M/V ILLUSIONS                                      TX TO WV TO TX CRUISE         

TX TO WV TO TX CRUISE TRIP 1 LOGS Houston, TX to Gilbertsville, KY May 27 – June 11, 2001 Houston to Port Arthur, TX, Sunday, May 27, 2001      We took our leave of South Shore Harbour Marina a little after 10am on Sunday morning, Memorial Day weekend.  Our original plan had been to spend the weekend with the Texas Mariners Cruising Association (TMCA) on their cruise to Offatts Bayou in Galveston, but we had some last minute things to finish at home before we could leave.  So, we loaded the boat late Saturday night and passed on the trip to Galveston.        We did stop there for fuel, taking on 250 gallons of diesel.  I figured 200 of that was what we needed to start the cruise with a full tank, so I counted 50 gallons for this particular cruise.  Temperatures had gotten up in the high 80s, sometimes even 90F; but our trip was pleasant and free of rain.  Our preparations for the cruise included a brand new water filter, which we hoped would take away the cloudy appearance of our water.      Other changes included new blue canvas and clear isinglass enclosures and new blue indoor/outdoor carpet for the aft deck and flying bridge; new covers for the dinghy, the outdoor grill, and the helm station, all in blue; new flags and one new flag pole for the transom; repaired tachometer shafts on both engines; repaired bolster around the front of the flybridge area; a new stereo/tape player for the flybridge; and new fenders, fender holders, and lines for the boat.  Also we had repaired the dings in the fiberglass, replaced a rear seal on the port transmission, aligned the engines and shafts, repainted the bottom and replaced the boot stripe, repaired the radio and hailer/speaker, and tuned up everything that could be tuned.      When we went through Port Arthur, we hit a submerged object, unseen before or after, with no apparent damage.  It was probably a glancing blow.  We slowed for the usual boating and sunbathing crowd at Stewt’s Island and made our way to a neat little anchorage just beyond Shell Island.  We had anchored there in 1992, and we had pleasant memories of seeing a mother and young deer by the edge of the water.  The anchorage was close to 20 feet deep in the middle, with more shallow water at the edges.  We had no trouble anchoring in 10 – 15 mph winds from the southwest.      Angela grilled some salmon for dinner, and we had an excellent meal.  As we were enjoying the dying colors of sunset in the sky, a sailboat joined us in the anchorage.  It was about 25 feet long, and it had its running lights on, which stayed on all night.  We had an anchor light on, so the towboats in the Intracoastal Waterway (ICW) would not pull in there and run over us.      We covered 110 statute miles for the day, in 8 running hours; and we ran the generator only after we anchored.  The ICW mileage marker is 350 at Galveston and 0 at the Harvey Locks in New Orleans.  We were slightly west of mile 270. Port Arthur, TX to Morgan City, LA, Monday, May 28, 2001      About 6am, something seemed to have changed, and that’s a good enough reason to get up and see what it was.  The wind had shifted to the East, which was not expected.  It caused us no problems, but served as a good wake-up call anyway.  The temperature was 75F, with high humidity and a nice, cool breeze.      Just a mile or so west of the lift bridge at Ellender, LA, Angela was at the wheel while I was below for some reason.  I think I heard us go aground before she did, although at first it sounded like we had picked up a crab trap.  By the time Angela realized what was happening, we had driven up on a sand bar, which should not have been there but was.  She was not in the middle of the channel, but she was not over at the bank either.  There are shallow spots in the ICW, where they need to dredge but haven’t gotten to it yet.  That was on our starboard, or south, side.      I didn’t know if I could get us off or not.  The depth gauge said 1.6 feet, but we have an extra foot built in, so it really was 2.6 feet.  Our draft is 4.25 feet.  Both props were grinding sand and shells when they turned, so I couldn’t use the port engine to turn us more to the bank.  Each time I would put the starboard engine in reverse, it would move us a foot and then die.  I eventually got us off, and I expected some prop and/or rudder damage, but it planned without vibration later on.       We went to the Calcasieu Lock about 9am, and we went through without delay, which was probably a first.  The lockmaster was nice, too, which was unusual.  Those locks are there for the rice farmers and have nothing to do with navigation on the ICW, I have been told.  They are supposed to stop salt water from going into the ICW between the Calcasieu River and Freshwater Bayou, where the Leland Bowman Lock is located.      Once while I was below, Angela spotted a deer at the edge of the water.  It ran a little ways alongside the south side of the ICW and then disappeared into the brush.  At Gibbstown, LA, at the boat ramp by the bridge, she saw a wrecker pulling a pick-up truck out of the water.  She said the hood and a portion of the roof of the cab were visible.  She could not tell if they were just beginning to pull it out, or if it had been completely submerged, but it looked like the driver had backed too far down the ramp for sure.  