Beardstown, Bar Island, Grafton

    Well we are now in Grafton the intersection of the Mississippi and the Illinois river. It was a long run of 86 miles to get here. The current should have added 1.5 mph but the 15 mph winds slowed us down a little. On todays trip we had the company of Tika, Always Home, Sea Moss and Elizabear. Tika is a fast cruiser and headed out ahead of the group after the first lock. The rest of the pack cruised at 10-11 mph for about 8 hours to get to Grafton. We passed several up and down river tows. One had fun with the Fryedaze name. These captains are very helpful and take care to keep us pleasure craft armatures safe.
    Yesterday we made a run from Tall Timbers to an anchorage behind Bar Island just south of Bar Island. Sea Moss and Fryedaze tucked in behind the island for the night.  We were very protected from the river traffic but at night you could see the bright flood lights of the big tows as the headed up and down the river.
  Tomorrow we head down the mighty muddy Mississippi. We have about 185 mile on the Mississippi before we hit the Ohio river. We will go to Alton and catch up on laundry and other chores for two days and the head farther south.

 Always Home and Elizabear tied to barges at Breardstown. Fryedaze and Sea Moss are anchored three mile down stream.

 Camera experiment panorama view:-)

 The debris on the banks is 10-15 feet above river level. In the spring this is no place for pleasure craft.

 There are flocks of white pelicans as large as the geese we see in Maryland. They are more beautiful than the geese. Their flight path seems to swirls on circles.

 Big bad eagle. You see eagles everywhere going down the river.

 Note the tree roots. The next spring flood should carry then down the river.

 This is a mom or dad eagle that was with 3-4 young eagles on the bank.

 

 See the flood level at the bottom of the windows.

 Tall Timber Marina. Everything floats. In the spring this office will float up so the ramp behind it is level with the bank.

 Young eagles

 At sunrise a large tow pushed his barge into the bank to wait for upstream taffic.

 White pelicans swirling in the sky.

 

 We passed two car ferries going down river. The run across the river in about 5 minutes. They are pretty quick!

 High wire act. Just had to take a picture.

 Bets is on the bridge driving the boat and goofy Dave is standing by to raise the anchor for an 86 mile run to Grafton. We have to wash the chain down so the mud doesn't get into the chain locker.

We see lot of barges abandoned along the river. This is an example of one that's been there for a long time.

Ottawa, Henrys Island, IVY - Peoria, Tall Timber- Havana

 Big guy heading our way. We are headed down the Illinois river. As we go south we run into new "Loopers" and previous Looper we have met. We generally team up so we can manage the lock through better. The locks require a little planning. You can get stuck waiting at a lock if you don't call the lock master ahead of time and pay attention to the online lock logs that let you know how may barges are waiting. So far things have worked well and the folks at the lock have been very accommodating. The river is a roadway for industry. It is amazing how much product travels on the waterway. The Asian Carp are the most interesting part of this leg of the trip. The sound of the props causes them to jump out of the water. Today when we backed into the slip at Tall Timbers marina in Havana, the carp were jumping onto the dock. The dock hands were kicking them back into the water are they managed our lines getting into the dock. We are at mile 122 on the Illinois river. So in about three days we will enter the Mississippi river. After a few days on the Mississippi we will hit the Ohio river.

 Cottages on the water

 This was cool. As we waited for a lock all these cows came down to drink. The little guys were cute. The bulls came in at the end and moved the herd along.

 We did a slow pass to these guys in a duck blind. Ben, they are warming the geese up before the hit the eastern shore!

 Passing on the "ones". The lingo for navigation takes a little getting used too. The barge captains speak in a different language. If you pass on the "one" you turn right. If you pass on the "two" you turn left. The rule applies if you overtake the tow or if they are headed at you. Its kinda funny listening to the other pleasure craft who haven't figured it out yet. They want to talk in port and starboard terms. The "ones" and "two" is much simple when you figure it out.

 The admiral got me off the wall and now we are headed for a pass on the  "one" for the tow that was in the lock with us. It gets a little snakey going down stream of a lock because there is a dam associated with it and the dam current pushes the boat around on the down stream side. You just have to pay attention.

