OK Boat Trip, Day 30, 05/24/2008

Yesterday was much too stressful with engines quitting and such so we're going to lighten things up a little today. How about some culture, particularly let's say from Romeo and Juliet? "What's in a name?" Shakespeare would have been proud.

Each Lock and Dam, in addition to its number, has a name, usually from a prominent person in the area or someone instrumental in the development of the L&D. Some of the other AR River L&Ds are named Norrell, Montgomery, Ormond, Murray, etc. Not so at Morrillton, AR - they went with Toad Suck! Now in all fairness, we have seen similar names on other rivers. The TN River for example has a stretch that has The Pot, The Skillett, and The Suck, named for treacherous waters before dams were in place to control the river. So what's up with Toad Suck? According to the Arkansas River Guide by the Johnsons, there was a ferry in the area that was part of a postal route to Hot Springs in the early days. The area became a favorite gathering place for steamboat roustabouts, passengers, and local folks. Heavy drinking at the local tavern caused one traveler to remark "Those fellows suck at a bottle 'till they swell up like toads!" Impressive and definitely more interesting than Murray, Norrell, Ormond, etc.

The cats were even a little weary today from all of yesterday's excitement.

But the scenery was again beautiful and definitely calm today on the surface, but the current was still flowing pretty strong.

We had a little thunderstorm and some rain around noon, but no delays at either of the two locks. Have you noticed we've had no lock delays now for 2 days? We figured out what the problem was. About 5 locks back on Thursday, I called the lockmaster as normal on Channel 16 about 4 miles out. No response. Well, sometimes they're busy so you wait a while. Still no response so I tried again. No reponse so I waited a while longer and tried the working channel, Channel 14. Ditto. So, waited again and tried 16 one more time. Still no response and by then we were coming up on the arrival point. So, I handed the radio to Rhonda and said, "Here you try it." The words were hardly out of her mouth when a very accomodating response came back loud and clear - "Yes Maam, how can I help you?" In addition to that, several of the lockmasters have come to the railing above us while the water's rising to say hello and "visit." Fine. And for the record, I have no problem with this - just glad to be getting through the locks quickly now.

Here's the entrance to today's destination - Charlie's Hidden Harbor. We arrived around 1:30.

HMR docked at Charlie's.

The marina.

Now you need to understand that Charlie is laid back, been here fifteen years. Life is simple at his marina. When we asked how much we owed for our transient stay, he responded "whatever you want to pay me. That way, no one can say I charge too much!" He was serious so we paid the same that we paid at LRYC last night.

He has a garden that transients can pick from if interested.

And resident geese.

Here's Charlie.

And we'll close on an interesting note. Look below at the center of the dam for the yellow barges. The other day a tow was heading downstream with six barges when they all broke loose from the tow. The captain managed to retrieve four before they reached the dam but couldn't get these two. They're full of molasses. They'll drill holes in these to suck (there's that name again) the molasses out, then a crane (Big Bertha) will retrieve each barge, repairs will be made, etc. Heck, we thought it was interesting.

Got an oil change done today and we're headed for Spadra Marina tomorrow in Clarksville, AR. We are 4 days out from Muskogee!

OK Boat Trip, Day 29, 05/23/2008

There’s lots of text to follow but bear with us – it is a very interesting day.

We didn’t set an alarm last night and decided to just get up when we got up. The rooster at the chicken coop would have none of that of course and we were off and cruising again by 0700. Today had all the things you’re looking for - a partial overcast and cool temperature, smooth water, current wasn’t too bad, nice scenery, no delay at the 1st lock, meeting a friend in Little Rock for dinner this evening, etc., etc. Here are some shots from early morning.

Lots of pasture land now.

Lots and lots of farmland as evidenced by the cropduster.

And we start to see a few hills as opposed to the flatlands closer to the MS River.

