Chattanooga

Yesterday we did a road trip by car to Chattanooga, TN.  To travel there, we passed through Georgia for about 10 minutes and can add another state to our journey.  We've passed through nine states:  MI, WI, IL, MO, KY, TN, MS, AL and GA.

The first stop was the Antique Tow Truck Museum where we got to see over a dozen trucks from all different era's in American History.  Below are a few highlights.

1913 Locomobile w/ 485 Holmes Wrecker
Notice the original wood wheels
6 cylinder engine w/ 82 HP

1929 Chrysler w/ Weaver Crane
was in continuous use from 1930 to 1971
2 years to restore it

1970 Cony (Japan) 1/4 pickup w/ 2 cylinder engine

1947 GMC "Bubble Nose"
Used by Pabst Brewing to Haul Beer & Later used to tow school buses
Found abandoned in a field in 1988 in need of a water pump

Holmes W-45 Military Wrecker Diamond-T "Redball Express"
15 Ton rating.
Used in WWII in France to deliver supplies to front line.

1926 Graham Brothers w/ 3 Ton Manley Auto Crane

World's Fastest Wrecker - 08/01/1979
Talladega, AL
Driver:  Eddie Martin exceeded 130 MPH on straightaways

World's Fastest Wrecker

1929 Packard Model 640 w/ 3 Ton Manley Crane

1929 Packard Model 640 w/ 3 Ton Manley Crane

There is even a two truck for the "kids" to play with - tee hee

Once we finished with the tow truck museum, we moved onto the Tenessee Valley Rail Road Grand Junction Station and took an hour ride on a steam engine.  The route was the Missionary Ridge Local and is on 3 miles of track that was donated and we crossed over 4 bridges and went through a pre-Civil war tunnel completed in 1858.  The trip takes riders to the railroad restoration shop and demonstrates how the train gets "turned around" on a giant turntable.  Video Clips below.

630 being driven onto the turn table

Diesel engine at the restoration yard

Restoration projects in progress

Once we completed our train ride, we moved onto the Chatanooga Choo Choo Hotel complex.  From there we took the electric trolley to the riverfront and walked the Trail of Tears.  In May 1838 soldiers rounded up Cherokee Indians in the area and marched overland resulting in the death of many.  The Trail of Tears, which resulted from the Indian Removal Act passed by U.S. Congress in 1830, is one of the darkest chapters in American history.

Part of Trail of Tears

Chattanooga is also home to one of the worlds longest pedestrian bridges at 2,376 feet long.  It was built in 1890 and closed to  motor vehicles in 1978.

Walnut Street Pedestrian Bridge that crosses the Tennessee River

The Chattanooga Choo Choo engine now on display at Terminal Station is the same type of wood-burning train used on that first run from Cincinnati to Chattanooga in 1880.

Looper Rendezvous

The last several days have been a whirlwind of activity for the two of us.  Festivities for the rendezvous kicked off last Sunday evening and closed on Wednesday evening.  We had an amazing time, met more new friends, toured many other boats and learned a lot at the seminars.  In addition, every time we turned around the sponsors (America's Great Loop & Cruisers Association) were feeding us.  Each evening also included a cocktail hour sponsored by businesses that support the AGLCA and those of us doing the Great Loop.  Since our boat was right by the tent for the cocktail hour, we relocated the Leg Lap to the aft deck so it could be seen.  It is a major award you know.

A Christmas Story Leg Lamp on display

We attended seminars on wintering in the Bahamas, boat building, boat maintenance, boat structural repair, boat electronics and being suddenly in command.  All very interesting sessions.  Below is a picture of Joe Wheeler State Park's main Lodge where the conference was held and also a picture of a lifesaving raft that was on display.

Joe Wheeler State park main Lodge

Lifesaving raft on display at the conference

Two Years free membership in ALGCA for early registeration

Bert & Hilary at Closing Ceremony Dinner

All the attendees at the Rendezvous

During a break from all the social activity Hilary took advantage of the trails in the state park and snapped some pictures during her hike one day.  The first two show how debris from the river system collects on land during periods of low water.  All of these trees will float back out into the river system next time the water rises.

Trees collected in a basin during low water

The River inlet where all the trees came in when the water was high

Watch your step!  It is a long way down.

The most perfectly developed beautiful pine cone Hilary has ever seen.

