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| Pre dawn coffee on the flybridge |
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| Riva got out of bed with momma to join dad for sunrise |
We had originally planned to pull out bright and early and make a long run of 100 miles today to Guntersville free dock. We had been there before and really enjoyed the town. However. Renee realized yesterday that she had a scheduled meeting with her professor at 11am. The area downriver from Chattanooga would be pretty remote and the chances of not having a signal for her virtual meeting was good so we decided to wait and stay out for the morning. This meant that we would not attempt the long day but rather would plan to anchor out tonight somewhere downriver of Nickajack Lock and Dam.
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| Renee (and Riva who apparently got up too early) preparing for her meeting with her professor |
Erik had a nice conversation with his cousin, Mike, who has been in the hospital for some time now. It was GREAT to hear that he is finally improving significantly and preparing to start PT to build strength :-) We are certain you will be back to your shenanigans soon Mike!
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| Sunrise conversation with Cuz Mike while walking Riva |
We took advantage of the time and did some boat cleaning, filled our fresh water tanks and just chilled out. While Erik was on the Flybridge he had another visit and long conversation with our new friend, we’ll still call him ‘Sanford’ although he is actually ‘Captain Dave’. He was quite the character. He is celebrating his 71’st birthday Saturday. After locking down with us the night before last and docking his hooptie boat full of wares he took a cab back to his home marina and came back with his old truck (definitely a Sanford truck) towing another MAJOR hooptie boat. Both the truck and the boat he was towing were full of all kinds of stuff. He proceeded to tell Erik his life story of being a crane operator, his many aquatic travels and his dream of also doing The Great Loop. We meet so many interesting and colorful folks on our journey.
We shoved off at right about noon. It was a much more comfortable cruising afternoon than the previous couple. The clouds were still lingering and there was a nice breeze. About an hour into our trip we were visited by a beautiful bald eagle that flew right in front of us before circling and landing in a nearby tree. We always get excited to see these amazing animals!
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| FREEDOM! |
This section of the river is very windy with many tall gorges and cliffs on either side. After cruising for 2 hours or so (about 20 miles) we took a glance at google maps and realized that after many twists and turns we were still only just a few miles from Chattanooga the way the crow flies! This boating thing is proving to NOT be the most efficient mode of transportation. 😂
Continuing on down the river we had our second bald eagle sighting of the trip. We were able to get a few good pics of this one since he flew right in front of us before heading over to land on a tree on shore. It is always exciting to see these beautiful birds!
As we were nearing our only planned lock for the day, Nickajack Lock and Dam, we called ahead and the lockmaster informed us that he was in process of locking a large barge downriver and the wait would be 1.5 to 2 hours. As it turned out, this worked out well for us. There was a very nice park and campground with a dock just above the lock. Riva was acting like she may need to go potty so we headed there and docked. Taking a closer look at the maps we realized that we were directly on the boarders of Tennessee, Alabama and Georgia. We radioed the lockmaster to let him know we would be waiting there and to just call us on the radio when he was ready for us. After just about an hour the lockmaster radioed informing us that we could head over his way and he would get the chamber ready for us. After a brief conversation with the lockmaster who instructed us to make sure to tie off to a bollard and not a ladder (that would be a bad thing!) he gave us a ride down to the next pool.
Continuing on downriver we realized for certain that we were now in Alabama when we saw a dock with two interior recliners on it! lol. Roll Hillbilly Tide! Sorry about that our Alabama friends. After about 20 mins and just a few miles we caught up to the tow/barge that had locked down in front of us. The tows only navigate downriver at about 6mph; we were traveling at about 10mph. We were approaching him just as we were both entering into a narrow part of the river with an even narrower channel to navigate. We attempted to make contact with Jvesco (the barge name) on the radio to ask if he had a preference on which side we should pass since he was navigating a fairly narrow turn. When he did not respond to our radio beacon we decided to speed up and make a pass on his port side. In order to get around him quickly and efficiently before the channel narrowed too much Renee gave Erik permission to get down on the throttle :-) We burnt some carbon our of the cylinders and got Happy Destiny up to 26 mph for a few minutes; that is certainly our top speed for this trip thus far. While Erik was excited watching the speedometer Renee was fretting watching the fuel burn on the Simrad. At peak speak of 26 we were burning close to 20 gallons per hour....yikes! At that rate our fuel mileage drops from about 1.2 mph to about .75 mpg.
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| Hillbilly dock chairs |
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| Railroad lift bridge had a lowered clearance of 34' but it was being raised as we came up on it to allow the barge we had passed through |
We chose to stop for the evening at Battery Hill anchorage which was about 7 miles below the lock. It was located on a channel behind an island and right next to a boat ramp and small park. This was nice for dinghy access to get Riva to shore. Our new to us anchor did a great job of holding again on the first attempt which makes us VERY happy. Even with a stiff breeze and a decent current it held us in place perfectly. We fired up the grill and put the Kabobs on that had been marinating for a good part of the day. Erik redeemed himself from the slightly overcooked chicken a few nights ago by cooking these ones to tender perfection; yum!
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| After anchoring for the night the barge that we had done the quick pass on came slowly down the river past us |
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| Dinner time |
We enjoyed the beautiful cool, breezy evening on the aft deck. Just after sunset we dropped Trudge into the water and motored over to let Riva have some land time. Back to boat Erik put a piece of hot dog on his hook and dropped a fishing line in the water but quickly determined that the bugs were too bad to sit outside for long. He tied his pole to a rope and left it in the water before retreating inside with Renee to shower up and hit the pillows for the night and call it another splendid day on Tennessee River.
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| our Nebo track for the day |
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| Our Simrad stats for the day Notice the top speed! |
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