So anyhow, we’re cruising along about halfway between Pine Bluff and Little Rock, cycling through all the pleasantries noted above, when an unusual clicking sound came from the throttle lever. No idea why we have this new noise, everything looked normal, so we pressed ahead. Besides, what you gonna do, just stop in the middle of the river and check it out? Shortly thereafter the engine surged once, then slowed once, then abruptly quit, right in the middle of our pleasant morning on the river (see previous sentence)! In 31 years of boating, we have never run out of fuel, been stranded anywhere, never had any mechanical issues at all, and certainly never lost an engine. But you read about it because it does happen and you prepare for when it happens to you. First priority, drop an anchor and secure our safety. That went well and the anchor held the first time in 20 feet of water on the edge of the channel at mm 92.5 of the AR River. We’re good at this point knowing that we haven’t ended up on a dike somewhere with a hole in the hull or who knows what else!

We made our “Pan-Pan” call, a general broadcast to alert other boaters in the area of our situation. Let’s say the anchor had not held and we’d ended up on a dike with a hole in the hull, taking on water, etc. Then you move quickly to the “MayDay MayDay” mode. We then called Boat US just in case we are not able to get underway again on our own. Boat US has a great towing service package that provides unlimited tows and other services for our situation today. We provided them our location, GPS coordinates, souls on board, conditions, etc. Ingrid at Boat US began to work on those possibilities while we researched the problem. The 1st possibility is a fuel problem and I’m visually recalling that we refueled from on top of the hill yesterday close by the chicken coop through a water hose that occasionally dipped in the water before it got to the boat. Yesterday it was a “new experience.” Today it’s not even funny. Checked the fuel/water separator – no water in the fuel. Pumped about a pint of fuel out with our in-line 12-volt pump and all looks good. So, we try cranking again and notice a little smoke at the fuel shutoff solenoid. According to the engine manual and the old saying “where there’s smoke there’s fire,” this is probably the problem.

A few months ago while we were waiting on our son Scott to fly into the Cullman airport to join us for Christmas dinner with friends, I struck up a conversation with Robert Kaples, a local pilot, who knew Scott and is a boater. Turns out, Robert is a retired truck driver and previous mechanic specializing in the diesel we run on our boat, an 8.2 liter Detroit Diesel. He said to call him if we ever needed any help so I wrote his number on a business card and put it in my wallet. So, I called Robert, he was still at the airport watching airplanes, and he agreed with the smoke/fire theory. He said to remove the solenoid and figure out a way to close the opening that would be left. Two allen screws and two cut wires later, the solenoid was gone and we moved into the “creative MacGyver” mode. Decided to cut a section of ¼ inch “gasket” from a spare engine hose but needed some sort of firm plate to hold it in place. Rhonda found a paint stirrer stick which would work well. Fired up the generator, drilled some holes in the gasket and stick, closed up the hole where the solenoid was, fired up the engine and off we went. The only problem now is that the engine will not shut off without us reversing the above process and manually shoving the old solenoid back in the hole – a minor detail at this point. We’re just glad to have power again. And of course, we have to replace the solenoid. We then got to cancel our "Pan-Pan" and "come get us" calls.

Remember I said we were having dinner with a friend in Little Rock. About a month ago, I sent out a general email to the Amerca’s Great Loop Cruisers’ forum asking for any helpful info from those who have cruised the MS and/or AR Rivers. Gary Barger, a retired Little Rock physician, responded , having cruised both of those a lot. So I called Gary, told him of our plight and he moved into action. He tracked down the only fuel shutoff solenoid for an 8.2 Detroit Diesel in Little Rock (before the stores closed on Friday until Tuesday) and was waiting for us at Little Rock Yacht Club. Turns out that Sean, the attendant at the LRYC, is also familiar with the 8.2 diesel. So, we changed out the solenoid, fired her up, everything worked fine, and we went to dinner, also joined by some of Gary's friends of about 30 years.

So, what are the chances we would meet Robert in December and the one response I got from the Loopers' forum would be from Little Rock, 25 miles from where the engine quit? While our Christian faith certainly does not exempt us from the trials, tribulations, and solenoid failures of life, we do believe the Lord watches over us and we believe His hand was active in all the above. For that we are thankful. By the way, we did not get any pictures of all this - we were just a little busy. (The place we anchored was really neat - an arching overhead pipeline.) On to Little Rock!