One of the highlights of the Rendezvous was attending a concert at a local venue on Tuesday evening.  Arrangements were made to bus all the conference attendees into Rogersville for an afternoon of shopping and then to the concert.  The band was the Kerry Gilbert Band (KGB).  The KGB is from northwest Alabama and they play primarily country, classic rock, folk, gospel and R&B.  They have original hits but the cover music they play is by artists such as:  Zac Brown Band, Elvis, Merle Haggard, Johnny Cash, Don Williams, Willie Nelson, George Jones, Motown Hits, Exile, The Eagles, Jerry Lee Lewis, The Temptations and the Commodores.  They offered to travel anywhere to perform as long as they get fed and have a place to stay.  www.kerrygilbertband.com  One of the guitar players makes some of his own guitars and he had two really interesting ones.  One was made out of a kitchen sink and the other out of two gourds.  The paint job on the gourds was done himself and is Ferrari paint.  He is a custom car painter for his day job.

Guitar made of two gourds with Ferrari paint job

Guitar made out of a kitchen sink

An added surprise at the concert was a man named P Parker who is an older gentleman that is amazing when it comes to flatfoot mountain dancing or clogging.  Each time a bluegrass song was played, he started dancing at the front of the audience by the stage.  It was great to see something so interesting at the concert.  He is also an artist and handed out copies of original artwork he'd drawn of Cumberland Falls, KY.  Such a talented man.

Original Artwork by P Parker

When the rendezvous came to a close, many of the attendees hurried and left at first light on Thursday morning but we decided to stay another day at Joe Wheeler State Park and as is typical, docktails and a potluck occurred for those Loopers still remaining on Thursday evening.  Friday we started moving back towards the Tenn-Tom waterway and are now in Florence, AL for the next week.  Eva, the HarborMaster at the Florence marina offered a buy 5 nights, get 2 nights free deal so we decided to take advantage of it and even rented a car for the week which is a real treat.  We plan to do some sightseeing over the next week in the area.  Chattanooga, TN is on the list for sure as many of the loopers were going onto there by boat before turning around and heading back to the Tenn-Tom waterway.  We are considering Shiloh, Elvis's birthplace, a Frank Loyd Wright house, and Heller Keller's home as well.  Yesterday was the first time Hilary has driven a car since August 19th and she hadn't missed it at all!

Locks

Some mention of locks has been made in prior posts, but not a lot of detail was provided about locks so far.

At this point in the trip, we have passed through 17 locks. On the Illinois River we passed through 8 locks, all down.  On the Mississippi river was passed through three locks, all down.  On the Ohio and Cumberland Rivers we locked up three times.  Finally on the Tennessee River, we have locked up three times.  Locking down you are traveling with the current and locking up you are traveling against the current.  We have 14 more locks to go before we reach the Gulf of Mexico.

The Wilson Lock which was passed through on Friday, was the largest lock we've encountered, raising over 90'!!  It was incredible.  At the Wilson Lock, we were with about 9 other looper boats all heading towards the rendezvous.  We all had to work together to determine placement in the lock so everyone could have a floating bollard to attach to.  For those unfamiliar with locking, the side walls have bollards you can wrap a line to to secure the boat and then the bollard raises or lowers along with the water level.

Locking for us has gone pretty well and we've learned to catch the floating bollard off the swim platform so Bert can use the bow thruster to control the bow of the boat and keep it close to the wall.  Took the Plunge doesn't have a stern thruster so if we catch a floating bollard at the front of the boat, then the stern end is free to float away from the wall and push the bow of the boat into the wall, potentially causing damage.  The lock walls are cement and fenders are used all down the side of the boat to protect the fiberglass hull and rub rail from the cement lock wall.  Typically the boat engines are turned off while locking so Hilary doesn't have to inhale diesel exhaust fumes on the swim platform while locking.

Unfortunately, we were positioned to catch the floating bollard off the bow of the boat in Wilson Lock, leaving the stern to float free and away from the wall.  It was also very windy on Friday which doesn't help things at all.  Wilson Lock is turbulent as it raises because so much water is being moved at such a fast pace.  The lock chamber fills very quickly with water.  Suffice to say we didn't have a very good ride up the 90' as the stern of the boat kept floating out and away from the lock wall, forcing the bow of the boat towards the lock wall.  All Bert's muscle and Hilary running the bow thruster wasn't enough to overcome the wind and working together we were unable to keep the bow off the cement wall.  Bert gave instruction for Hilary to start the engines to get better control and while that was going on Bert was still fighting the wind to keep the bow off the cement wall.  Well, at the last second before disaster, Bert was able to save the bow of the boat with one of our two dock poles.  Thank goodness he got his fingers free before impact.  After the crunch, Hilary had the engines running and Bert was able to regain control of the boat and get it parallel to the lock wall for the remainder of the trip up.

