Columbus at last!

We have arrived at the Columbus, MS marina and are all tucked in under roof for the hurricane season. We're right next to Loose Stones, our cruising buddies' boat. They live in Michigan and are leaving their boat here for the summer too.

I originally thought I'd stay on the uncovered docks, but the heat down here is fearsome in the summer and the covered slips are MUCH cooler inside the boat, plus it will keep my freshly varnished teak perfect.

I also got a dehumidifier and I'll put it in the galley sink to run so it will dehumidify the boat and the water will just run out the sink drain into the lake.

We'll be here tomorrow and then driving back to Saint Charles for the beautiful summer season in Illinois. Of course, I'll be back to work on the boat frequently. I already have a long list of things to do.

Paddlefish!

There's always something unexpected and interesting when you're cruising. Today, it was a paddlefish just swimming along the surface of the river. Kathy =saw it and we went back to see it and get a picture. It was only about 2 to 3 ft. long, but I understand that they can get much bigger. It went under the surface when we first went by, but came back up when we crept back quietly and we got within 20 ft of it before it swam off.

We also seen a number of bald eagles, and even saw 2 alligators, which were very unexpected on the Tombigbee River, but there they were. One was about 5 to 6 ft. long.

We passed the "White Cliffs of Epes" on the Toimbigbee River today. These are about 200 ft tall cliffs of white limestone and very picturesque, for the Tombigbee.








We're anchored at the Cochrane Cut-off of the Tombigbee River for the night. It's a very nice anchorage in a big oxbow off the main channel of the river. We're sharing it with 2 other boats, but there's room for 10 boats here.






Tomorrow we'll go to Columbus, MS... the end of our "winter" cruising. We were supposed to get there around mid April instead of mid-June, but you know... the best laid plans of mice and boaters...

We're at Demopolis, AL tonight at the only marina between Mobile Bay and Columbus, MS. We anchored at Bashi Creek last night after another HOT day on the rivers. It was very comfortable on the flybridge in the morning, but by noon it was 94 degrees and probably 94 humidity too, so even with a little breeze from cruising at 10 knots it was hot and sticky. I put root beers in the freezer and drink them when they make a slushy, but that only lasts a few minutes.

The rivers were wide and calm all day for the last 3 days.









We're back to passing occasional huge barge tows on the rivers. This one is mostly wood chips for one of the opaper mills along the rivers here. We frequently saw tree farms along the banks, planted with perfect rows of fast growing pine trees destined for the pulp mills.

The barges were probably headed for one of the paper mills, like this large Boise paper mill on the Tombigbee river. Our friend Tom Drouin is an executive for Boise and had set up a plant visit to this paper mill for us two years ago as we passed by going south, but we passed here on Thanksgiving day and were not able to stop.

In a lot of places, the rivers were completely like glass. No wind and no boat traffic so it's dead calm. Of course, that means the only breeze is the one made by your speed over the water, but that's better than when we had a breeze blowing the same way we were going, which makes it dead calm on the moving boat.

I did see two very large cranes flying south today, identifiable by outstretched necks, unlike the many Great Blue Herons we see. I believe these were either Sandhill Cranes or Whooping Cranes, which is 99.9% likely to be Sandhill Cranes as Whoopers are so scarce.

We also passed the old Rooster Bridge, site of the famous Cahaba towboat incident where pictures circulated on the internet of a towboat that was capsized during a flood and pulled under water under the bridge only to come up on the other side and right itself with the engines still running and all hands survining. There's nothing left of the bridge today except for the handrails high up on the bank visable here, but they'll be invisible soon due to the kudzu overtaking everything.

Tomorrow, we'll go on to a nice anchorage at Sumter Landing, and then on to Columbus, MS.

We're anchored at Three Rivers Lake on the Tombigbee River after running 85 miles today. The cell signal here is extremely weak, so I added pictures later, but it was a very nice day to cruise. Even though it was hot (near 90), usually the breeze on the flybridge kept us comfortable.

Mobile Bay was unbelievebaly calm and completely smooth, which was nice. It can kick up serious waves when the wind blows. That's the skyline of Mobile off in the distance.







Going through Mobile is always interesting because of the major shipbuilding activity. There was a very large Navy Trimaran being built, a number of large fast ferries (two for Hawaii), regular container ships, and lots of other ships being refitted in drydocks along the waterway.

We cruised up the Mobile River to the Tombigbee River, which is after the junction with the Alabama River. The whole Mobile river system is a huge intertwining set of rivers, swamps and estuaries forming the delta at Mobile.

We anchored on this very small lake which is down a creek about a quarter mile from the river. The lake is nice and quiet and VERY dark at night, but we can't go out on deck to see the stars because of the hoards of bugs waiting to get in as soon as we open a door.




The creek is 10 to 12 ft deep in the middle but only about 40 ft wide with overhanging trees on the shoreline, so it's spooky going along a little creek in a great big boat with absolutely no way to turn around even if we wanted to.






This evening, the generator overheated when we started it up and ran 3 air conditioners and the water heater, which automatically comes on after cruising. I turned off the water heater and ran 2 air conditioners and the genny is running fine with that load. I think the very warm river water just doesn't cool the generator when it's loaded up like that.

Tomorrow we'll go to another anchorage at Bashi Creek and then on to Demopolis, AL.

FINALLY!

We're back at the boat today (Sunday 6/7) to start up the rivers to Columbus, MS. After the rivers were below flood stage enough for us to go, the passing of a dear friend in Illinois caused us to stay for another week. Now things look good to go tomorrow. We got a rental car at the Columbus airport and left our car at the marina in Columbus so it will be there when we arrive.

We'll be on the river systems for 5 days before we get to Columbus, probably with no phone and no internet, anchoring out 3 of the 4 nights. Then, an oil change and maintenance for Nonchalance and back to Saint Charles, IL for us for the summer.