Here's I-440 that loops around the south side of Little Rock. This excites us a little as this is the driving route we normally take to see our kids and grandkids in Fort Worth. We're looking forward to seeing them more often from our new location in Muskogee, not to mention the much shorter drive.

And, bringing back a few memories for me, an aircraft on final at the Little Rock airport. You can begin to see Little Rock in the distance, bottom right.

A little closer view of downtown.

About 5 bridges in a row through downtown.

The Peabody. Remember the duck walk in Memphis? Look top right.

The "rock" at the foot of the bridge from which Little Rock got its name.

And leaving Little Rock we see hills in the distance.

Then we see the fabulous red cliffs as we get closer to Little Rock Yacht Club.

Unfortunately, we were so busy upon arrival at Little Rock Yacht Club meeting Gary and his friends, installing the solenoid, dinner, etc., we failed to get any shots of the Gary and friends, Sean, and the marina. If you're interested, Gary has an excellent website, http://www.calypsopoet.net/, if you want to read of their travels.

OK Boat Trip, Day 28, 05/22/2008

We left our Merrisach Lake anchorage early, but not quite at the crack of dawn, and joined the Arkansas river about 3 miles later. The current was not too bad - we averaged 5.5 to 7.5 mph most of the day. The lockmaster said they were flowing 107,ooo cfs and tomorrow should be around 90,000. So, things are getting better every day. A week ago it was flowing around 165,000.

Today would have been a really nice easy day but we ended up with a 3-hour delay at Lock #3. The current was a bit strong to just drop anchor in the river so we ended up circling and waiting and waiting and waiting. Not sure what the problem was but the lockmaster said they were "waiting on some approvals from above to get this barge through." Once we were in for our turn, it was the quickest lockthrough (is that a word?) we have ever done, no more than 10 minutes. You have to keep in mind though that these first few locks only raise you about 3 to 5 feet each. We made sure we passed that barge ahead of us ASAP after leaving the lock so we didn't have to wait on him again at Lock#4. And sure enough, we called lock #4 by phone and there was no other traffic ahead of us. He had the doors open when we got there. When you leave the lock, you have to call the Rob Roy bridge tender to have him raise the bridge if no train is coming, and there wasn't.

I decided to wash the boat between the two locks - she was looking a little dirty. We have a freshwater pump and line that draws direct from the river so Rhonda drove (piloted) the boat while I walked around on top and cleaned. This was her chance to get rid of me with a man overboard trick but she didn't so I guess she still loves me. I'm sure she thought about it though - we've been pushing it hard the last 2 days.

I'll mention one thing about anchoring out as we did last night that contributes a little to some fatigue today (not to mention covering 153 miles on the MS yesterday!). There was only a narrow area for anchoring last night on Merrisach Lake and that area was right next to the main channel. Four barges came through after dark and before we went to bed. When that's the case, you sleep very lightly and wake easily. We also usually set an alarm on the GPS or depthfinder so that if the anchor pulls loose for some reason, the GPS or depthfinder senses the change and an alarm goes off so you can check it out. The anchor held just fine but I slept in the pilothouse just in case I had to move quickly during the night.

Anyhow, here are some shots from during the day. Just after entering the AR River, we spotted lots of white pelicans - you need to enlarge this photo if possible. Beautiful.

Later, more white pelicans and a sandy beach.

A blue silo which is a little different. Most are usually red, silver, or white. Lots of farmland today.

You don't want to stray from the channel on this part of the AR - lots of dikes. Here are some pilings for one dike and another of stone. Dikes and revetments keep the rivers flowing where man wants them to go. Without them, rivers go where they want to go.


And finally, we're docked at Island Harbor Marina in Pine Bluff. Chris Wade has recently purchased the marina and he is doing lots of renovations. I called him yesterday to be sure he could provide us a slip and fuel. He provided us a slip at the fuel docks and had some new diesel trucked in for us. His diesel service is out of service on the docks so he pumped it from up on the hill through a water hose. Another first for us but that is service. When he found out I was headed to Muskogee for the harbor master job, he decided our slip fee should be free. Thanks Chris!