Dock Pole Damage at Wilson Lock

Dock Pole gone, Bert's fingers saved!

As you enter Wilson Lock from the Tennessee River, you are locking up to Wilson Lake.  The doors of the lock on the bottom side look like two double doors that close together in the middle.  They swing in from the sides to close.  I posted a video of doors closing below.

Entering Wilson Lock

Boats inside Wilson Lock - secured to Floating Bollards

On the Wilson Lake side of the lock, there are no double doors to get out.  A wicket dam lowers to let the boats out and the vessels pass over the top of the wicket.  Below are pictures of the wicket that lowers down once the lock is full of water.  The wicket lowers and rests on the cement supporting structure seen in the picture.

Looking Up inside the Lock

Picture of Wicket Dam on Wilson Lake side of Lock

Since we arrived at Joe Wheeler State Park, we've been busy visiting with other boaters before the official start of the rendezvous.  Rogersville, AL had a fall festival including a car show that we attended on Saturday.  One of the cars at the show was a replica of the General Lee from Dukes of Hazard.

General Lee replica at the Rogersville, AL car show.

We also had front row for a wedding ceremony here at the park on the aft deck of our boat on Sweetest Day.  Ron and Lynn (friends from the sailing vessel Northern Spirit) were sitting with us visiting on the aft deck for the wedding.  The ceremony was very, very short, lasting less than 10 minutes.  Once the couple was married, all the boaters blew their horns in celebration.  It was fun!

Dad and the Bride

Wedding Party

Bride & Groom

Now you see them, now you don't . . .

Rewind back to last Thursday morning.  Imagine soundly sleeping and at 5:50 a.m. being gently awoken to the sound of voices and spending the next 10 seconds have a conversation with yourself that goes something like this:

"It is still dark out."
"My that is odd, why am I hearing voices?"
"I should only hear voices that clearly if I left the window open."
"OMG!  It rained last night, what if I left the window open?!?!?"

Still dazed and confused, immediately spring out of bed to feel the curtains . . . . they are dry.  Whew, what a relief.  Lift the blind . . . .   the window is closed.  Hhmmmm . . . . still hearing voices, and something that sounds like bees.

Upon going up to the galley and looking out the front windshield, there is a sea of red, green and white lights in the bay.  Hundreds of them!!!   All moving around, all over the place.  It was 142 bass boats preparing for the 7:00 am start of a bass fishing tournament.  Each had their navigation lights on and all the red, green and white lights were beautiful - like Christmas lights all moving around in the bay.  The voice was the official with a loudspeaker checking in the boats by their number as they parade past the fuel dock to check in.  It was chaos!!!  Amazing, wonderful, new chaos.  Having never experienced something like this, the coffee pot was started and Hilary got dressed.  One of the boats had decided to use Took the Plunge as a mooring site and had their boat tied off the cleat on the swim platform.  Hilary spent the next 45 minutes chatting with the two gentlemen in the boat.  They explained it was a 3 day tournament and that the boats would all come back in around 3 or 4 for weigh in of the days catch.  It was pretty interesting.  Before starting, there was an invocation and then the National Anthem which is a favorite of Hilary's.

At about 6:50, 10 minutes before the start, Hilary walked up to the mouth of the marina to watch all 142 boats pull out in a pre-arranged order while the official with the loudspeaker counted:  1, 2, 3, 4, etc to dismiss all the boats.  One of the pictures below is a video pan of all the bass boats immediately before the start.

Bass Boat Team that tied to Took the Plunge

Now you see them . . .

 . . . . and now you don't.

Another beautiful sunrise

Monument marking entrance to Florence, AL Marina

The bass tournament was Thursday, Friday and Saturday morning so the entire morning ritual was repeated on Friday before we pulled out to head onto Joe Wheeler State Park.

CJ has decided Bert's lap is an excellent place to ride while underway

We are now at Joe Wheeler State Park for the Great Looper Rendezvous in Rogersville, AL.  We will be here until Friday, October 26th.  More about the trip to get here including locking up 90' in the next post.  This blog post needs to come to an abrupt end so Hilary can go sit on the aft deck and watch a Sweetest Day wedding ceremony that is going to occur about 50 yards off the back of the boat on the patio of the conference center.

