8/1/22 - Peoria to Heritage Harbor Marina, Ottawa Illinois

 Erik rose early to sit on the flybridge and enjoy the sites and sounds of an early morning spectacular thunderstorm that was rolling through the area.  As the storms passed through the morning light gave way with the sounds of seagulls singing their morning songs and waves lapping against the hull of the boat.  Mornings on the water are soothing.  After enjoying our morning coffee we did not waste too much time in preparing for todays float. 

Originally we had planned to cruise about 40 miles today, however, after talking things over last night we decided that we would cruise 80 miles aiming to make it to Heritage Harbor Marina in Ottawa Illinois.  We have heard really good things about the marina and town.   Additionally, the AGLCA harbor host in the area whom we had previously communicated with and who has offered to delivery our car to St Joseph Michigan told us yesterday that if we can meet him Wednesday in Ottawa rather than Thursday in Joliet it will work better with his schedule.   We talked to Derek yesterday and made arrangements for him to drive from Ohio and meet us there.  Also, this way it will give us a three night layover in Ottawa to get some boat chores and provisioning done....if we can pull ourselves away from the swimming pool :-) 

With the course charted we untied the lines and shoved off.  Renee did an update to the Navionics app on her phone yesterday which now allows her to create longer routes.   Previously, if the planned trip was too long she would have to create multiple routes because there were too many way points to do as a single route.   Nice!   While Renee took the helm for a while Erik worked on a few small work tasks below on the computer.   

Twenty miles up river as we were exiting Peoria Lake we made a pit stop at Hamm Harbor where we scored 60 gallons of gas at $5 a gallon which is at least 90 cents or more lower than anywhere else we are seeing north of here.  This also gave us the chance to let Riva off the boat for a few mins to break up the long trip.  

This area of the Illinois River is fairly shallow, averaging 15 feet deep, with a narrow channel winding through large lake like regions.  Outside of the channel are many islands that it would be too shallow to navigate over to.   We spotted many species of birds including different egrets, white and bock winged pelicans, osprey and bald eagles.  A bird watchers paradise.   

One of many birds along the way 

We continued to trek along arriving at our one lock for the day, Starved Rock, at 3:15 pm.  There was a southbound barge in the chamber and the lock master said it would be about 45 mins.  The channel back to the lock was narrow and about 3/4 mile long. We brought the engines down to near idle and waited for the barge to exit and the lock master to call is in.   It turned out to be well over an hour before we locked up.   We kicked up the pace of our cruise and made it to Heritage Harbor at 5:45 pm where we proceeded to have the ugliest, worst docking EVER!  It was truly embarrassing. The wind was blowing strong when Erik attempted to back the boat into the assigned slip unsuccessfully and narrowly missing bumping into other boats.   He brought the boat back around attempting to pull into the same slip front first…another failure as the strong winds blew him by slip again narrowly missing other boats again.  The dock master then decided to instead put us on an outside wall that SHOULD have been an easy approach   The wind again was catching the side of the boat and blowing it off of the dock   It took all the strength the dock master and another friendly gentleman who stopped to help had to get the boat in and secured to the dock.  Oy vey!  Fortunately no people or boats were harmed; only Erik’s ego.  

A duck house is good to soothe the spirit 

Before even settling in we changed into our suits and headed to the pool for a cooling dip after the stressful ending to the cruise.   Homemade coney sauce and dogs were on the menu for dinner.  We were rushing in order to try and get Riva up to the dog park.  Our rush got slowed down a bit when we were taking the bikes off the boat and found that the one bike had a flat rear tire AGIAN!  Same rear tire that we have now had 3 inner tubes replaced on in the last two months.   Ugh!!!  So, we ended up walking up to the dog park instead which was quite a hike.   We made it there just before sundown and fortunately there was still one dog for Riva to frolic with.  

Back to the boat for coffee and we were exhausted.   Bed time was in order for us all!  

Nice sunset and moon