On Friday, Sept. 13th we continued down the Mississippi. This morning we are traveling with four other boats. We successfully locked through the Melvin Price Lock. We are noticing on this stretch of river, there is much industry on the Illinois side. We then locked through the Chain of Rocks Lock after waiting for a tow and barge to go through. We continue to marvel at the strong current on the Mississippi. We passed through St. Louis.  Surprisingly there is no place to dock near the city. We saw the famed arch. Then it was on to Hoppies our last marina until Barkley Lake. It is very primitive made up of three barges. They do have fuel and electricity. The owner of Hoppies is Fern. She is a legend in the looper world.  Every afternoon at 4:30 she holds court and tells the loopers about what to expect as we continue down to Mobile. Tony took a walk into the village of Kimmswick, the second oldest town in Missiouri. There are only 200 residents in the town and forty-four of the log homes and log businesses are part of the National Register of Historic places. The oldest building was constructed in 1770. We talked to Kathy and Ken from Meandering and we decided that we would travel together on the next leg of our journey. Saturday we continued traveling down the Mississippi. We passed and were passed by many tows. Protocol dictates that you radio your location by landmarks. Also, you always call the tow captain for passing instructions. Most of them are very friendly and appreciate the communication.  After traveling about about 80 miles, both boats tucked in between two wing dams (now called training structures). These dams are constructed to force the flow of the water into the middle of the channel. We were protected from the current as well as any tows that might pass during the night. They travel 24/7. We did have a hiccup. Our gnerator would not start. So we were really camping on the water. When we awoke on Sunday, we had very dense fog delaying our departure to 8:30. After traveling about 70 miles and encountering several tows, again we anchored in a protected spot. On Monday we left the Mississippi and entered the Ohio River. We now were traveling north against the current so we slowed down considerably. We are now bordered by Illinois and Kentucky. We locked right through Lock 53, but had almost a four hour wait at Lock 52. When we were finally called in Ken could not start the engine. As we rafted together, he tried one more time and it fired up. We ended up tying up to the city dock in Paducah, KY. It was a long 12 hour day. We left early Tuesday morning. We got a great sunrise picture as well as a picture of the American Queen. This large paddle wheel boat cruises from New Orleans to St. Louis.  We left the Ohio and entered the Cumberland River.  The Cumberland is a very narrow river with many twists and turns. The banks of the river are treelined with many beautiful rock outcrops. We finally made it to the Barkley Lock. Fortunately, there were two other looper boats at the lock and we had a short wait.  The lock was massive and lifted us 43 feet.  We then proceeded to Green Turtle Bay on Barkley Lake. There are many loopers here and more are expected.  We had a great docktail party and reconnected with boats we have not seen in awhile. We will be staying here for a week. We will have the generator repaired before we continue.

                                                                   St. Louis

                                                                    St Louis

                                                                      The Arch

   Meeting with Fern at Hoppies

Meandering anchored at Weir Dam