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| Onto Paducah! |
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Happy Destiny at Kenlake Marina
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Today is the day we would make it back to the Ohio River to do the final section between the Tennessee River and the Mississippi River that we have yet to traverse.
We rose early to a nice sunrise and spent an hour or so cooking breakfast so that Rusty and Ashley could depart for home and us for the trip down the Tennessee River on full stomachs. After eating we loaded up the SUV with multiple items that we no longer needed/wanted aboard. This included our cooler, a spare AC unit and a large microwave that we have replaced with a smaller unit. We saw the kids off and fairly quickly departed Kenlake Marina. Our first stop for the day, The Moors Resort, was about 20 miles up from the marina and just a few miles from the Kentucky Dam where they had regular gasoline for $4.63 a gallon ($1.30 a gallon cheaper than anywhere else we could find on the water). The marina there was seriously hopping with dozens of pleasure boats out on Saturday morning coming and going. Most we believe were just coming in for the reasonable fuel. The small harbor was so crazy and busy that it requires concentration to maneuver while waiting for our turn at the fuel docks. The wind was blowing making it more challenging. Erik was working so hard at holding the boat in place that he just BARELY noticed the pontoon boats of women in skimpy bikinis! Sorry fellas….no pics
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| In lieu of bikini babe pics Erik did capture this fascinating accidental shot. Any guesses on what it’s of? Let us know if you know because we don’t. Lol |
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| Nice morning for sailing on Kentucky Lake |
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Started seeing multiple barges again reminding us that we were close to the intersection of multiple heavily transited rivers (Ohio/Cumberland/Tennessee)
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Upon calling the lock master at KY lock we were told that a commercial barge was in the midst of locking down and that we would have an hour and a half or so wait. We slowed a bit and made our way to the top of the lock where we ended up spending the next 2+ hours floating. We took advantage of the time by eating a little something and taking a dip to cool off. Erik also checked all of the engine fluids. While doing that it was discovered that the ‘stuffing boxes’ (point where the shafts exit through the bottom of the hull) we’re letting in a significant amount more water than they should. This is normally a pretty simply adjustment of loosening and tightening a couple large nuts on the shaft that squeeze together a flax material creating a good seal. Unfortunately, when we added and moved battery banks this spring we managed to place the battery banks directly over top of the stuffing boxes making it virtually impossible to get a large wrench on the nuts in order to adjust. It was determined that this project would wait until late tonight or tomm morning when a) the engines weren’t hot creating a miserable working condition b) we were at at dock and could take the time to properly disconnect the battery banks.
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| Inside Kentucky Dam Lock chamber preparing to descend to the last 23 miles of the Tennessee River before it feeds into the Ohio River |
The trip down the river toward the Ohio was smooth as we were now back on a section that was actually river like instead of a lake. The day was again boxing hot but there was a nice wind blowing keeping things bearable. The majority of this section of the river was fairly boring. There were many large boatyard facilities that work on tugs and barges dotting the shoreline.
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One of many large boatyards
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As we drew closer to the convergence of the Tennessee River with the Ohio River the two began to parallel each other for the last couple of miles before we eventually made our way back out into our home namesake river!
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Approaching the Ohio on the Tennessee
Paducah transient dock is located just a mile or so downriver on the Ohio from where we entered off the Tennessee. There was one other large cruiser at the docks and fortunately the owners were standing on the dock and were kind enough to catch the lines for us. Renee made a bee line for the shore with Riva while Erik quickly got the power hooked up to get some much needed relief from the AC.
 | | Paducah welcomed us |
Famished, it was soon time to lite up the grill to prepare the steak that we forwent last night. That proved to be a little more challenging than it should have. The grill would not lite. We didn’t think the small propane tank was empty but tried switching it out for a new one anyhow. Nope….no flame. Upon some disassembly it was discovered that multiple wasp/mud dubber things had made a nest of larvae and mud that went entirely through the metal tube between the tank and the burner. Fortunately we have a high tech set of tools aboard which includes the all important coat hanger to clear the clogged tube. Steaks and sweet tatoes were delish and rectified our oncoming hanger issues.
 | | Obligatory sunset selfie |
 | | Another Sunset pic by a few young ladies who asked us to take their pic as we were walking up the ramp to shore from the dock. You can see the bow of Happy Destiny between our shoulders |
Just after another pleasing sunset we took a stroll up into town to check things out and stop at the store for a few items on our list. Paducah turned out to be quite the nice town. It has a very artsy vibe and being Saturday night there were lots of people walking the streets which had several outside vendors and artisans as well as many shops, restaurants and other venues.
 | | Old steam engine on the tracks next to the flood wall and near the railroad museum |
If it were not for the fact that rain is in the forecast for Monday and our next two legs entail a 200+ mile up the Mississippi against the current. We didn’t want to take the chance that rains would swell the river increasing the current. On the walk back after a stop for supplies we walked along the flood wall which was painstakingly painted with dozens of large murals depicting the history of the city.
Paducah was founded in 1827 by William Clark (yep….of Lewis and Clark) and is known as the City Of Craft and Folk Art. It boasts multiple intriguing museums including a railroad museum and The National Quilt Museum. We were pretty certain that no quilts were needed for us given the continuing heat wave, but, we were kind of disappointed that we did not arrive in time to experience the quilt museum as we have read and heard that is is actually quite impressive (despite it sounding rather boring).
 | | many nicely done flood wall murals |
Back at the boat both Renee and Erik relapsed on their addiction to ice cream….ok, we guess it’s hard to truly call it a relapse when we’ve never quit! Lol
A bit of blogging and we both retired hoping for a good nights sleep in order to get up early for preparations for our next two long days.
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