Now this is strange. One of Island Harbor's claims to fame is the only known floating chicken house. The chickens were gone at the time I took the photo but here's the house. Now who do you think thought of this? By the way, that's Chris's boat, the big white one to the left of the chicken house. It's about a 70-footer which was previously used to shuttle crews to and from oil rigs.



One other neat story of the day. All day long, swallows flew playfully around the boat, kind of like the dolphins that swim along the bow of the boat in salt water environments. They had a pretty blue color and just seemed to be having a great old time. Things you see on the water!

There's a nice easy rain this evening - should make sleep that much better so maybe we'll get a good rest tonight. Tomorrow - Little Rock at Little Rock Yacht Club.

OK Boat Trip, Day 27, 05/21/2008

So long Memphis. We left Mud Island Marina at 5:30 AM. Great city, but we were ready to leave and get closer to Muskogee.

Before the day was over, we put 153 miles and 3 locks between us and Memphis, a record day's travel for us, ever. We did get some help from the current - we saw 17.5 on the speedometer at one point which means we had a 7.5 mph current. But it generally averaged 4 to 5. Today we saw "submarine bouys." One minute you would be watching a bouy, and then it would take a dive and stay underwater for several seconds or in some cases never resurfacing. All you would see would be a huge swirling circular wave where your bouy had been. In any event, the MS River was absolutely beautiful today. The surface was like glass most of the day with a light wind out of the north. But even with those mild conditions, the MS is tiring because of the continuous swirls in the water, and you always have to be on the lookout for debris. The glassy surface is obvious below. Look closely and you might be able to see some of the swirls. Each one tries to turn your boat, so it's an all-day affair steering where you want to go rather than where the river would prefer you go.

The first 35 miles of the river was deserted and then in the middle of nowhere, a resort and casino pops up on the riverfront in Tunica, MS.

About 70 miles down the river is the town of Helena, AR. Not much town to see from the river, mostly industrial and shipping.

We saw more barges today than ever before, probably around 25. Duh, Wayne - if you go 153 miles in one day you'll probably see more than if you go 70. We did not take a picture of these but they were huge. The large tows (they actually push the cargo so not sure why they call them tows) put out about 5 huge 8-9 ft wakes behind them. So, you try and avoid these as long as possible but eventually you have to cross them, but at a lesser height of course. In fact, you don't just cross them once - there are about 5 more sets of waves that follow the original ones and they last for about 2 miles behind the tow.

So, we were excited to put the MS River behind us and entered the White River at 2:57. Talk about night and day. The White River here is actually a man-made canal that joins the AR with the White and feeds both into the MS. It's very narrow (about 600 feet across) and very calm.

This is again Rhonda's kind of river!

We were a little anxious that the current would still be running strong but it was only about 1 mph. However, the water is still high and we just went over the top of the Montgomery Lock and Dam (#0 since it was added after all the originals) at mm1.5. The two poles you see here are light poles which are attached to one wall of the lock which is completely under water.

The next lock, Norrell L&D #1, is not under water but the water is still high enough that they don't actually lock you through, just keep on cruising. Rhonda wishes all locks were this easy!

Our final lock for the day, L&D #2, and we actually had to lock through this one.

We anchored 1.5 miles past L&D #2 at Merrisach Lake. Here's the L&D behind us.

And some water lillies next to us for the night. We also had a copperhead swimming beside the boat.

Tomorrow, 3 miles ahead and one lock is the AR River. We plan to be at Island Harbor Marina in Pine Bluff for the night.