 This is a first for us in a lock. Fryedaze is tied to the lock wall and two other boats are rafted (tied to us) for the lock through. The boat on the end is a 49' DeFever and probably weighs 10 tons more than Fryedaze. Fun, fun, fun!

 All up and down the Illinois river there are barges that are grounded and tied to trees on the shores.

 This is an example of a big tow. They are huge. When they go up the river they actually suck the water off the banks.

 Bow fishing for Asian Carp. You can see one just at the stern of the boat. We didn't get a good shot but for a short period there were 5-10 fish in the air at one time. There are four guys with bows shooting fish.

 Multi-taking, using the heavy morning dew to clean the boat and getting our hair done. " I am in big trouble for this shot"!

 Flying carp

 Our traveling partner Sea Moss at Henrys Island pulling the anchor.

 14 barges in a tow

 Spirit of Peoria

 This young buck crossed the stream at Henrys but jumped into the high grass when he saw me. I waited and he came back for a few good shots. This was an awesome place to anchor. Eagles, Asian Carp and lots of quiet.

 People get confused and think that young eagles are hawks. They are brown when young and eventually turn black with white heads. Bets did a great job get shots of this guy.

 We have seen dry docks for ships before, well here is one for a barge. There were welders under it repairing the bottom.

 We got luck and Kay on Plan to Sea sent us photos in the Peoria Lock. Look at that mustache from the dirty river silt. That wont get cleaned for a while. If we did clean it it would be back the next day.

 

 This is another first for Fryedaze. All 5 pleasure craft locked through at the Peoria Lock but we didn't tie up.  We just floated in the lock controlling position with engines. The lock is only 11 feet so we all just drifted in the 600 X 100 foot lock.

 Mark Twain Hotel, for us river rats!

 We had to call to have this rail road bridge opened. The chart height is 19' 8" ( we are 20'). The river is down over a foot so Bets and I slowly went up to it to see if we could squeeze under. We chickened out and waited for the train to pass so we could clear it. We wouldn't have made it!

Peoria waterfront

 

 

 



Chicago to Joliet

  We timed our Chicago departure so we made it through down town before the tourist boats cranked up at 1000. What we didn't count on was the water taxis. We were the only boat in the 600 foot Chicago lock and it only drops you about 2 feet, easy peasy. The ride through downtown was so cool, especially after we had confidence that we wouldn't rip the canvas off the boat going under bridges. Once past downtown Chicago we passed many barges tied to the banks at industrial facilities. We were lucky and only had to pass on very big tow and had nothing coming up river. We made it safely through the Asia Carp electric barrier area. This area has electricity in the water to stop the carp from getting to Lake Michigan. You die if you fall in! http://www.lrc.usace.army.mil/Missions/CivilWorksProjects/ANSPortal/Barrier.aspx
Tomorrow we will have more bridge, more locks and more adventures as we head down river.

 Entering the Chicago lock that separated Lake Michigan. This lock was established to reverse the flow of the Chicago river and the sanitary canal. That way the Chicagoans don't pee were they drink. Bets is in full rain gear due to a wet morning and that slug is high and dry on the bridge.

 Chicago fire boats. They are designed to go under the low bridges in town.

 The Michigan Ave bridge was  about 18'. We took it very slow so Bets could tell me how much room we had. The top of Fryedaze is at 16.5 feet. She said we had 1 1/2 to 2 feet of clearance, but then she cant measure because of the little lie I have told her most of her life.

 Low bridge everybody down!

 This railroad bridge has a 10' clearance. Betsy call and they opened her right up for us.

 The canal is in a very industrial area. Oil tank farms, scrap yards, pulp yards, huge gravel and sand yards and lots of old decaying industrial buildings.

 UFO!!!  ok, maybe its just the Metlife blimp.

 Lots and lots of wood pulp. Looks like a bigger version of the mulch operation just north of saint Leonard. We lover the wood smell.

 Exiting the Lockport lock. We were in the lock with two other pleasure boats and a tow that had six barges that were about 500 feet long.