles) to chatanooga and be ready for some exploration of the city when we arrived.
We departed Hales Bar at about 8:30am.  The Nickajack Lake has a much different look and feel than the past couple of lakes.  It has definately become more of a river; still pretty wide but not many coves or wide open expanses of water.   The surrounding landscape has also turned into a much more impressive array of maintains and valleys.  It was very beautiful cruising today with perfectly flat waters and gorgeous views of the surrounding mountains.  The river is also very windy leading us in every which direction.  As we got close to Chattanooga the landscape did flatten out some and things became a little more industrial.
We arrove at Erimwin Marina at about 12:30pm and got settled into our assigned slip quickly and got some advice from the harbor master about where to go and what to see.   We walked up the riverwalk and into downtown.  We briefly walked into the Tennessee Aquarium (very nice and renown) but decided that we did not feel like paying $30 each to go in since we had many other sites we wanted to see and thus did not feel we’d get our monies worth for the time we wanted to spend.  Instead, we jumped on the FREE electric bus transportation and took it to its southern most stop which was at the historic Chatanooga train station (Chattanooga Choo Choo!). This was an interesting stop. It is now a hotel, but also has historical placards explaining the history of the station and the railway as well as many of the old engines and train cars still on the tracks that now serve mostly as shops and restaraunts.   From the station we walked across the street and got Ben and Jerry’s comes...yum!   We got an Uber ride up to Ruby Falls (about 5 miles up Lookout Mountain).  The Falls are quite impressive and we highly recommend this tour.   The cave and falls were discovered by Leo Lambert (maybe a long lost Cuz??) in 1923.  After  about a .5 mile walk through the cave you come to a point where you are approx. 1100 ft below the mountain and it opens up into a huge cavern/room with a nice large waterfall that is 160 ft tall.  Very cool.   Also there at Ruby Falls was a lookout tower that had impressive views of the city and the Tennessee River basin below.   There is another local attraction called ‘Rock City’ that is at the top of Lookout Mountain and is supposed to have even more impressive views and many other sites.   We may do this when we return to Chatanooga for the July 4th holiday.  
We Uber’d back to downtown and to a 5:15 AA meeting at a downtown clubhouse.   It wa s a good meeting in a rough area of town with quite a few ‘low bottom’ alchys and addicts.  A much appreciated meeting after a couple of weeks with no meetings for us.  We took the free shuttle back to the marina area and went back to check on the boat and cool off for a few minutes while letting phis charge.  We met a nice couple in the dock who are live aboards.   He is a marine mechanic and she makes canvas biminis and enclosures for boats.  They just finished up a 6000 mile trip on the large (48’) Jeffferson Yacht.
By the time we finished talking with this couple it was 8pm and we were just headed back up to The main drag to get dinner.   We chose a reccomended Italian restaraunt.  About half way through the 3/4 mile walk the skies opened up with a vegence and DUMPED buckets of rain.  We sought cover under a nearby bridge.   I stuck my thumb up at the first car passing by and was picked up by an older veteran gentlman who brought us to what we thought was the correct restaraunt; it actually turned out to be a coffee house next door.  During the run next door to Tonys we got soaked :-(.   The restaraunt turned out to be an excellent choice. It was delicious and reasonable.   The rain stopped (almost)?by dinners end and we had a nice leisurely stroll back to the boat on the riverwalk.
There is obviously much more to see and experience here in Chatanooga aobwe plan to make reservations for two additional nights of dockage on July 2nd and 3rd.  The cities main fireworks are on the 3rd.   Looking forward to retuning here on our way back down from Knoxville.

The cliffs and bluffs are huge!

Yet more future retirement homes....love the mountain backdrop here!

This area has some beautiful landscapes!

Every house needs a lookout tower with spiral staircase!

Just a little shack on the riveside!

We passed the Southern Belle as we came into Chattanooga

Chattanooga Choo choo S

From the look out tower at Ruby Falls overlooking Chattanooga

Erik's long lost cousin discovered Ruby Falls!!!!😁

Awesome rock formations in the caves at Ruby Falls, these are stalactities!

The beautiful Ruby Falls!

One of many statues along the river-walk in Chattanooga

6/25/18 - Guntersville Al (free dock) to Hales Bar Marina Tn

We slept in.....till almost 6:30am!   A record for Erik.  We had a purposeful slow start this morning while Renee logged on to a live tutoring app for her college class Erik logged on to do a small amount of work as well.  After cleaning up the boat a bit we got out onto the river at about 9:30am.   The plan for the day was to move upriver 76 miles and one lock to Hales Bar Marina (within 32 miles of Chattanooga).  The cruise started as a hot, sunny morning.  Just upriver there was an abundance of an invasive species of water grass call hydrilla which the TVA cuts Chanells through for navigation.   We are hoping this does not last for long!  About 20 miles upriver we stopped at Goose Pond Marina where they had reasonable gas prices ($3.63 compared to $3.89 or more elsewhere).   The entrance to Goos Pond was a very narrrow 1/2 mile channel that was thick with Lilly Pads on both sides....a bit dicey since the depth finder was reading just 5-6 ft all the way in.   We gassed up with 92 gallons of fuel. The dock attendant took our debit card for payment and returned to the boat where Erik signed off on the sale (without really looking at/considering the amount).  Fortunately, Renee actually looks at receipts and saw that he had charged us not only for our gas, but also for the amount of the customer before us.  The attendant fixed his mistake and credited our acct back the appropriate, significant amount.  Meanwhile Erik tightened a couple of belts and checked fluid levels.  We also did some testing of our starboard alternator because it appeared from the gauges to be putting out low voltage amounts.   It did in in fact test with the multi meter to be putting out just 12.5 volts or so where it should be putting out 14+.  It’ll get us through, but we will need a new one or this one rebuilt soon.
Continuing upriver the invasive grass issue decreased. However, the rains began to move in shortly after.  We switched back and forth between the flybridge and the lower helm to remain dry.  We arrive at the Nickajack Lock at about 5pm and were locked through quickly.
Hales Bar Marina is only about 5 miles above the lock and we cruised up to it quickly.  We were greeted at the marina by a nice woman who docks there annualy and also by swarms of Mayflies!  They are annoying bugs, but do not bite so we can live with them.  We got settled into the slip, talked for a few minutes with dock mates, and then headed up to the shower/laundry room to get cleaned up and a couple loads of laundry done (free washer and $1.25 dryers were reasonable!).   There was not much too exciting around the area of the marina.  I know it’s hard to believe, but we did catch another wonderful sunset with a mountainous backdrop and floating cabins at the marina in it.  
We are excited to hopefully make it up to chatanooga tomorrow.

The channel at Goose pond, notice the big lily pads  outside of the channel

Another bald eagle if you can make it out

Cool wispy clouds that can out after the rain

Comingup on Hales Barr

Sunset over the floating cabiins