OK Boat Trip, Days 24-26, 05/18-20/2008

If you recall from a few days (actually, weeks) ago, Rhonda's Dad asked "when are you going to slow down and enjoy the sights and cities a little?" Well Poppa, is 18 days in Memphis enough? LOL

While we certainly would have preferred to be in Muskogee by now, Memphis and the folks at the Yacht Club here have been wonderful to us. Here's a shot of some of the neighbors at a fish fry on Sunday evening. The main entree' was a 30-pound catfish freshly removed from the MS River. We had always heard that big catfish are not very good eating - not true. This was outstanding with salad, fries, hush puppies, slaw, potato salad, and Mexican dip on the side. There were at least 5 men around the deep-fry cooking - never could figure out who was in charge so I finally asked and was quickly told "the Mayor." Never realized the Mayor of Memphis was among us and actually he wasn't - Lanny is "The Mayor" of the Memphis Yacht Club. Apparently, Lanny has a real zeal for catching large fish. He has some serious bruises on his leg from the one that got away (not kidding).

That's Tara in the pink shirt below, "The Mayor" to her left, and Tara's Dad to his left. Tara's Mom and Dad were in town visiting from Florida.

The crowd grew as the evening progressed and we even had a couple of grandson twins to join us.

After the initial rush on the corn meal batter catfish, Dick (in the yellow shirt) moved in with his secret batter recipe, outstanding as well.

Since we'll be leaving tomorrow, we thought we'd pay tribute to the Memphis Yacht Club. Here's their T-shirt design and logo.

Did we say leaving tomorrow? Yes, the forecast is looking pretty good. It should be a beautiful day with a light wind on the river. We are planning an aggressive 136 miles which will put us on the White River for one night of anchoring out on Merisach Lake. That will be followed by another 60 miles or so on Thursday on the AR River to Island Harbor Marina at Pine Bluff, AR. The current for this leg of the trip is all below 100,000 cfs and this may be our best shot for a while. There's more rain forecast for the watershed area of the AR River so we may have to delay a little at Pine Bluff.

Anyhow, we'll spend today checking everything out and getting our provisions fully stocked. We should be able to keep the blog up to date now without relying on WiFi. When I was in Muskogee last week, Arrowhead (my employer) went ahead and got me an AT&T air card for our internet service at Three Forks since the WiFi at the River Center will not be up and running for a while yet. That is a tremendous help with our communication and planning while on the boat. Thanks, Joe.

In closing, anyone interested in how my bus trip went from Muskogee to Memphis last Saturday? That seemed like the easiest way to leave a vehicle in Muskogee and return to Memphis without Rhonda having to come and pick me up. I'd probably reconsider that option if faced with a similar decision again in the future. Actually, it wasn't that bad but we did stop at every town and fruit stand between here and there. Let's just say it expanded my horizons some.

Also, congratulations to Betty Harrison, our dear friend back at Bay Hill who watches over our condo while we're travelling. She has a new great-grandson, Trey.

See you in Pine Bluff.

OK Boat Trip, Days 19-23, 05/13-17/2008

Rhonda has officially been in command of "Help Me Rhonda" now for the past 4 days in Memphis while I've been in Muskogee trying to get some things going at the marina. It's been a pretty productive week. To begin with, I passed my drug test, which is a key element in continuing in the job. For years I administered these on behalf of the FAA to our air traffic controllers so it was a little different to be on the testing end. I got to meet all the folks at Arrowhead Boat Sales. Everyone was very nice and certainly helpful - this is a very professional organization. I also got lots of help from Lewis McLemore, the on-site representative at Three Forks for the Port Authority. Lewis is "the man." He knows everybody and everything about Muskogee and the harbor.

So what needs to be done here? Well, here's the inside of the ship's store. You think we need some inventory?

Well, we now have drink and ice machines, coolers, desks, etc on the way and we'll stock quickly from Arrowhead's existing ship's stores once we're here.

Spent lots of time getting internet service up, a 911 address, fire extinguishers checked and certified, mail service, etc. You know, the basics. Also had a chance to meet some of the tenants. Here are some of their boats on C dock.

And the River Center, still under construction but very impressive.

A view entering the harbor as you leave the Arkansas River.

The transient docks and ship's store.

And our 100 ton lift.

The water in the harbor is still about 9 feet above normal but should start down in the next couple of days if the rain will please stop for a while. I'm heading back to Memphis tomorrow. We'll check all the forecasts again and hopefully be back underway soon.