On the Tenn-Tom
We had a beautiful run from Chattanooga back to Grand Harbor Marina at Rogersville, Alabama. The leaf color had become more and more intense during the ten days that we had spent going from Grand Harbor to Chattanooga. One reason I haven’t been keeping up with the blog is that I have been just sitting and watching the colorful mountains glide past the boat. Going There with Bob and Lois aboard has become a regular part of our little flotilla. They are from Pennsylvania and keep their boat in Baltimore. We had first met them on Lake Michigan back in August. It’s funny how Loopers seem to keep running into each other in various places.
We also traveled part of the way with Robert and Kay Creech on C-Life, and friends on several other boats. One group would anchor out for a night, then catch up again in a lock somewhere. At one point we had nine boats in the lock together—and we all descended on the restaurant at Joe Wheeler at the same time, too.
It was great to return to Grand Harbor at Pickwick Lock. Chip, the dockmaster there, is a great help to anyone who stops in. The restrooms at Grand Harbor are a source of pride, and for good reason. They are the cleanest, nicest we have seen on the Loop. In addition the laundramat is reasonable, clean and accessible. There are several great restaurants in the area also. Gary found a place through some local folks that had a catfish special on Friday nights. How lucky can you get? Gary, Lorenzo and Bob had the finger-lickin’-good catfish while the two Loises and I opted for other menu items. The place wouldn’t rate two stars in a guidebook for atmosphere, but the food was some of the best we’ve had. If you’re ever at Grand Harbor Marina, seek out the Redwood Hut. We give the food five stars, and that’s all that counts.
While we were at Joe Wheeler the second time we received word that my uncle, Jim Pathoulas, had passed away in Tellico Plains, Tennessee, where we’d recently buried my dad. We arranged for a rental vehicle when we got back to Grand Harbor and left very early on a very cold Saturday morning for Tellico. Despite forgetting that we’d lose an hour when we crossed back into the Eastern Time Zone, we got to the funeral on time. It was great to see some family we hadn’t seen in many years, but as always, it’s too bad it has to happen at such a sad occasion. The great thing was that the minister could truthfully say so many good things about Jim. He was a true “Greek scholar,” and the minister told what a blessing Jim had been to him and to others in their study of the Scriptures and how he lived out his faith in Christ in his everyday life. The drive through the mountains was sad, but the color just got more and more beautiful and we noted what a change had occurred in the few weeks since we’d made the trip for Dad’s funeral.
Quite aside from all this is the fact that when we were taking the rental car back to Grand Harbor we saw that we were only eleven miles from Shiloh battlefield. Since I’ve always been a Civil War buff, I hated to pass up the opportunity to at least drive by. Besides, family legend is that we’re related to General Albert Sidney Johnston, who was killed there in 1862. Shiloh is a vast battlefield and our brief visit didn’t come close to doing it justice, but we did ride through a good part of it. We found the marker where General Johnston was found weak and reeling, nearly falling from his horse. An aide led his horse down into a ravine where the general soon died. He had been hit in the leg, an artery pierced and the wound had gone unnoticed so that he bled to death because the blood had gone into his boot. It’s sad to look across those fields where so many lost their lives. Gary and I both have ancestors who fought on both sides.
We’d planned to leave Grand Harbor bright and early on Monday morning, but the morning turned out to not be so bright. We had to wait until the fog lifted so that we could have better visibility in the locks. Finally, we actually started on the Tenn-Tom Waterway. The Tenn-Tom is a canal system that links the Tennessee River with the Tombigbee so that boats can easily run from Chattanooga all the way to Mobile. The lock system drops a boat a total of 414 feet from its mountainous beginning to the last lock before Mobile. One of the first locks we entered was the ninth largest in the United States and dropped us 65 feet, quite a comedown!
I have, by the way, found out the difference between a bitt and a bollard. A bollard is a round post-like thing that a boat ties to. A bitt is the same thing, only different. It is basically a bollard that has a horn-like extension on either side so that the loop is held more securely when it is dropped over the top, or the line can be tied in a figure eight around it. So add that to your nickel knowledge.
On November 14 we received confirmation of some good news from Bill, our youngest son, and his wife, Melissa. They are expecting our first grandchild to arrive in mid-June of 2009. We are trying to remain calm, but I’ve been working for awhile on an appliquéd baby quilt. I’ve moved up my timetable on the quilt and have some other projects that I’ll pick up when we go home in December. I’m glad I took a refresher course in English smocking last year.
We have left the mountain hardwood forests and entered the swampier-looking area of cypress trees and flatter land. And for those who don’t know, Mississippi can get very, very cold in the winter time! We have had to set the heater up several times in the last few nights. But the frost is on the collards!
We spent a night in an absolutely wonderful marina in Aberdeen, Mississippi. The diesel fuel price was the lowest we’ve seen it in months. The people were some of the nicest and friendliest we’ve met anywhere on the Loop. They have red-eye gravy for breakfast on absolutely perfect grits. Lois mentioned not being able to get any decent mustard greens anywhere and a man who overheard her brought her a big bag of mustard greens straight from his garden, and brought Kay a bag of collards. When Lois remarked that she wished she’d said collards, he came back in a few minutes with a big bag of them also. Now that’s service!