Later I spotted a cow and her young calf.  We saw some eagles and other wildlife as well, including horseflies, which give a bite that itches for days.      At Mile 149 on the ICW, just west of Bayou Petite Anse, which leads to Avery Island, the Memorial Day activities were intense, with skiers and small boaters out in force.  It looked like a good time was being enjoyed by all.  We saw boat races, boats pulling kids on tubes of various sizes, fishermen, and young people running up and down the ICW in their runabouts.  Picnics were being enjoyed on the shore, and I imagine the Louisiana cooking was great.      We were poised to get into Morgan City by 6:30 or so, but construction at the Louisa Bridge (Cypremort, LA) shut down the ICW until 6pm.  It was 4:20 when we got there; some tows complained of waiting since 1:30pm.  We grilled chicken and ate dinner while we waited so we wouldn’t be eating late at night.      We actually arrived at 9pm at our fuel dock, and we tied up at the free dock in Morgan City at 10pm.  The one space reserved for pleasure craft was taken by a new Nordic Tug 37, so we had no power or water.  Actually we had a water problem at that point.  The new water filter was getting clogged up with the silt, or whatever it was, that we had in our water tank.  I really wanted a shower, so we took the system apart and tried to diagnose the problem after docking.  We got enough water to take a shower, and we made plans to flush the tank at the next stop that had shore water.      Other problems included a worrisome tendency of the port engine to overheat, or maybe it was the gauge?  I was very sensitive to overheating problems, as we all should be.  Overheating can ruin an engine.  Also, the port tachometer was acting up, like showing only the top half of the numbers, only occasionally, but it was not always predictable. Morgan City to Venice, LA, Tuesday, May 29, 2001      I was up at 6am to check the sea strainers on the CATS.  With all the grass in the water, and the temperature problem we sometimes had on the port side, I wanted to make sure we hadn’t picked up some debris in the sea strainers.  They were clean.  I also checked the oil; we had had some minor leaks below the engines, which we had been told was due to overfilling.  The oil levels looked fine.     We pulled away from the City Dock at 6:45am, with the permission of Berwick Traffic, of course (US Coast Guard Vessel Traffic Service, Channel 11).  We motored slowly east to the Bayou Boeuf Locks, and we had good luck again.  We locked through with no wait, and the lockmaster was even nice to us.  The next hour was spent slowly motoring by the largest shipbuilding complex I believe I’ve seen.  It was a very impressive scene.      On the other shore, on Avoca Island on the south side of the ICW, we saw equally impressive and photogenic Louisiana swamp, with moss in the trees, white egrets and other birds on stumps and logs, and palmettos and elephant ears growing alongside the water.      By 9am, we were at the intersection of the ICW and the Houma Navigation Canal, which we thought to use to put us in the Gulf.  We wanted to bypass New Orleans and the locks on either side of the Mississippi River.  The Harvey Lock was due to be closed for a few days beginning May 29, although the Algiers Lock would be available as an alternative.  The Industrial Canal Lock on the other side of the river has always meant a delay and unpleasant lockmasters, so we hoped to just give it all a miss.      We turned into the Houma Canal, and immediately the bridge tender started blowing his horn to indicate the bridge was going to open for us.  There were two tugs coming upstream on the other side, too.  After passing the bridge and some more oilfield service locations, we planed off and ran down to the pontoon bridge at Dulac, LA.  The port engine complained of a lack of fuel, so I went below and changed the Racor filter while Angela steered ahead on one engine.  We went through the bridge on both engines, and then I changed the other Racor filter.      The Canal was well buoyed through Terrebonne Bay and way out into the Gulf.  It was a nice day to be in the Gulf, and I am always impressed by the level of activity at the offshore oil rigs.  The small swells were coming from the south, and we were running to the east, so we didn’t have the uncomfortable chop of hitting the waves head-on.  The autopilot quit working, so we had to steer by hand.  Also, the GPS chart plotter would not accept the card for that area.  It would accept the cards for the areas before and after that particular area.  We had paper charts (always recommended) so were able to find Tiger pass with coordinates and the GPS.      A few days later I called Garmin, and they concluded the card had “gone bad”.  They had redesigned the coverage and did not have exactly that card any more.  They offered a somewhat different card for that area, for $300, with a 50% discount if I returned the “bad” card.      Tiger Pass was also well marked until we reached the upper end, where it was a little confusing.  We made a guess and found Cypress Cove Marina, where we had spent a night in 1999.  We plugged in and began the process of flushing the water tank.  