Mississippi!!!

Yesterday we said goodbye to Tennessee and hello to Mississippi.  However, we will only be in Mississippi for a short time and tonight we'll be in Florence, Alabama.  For the remainder of the trip to the Gulf of Mexico we will keep crossing back and forth between these two states.  Currently we are in Pickwick Lake and at this point in the trip, we are supposed to leave the Tennessee River and transition to the Tenn-Tom Waterway.  However, today we will detour off of the Great Loop route and stay on the Tennessee River for about another 65 miles in order to attend the Great Loop/Cruisers Association Rendezvous which is held at Joe Wheeler State Park in Rogersville, AL.  Below is a picture of the river route we've been on for the past few weeks and a big red dot in the center of the picture shows where we are now.

 
For the past couple weeks, we've been traveling with a rather large group of looper boats.  Yesterday was a long travel day which included locking up 55' to Pickwick Lake so everyone decided to get a very early start and by 7:10 a.m. most of the boats were already on the river.  Well it turned out to be a bit too early as within 30 minutes, we were surrounded by fog!  Fog is something you don't want to be in on the river because there is always the concern a barge may be coming at you.  Bert turned on the radar and drove by radar for about 30 minutes until the sun got high enough over the river to burn the fog off and it did turn out to be a good travel day once the fog lifted.

One of the boats we started with yesterday morning is a catamaran, Catmandu (Chris & Bill), which is pictured below.  Catmandu travels a little slower than the rest of the group and they have learned to leave last in order to not get passed by the group.  Last week they were still leaving first since it takes them longer to get to the next stop, but then Chris commented that when all the other boats in the group catch up and pass Catmandu she feels like she is getting chased down by a large pack of white dogs.   This group of boats use radio channel 72 to talk to each other throughout the day on the trip and as the boats passed by Catmandu last week, some of them barked at Chris on the radio after hearing her story.  The group does have a good time moving down the river.  Yesterday we brought up the rear of the white dog pack.  We all struggled with the current yesterday as we have continued to go "up river" with the current reaching about 4 MPH against us yesterday.  Our speed has been running about 9 or 10 MPH but yesterday at times were were lucky to stay at 6 MPH.  It made for a long, slow day.

Fog!  This is never good.

Catmandu - Bill & Chris

Took the Plunge - courtesy of Bill (Catmandu)

Took the Plunge - courtesy of Bill (Catmandu)

The pack of White Dogs ahead that we traveled with yesterday

Nearly 4 MPH current against the bouy

On the Tennessee River many houses are built high on the hills.  We passed one yesterday that had severe erosion and looks to be in danger of falling into the river!  Part of the retaining wall has already crumbled down the bank.

House on the TN river in danger of falling due to erosion

This part of the country is very historic and yesterday we passed by Shiloh National Park, which is the historic site of a bloody Civil War battle in April 1862.  We are not visiting this park, but many other loopers are making this a "must see" on their trip.  We also passed by Cherry Mansion which is significant because it served as headquarters for General U.S. Grant in the spring of 1862.  General Grant was having breakfast in the mansion when it was interrupted with news that the Battle of Shiloh had begun.

Cherry Mansion on the TN river - headquarters for
General Grant in the Spring of 1862

Upon our arrival at the marina last night, we were pleasantly surprised to see two familiar boats - Loopy Kiwi (Phil/Carolyn) and the sailing vessel Northern Spirit (Ron/Lynn).  He hadn't seen either boat since Green Turtle Bay a couple weeks ago.  We all shared a nice meal together and visited last evening.  In this marina, Aqua Harbor, boaters own their slips, much like buying a condo.  Once owned, anything can be done with the space.  On the particular dock we were all assigned to, many of the owners have built decks and installed very elaborate outside kitchens and seating areas for socialization.  With permission of the slip owner, we enjoyed one of these patio areas for our meal last night.  During dinner, Ron impressed us all when he folded his napkin into a sailboat.   Ron and Lynn are from Canada and referred to the napkin as a serviette.  It is very interesting to talk to folks from different places and have our horizons expanded to so many new things.

Dinner last night at outdoor kitchen built in the boat slip

Another view of the elaborate outside kitchens.

Serviette that Ron folded into a sailboat