We all got a good laugh out of Maggie’s whistling for Kilby. The marina owner’s son-in-law had a very friendly black lab who was running around on the docks while our boats were being fueled. Maggie’s cage was sitting on the back deck and she began whistling for Kilby. The lab heard her, ran over and came to a perfect point. He really seemed confused that no one came and got this bird he’d found. And Maggie wasn’t a bit afraid. She just looked at him like, “Where’d this thing come from?”
We only spent one night at Aberdeen, and left Friday morning for Columbus Marina. We introduced Bob and Lois to mustard greens and appropriate go-withs, including some barbecued Boston butt that Gary bought. Lois has a great way with a ham hock and a pot of greens. I guess it’s an acquired taste, or maybe one you’re born with in the South, but “Other” Lois and Bob may learn yet. They are great sports and willing to try something new. Bob still can’t quite see (or taste) the beauties of cornbread, but we’re working on him.
Saturday was Lois’s birthday so we took the courtesy van into downtown Columbus for a dinner out. After two rainy days cooped up on the boats it was nice to get away for a Wal-Mart visit and someone else’s cooking. Then came Sunday! For Sunday dinner Lois threw down the collards, complete with cornmeal dumplings, sweet potato casserole, Cornish hens, and cornbread, Other Lois brought baked beans, and Gary put together some shells and cheese. (I spent the afternoon at the two-machine laundramat.) As Phil Harris used to say, “That’s what I like about the South.”
We were sitting on the back deck “chilling” when we looked up and what did we see? Our Turn! Her new owners had been advised to take her down the Tenn-Tom and avoid the Mississippi since they are sailboaters not used to a power boat and the Mississippi can be intimidating with all its barge traffic and other hazards. They are taking her to her new home in Texas and had had a close call on their way to Columbus. While waiting to enter a lock they became entangled in the cable holding a can buoy. Fortunately, a diver found no damage, and after the rudder was freed from the cable, they were on their way again. And so were we, on Monday. We passed through two more locks and anchored in a beautiful diversion canal where we feasted on leftover barbecue, collards and sweet potatoes before tucking in for the night.
I’m still working on getting the hang of the new picture thing. I got them in an image browser, but haven’t figured out yet how to get them into i-photo and then onto the blog. Sorry about that! I have a bunch in the camera and hope to get proficient in time for the next blog.
The diversion canals and side creeks are nothing like the “septic tanks” we’d been anchoring in on the Illinois and Ohio. We’re still seeing beautiful, though not as colorful, scenery. There are more and more cypress trees and even Spanish moss along the banks. And then, like an oasis in the wilderness, up pops Bobby’s Fish Camp. Bobby’s is an experience not to be missed. Mainly because we had left Demopolis without topping off our water. We usually take showers at night and Gary tops off the water tank just before we get under way in the morning, so we’ll have enough to last all day, maybe two, if we have to anchor out. When we got ready to leave Demopolis the water had been shut off because of a hard freeze during the night. Good excuse for not washing up the coffee cups and we carry bottled water for drinking anyway.
Bobby’s consists of a group of trailers parked along a dirt road that winds along the bank of the river, a long dock, and a restaurant/office/store a short walk up the hill. The term “long” is relative concerning the dock. It has room for a boat to tie up and get fuel and room for four or five boats to tie up one behind the other. Our three boats had been first out of the creek so were first at the dock. Since we knew there were seven boats coming along behind us, we went ahead and rafted up. Li’l David tied to the dock, then Going There snugged up alongside and tied to them. Gilraker then tied up to Going There. There were no electric hookups, but we did hook our water hoses together and top off our water tanks. Before the morning had passed there were ten boats rafted up three and four abreast. Those collective water hoses got a real workout.
You might think the greatest thing about Bobby’s is its (one) water spigot. But it’s not. It’s the food. Bobby’s pretty much has a monopoly on the water concession, but that comes free with dockage—not the first place we’ve paid a dollar a foot to raft up to another boat, but the first one we’ve paid it and not gotten electricity to go with it. Our battery bank had been revved up by running the generator all day while en route from the diversion canal/creek, so we weren’t hurting for anything electrical anyway, but we do like to run our little ceramic heater on really cold nights. But I digress. The food at Bobby’s is wonderful if you like good old-fashioned Southern stuff: catfish—all Gary could eat—fabulous French fries, hush puppies, the world’s best coleslaw, and great lump meat crabcakes! Chip, the dockmaster from Grand Harbor, was delivering a boat downstream and he and his first mate ate with us. Poor catfish! They didn’t have a chance.
Next day we took off again in a long line and headed for our last lock till the minor ones at Okeechobee. I told Gary that we ought to turn around and go through the other way just for old time’s sake, but he didn’t think that was even worthy of a smile. We passed through the beautiful Alabama countryside, We’ve seen everything from chalk-colored bluffs to dense woods to a telephone booth standing high up on a bank in the woods. Sorry, I couldn’t get my camera ready in time to take a picture. You sit there and look at the thing for awhile, asking yourself, then you ask the captain, “What in the world is a telephone booth doing standing up there on that bank?” By the time you realize that’s really what it is, you’re past it.
We had a moment of near panic in that last lock. Since there were ten (yes, ten!) boats in the lock, and there were ten pins, we had been assigned the very front pin. That’s what happens when you’re on the short, short boat. When we tied up to the bitt our bow pulpit reached just a little beyond where the gate would be when it was opened by the lockmaster. Gary informed him and the lockmaster said that since they were about to change shifts he would tell the new man coming on to let us know when he was about to open the gate so we could loosen our lines and back off just a little. Of course, that didn’t happen. The door opened a few feet, for whatever reason, and we cast off the bitt moved toward the middle of the lock and were waiting to pull forward when the door closed back.
By this time we were out in the middle of the lock without much maneuvering room. It took some backing and forthing to get close enough for me to grab the ladder next to the bitt with the boathook and hang on for dear life. After hanging on for awhile and deciding that the door wouldn’t be opened any time soon, we hooked a rope around the ladder (keeping our bow pulpit safely out of the recess) and waited for the door to fully open, which it finally did.
We had a fairly long run for the day, trying to get to Mobile in two days, since it was less than a week till Thanksgiving. We anchored another night, this time in the Alabama River Cutoff, a rather small anchorage for the seven boats that holed up there. We rafted up, three abreast, though, and out of the way of the dreaded tows. Some folks were bothered by the fishing boats that zoomed by during the night, but we slept very well and pulled out bright and early the next morning for a long run to Mobile.
Running through Mobile Bay on a Saturday was a piece of cake compared to the stories we’d heard about how busy it is and how many huge tows swarm the place. We saw a few, but had no trouble navigating through the harbor. Then Gary called the Eastern Shore Marina at Fairhope, where we had reservations and headed for Fly Creek. Bob, on Going There, asked where in the world we were going and Gary told him the marina had told him to head for Fly Creek. By this time Going There and Li’l David were a mile or so off to our starboard. Gary re-checked the chart and found that our electronic chart showed two Fly Creeks and we were headed to the non-existent one. We finally got back on track and, after some maneuvering, breathed the sighs of relief that always come after a long day and difficult docking.
We had a really nice time in Fairhope. It’s a beautiful town and the people everywhere we went were friendly and helpful. That didn’t help us when it came to renting a car, though. Bob tried everywhere within a reasonable distance to rent a 6-passenger van and one was not to be had. There went our hopes of a day trip to New Orleans, plus some more running around we’d have done.
The marina did have a courtesy van which we made good use of, though. We went to dinner and to Wal-Mart several times and to the town laundramat. On Thanksgiving Day we ventured all the way to Daphne, Alabama, and had dinner at Cracker Barrel. We were relieved to find Cracker Barrel open, our other choice seemed to have been Hooters. We were almost the only people left in the marina at this point. Several of our flotilla from Bobby’s had moved on already. We were joined for dinner by Bill and Eileen from Blue Max. The courtesy van was for six passengers, but Bill tucked himself into the cargo space behind the back seat and we made room for Eileen on one of the other seats.
We have a lot to be thankful for and even though we weren’t with our families, we spoke with them and “thanks” seems inadequate for what we feel in our hearts. Being with friends is a blessing in itself. We have had some great fun and fellowship with friends new and old.
We had originally planned to leave Fairhope the day after Thanksgiving. Our stay was extended from seven days to ten due to rain and wind. It rained almost constantly for a couple of days, then blew a gale for a couple more. The sailboats had lines flapping against their masts all over the marina. Sometimes it sounded like there were windchimes going wild and other times like fingernails on a blackboard as fenders squealed against the docks. To add insult to injury, phone and internet service was on one minute and off the next. And we never knew which minute was which.
Most of us began to get cabin fever—as in boat cabin. For several nights we were rocked to sleep and lullabied by water slapping against the boat. The bad thing was that we suddenly realized we were back in tidal waters and when we went to get on or off the boats the docks suddenly seemed really unstable. That did not deter us from walking about five slips over to eat dinner on Li’l David, though. Takes more than a little wind to keep a Walker from eating.
We finally got a break in the weather on Tuesday and happily plowed out on low tide, headed east toward Florida. Seems everyone’s spirits were lifted just smelling the diesel fumes again. Maggie ran through her entire repertoire of beeps, whistles, and other sounds of the boat getting underway. Apparently she had become bored too. We saw quite a few dolphins cavorting, reminding us again that we’re getting back into southern waters—salt water. We also entered the Florida Inland Waterway. About 2:30 we rafted up in a bayou where Sunshine, Blue Max and Southern Comfort were already anchored. After one of Lois’s great dinners and a celebratory banana pudding, we tucked in for the night.
Tomorrow it’s on to Fort Walton Beach!
I know that I promised pictures would be up this time. I just haven’t had the patience to sit down with the thing and figure it out. But I will do it. For some reason it’s been hard just to get started blogging again.