We needed some chemical that Angela used on the shower heads to clean them out, but we were temporarily out of it.  I flushed the filter and reinstalled it.  We showered and dressed in shorts for dinner.  We ate at the restaurant there, and it wasn’t great.  After dinner I was tired and retired early.  It had been hot and humid.      At the end of our third day underway, we had traveled 426 miles (mostly statute miles) in 31 running hours with the generator running 36 hours.  Since we had come that way in 1999, we had some statistics to compare with the current trip.  In 1999 we had been offshore every day, covering 463 miles in 32 running hours with the generator running 35 hours.  Going up and down the Calcasieu and Atchafalaya Rivers added more miles to our 1999 trip.  Venice, LA to Mobile, AL, Wednesday, May 30, 2001      We were up early and left the marina at 6:50am.  We motored over to ASCO (formerly L & L Oil co.) fuel dock to fill up with diesel.  We took on 180 gallons, but I may not have filed the tanks full.  Then we eased out into the Mississippi River and across it to Bayou Baptiste Collette.  That waterway is also well marked, and we were soon into the Gulf again, this time on the eastern side of the Mississippi River.  The waters were shallow and smooth.      We headed east, to avoid the Breton Islands and shallow waters there, and then crossed the Mississippi River – Gulf Outlet.  One on the other side of that channel, we turned left to a course of 49 degrees for the lighthouse at the entrance to Mobile Bay.  The water was very smooth for the 60-mile run (nautical miles).  Angela did almost all the piloting of the boat, and she did a fine job, too.  Our deepest point was over 75 feet deep, same as the previous day offshore.  The water was pretty, too.  It was blue in the deepest areas and then green closer in to shore.      Upon entering Mobile Bay, the winds picked up, and it looked more like rain.  Angela drove us right to the bridge over Dog River where she turned it over to me for the docking.  We spent the night at Grand Mariner Marina, on the south side of the river, just a quarter of a mile or so inside the bridge.  We filled up with diesel and water, and then we pulled the boat forward to tie up for the night at the fuel dock.  Angela and I went below to shower and change.  I had to change to the new filter cartridge to get enough water through the shower heads, and I drained some more water from the tank in case there was still some sediment there.      Louise loaned us her car to go to the Wal-Mart Super Center.  We spent an hour and a half there. We found a new cartridge for the water filter, and we found the chemical Angela used to clean out the shower heads.  They worked great after cleaning.  We bought groceries and other stuff, and we went back to The Mariner for dinner.  It was good.  The Wal-Mart was dangerous for me though, because I kept seeing things I wanted to know more about.      When I paid my bill, I noticed the fuel usage seemed high.  We put 243 gallons of diesel in the boat.  On our 1999 trip we had stayed at Eastern Shore Marina, and the mileage to Dog River would have been about the same.  We had figured the mileage then at 115 miles from Venice.  243 miles divided by 115 miles calculated out to be 2.11 gallons per mile, compared to our usual 1.4 or 1.5.  Also, dividing the gallons by the 8 hours we ran (both trips), we used 30 gallons per hour compared to our usual of 20.      I spoke to Willie about the gallons, and he assured me the number was not a calculation.  It was off the pump and the computer, so that made it correct.  I thought it might be correct because:  (1) the miles might be 138 (statute) instead of 115; (2) the hours might be closer to nine (I usually just read the hour number and ignore the tenths) than to eight; and (3) the tanks may not have been filled all the way at Venice, for several reasons.  That seemed to answer some, if not all, of the questions.      Our revised totals were 564 miles in 4 days and 39 running hours with 39 hours on the generator.  In 1999, on about the same trip, our numbers were 578 miles in 40 running hours over 4 days with 39 hours on the generator.  In 1998, when we stayed one night in Galveston and three nights in New Orleans before arriving at Dog River, our numbers were 661 miles in 50 running hours and 70 generator hours.  We were getting more efficient!  Bypassing New Orleans reduced the mileage and saved time, too. Mobile to Bladon Springs, AL, Thursday, May 31, 2001      I was up at 6am, and we pulled out at 7am.  We idled out the Dog River Channel into the Mobile Ship Channel, and then we motored slowly into and through downtown Mobile and the modern port there.  It was after 9am when we passed under the new bridge for US Highway 98 and began up the Mobile River.  We stopped briefly at Mile 14 for the RR swing bridge, but that was a short delay.  The weather was humid and overcast.  It was 75 degrees F, and it looked like rain.      I had emailed a man at the Corps of Engineers to find out whether the water would be high enough to use the same anchorage we had used before at Mile 100.  He had responded by asking me to call on May 30.  I called him, but he was not there.  I also called the Coffeeville Lock; the lockmaster didn’t have much advice for me.  It seemed like there would be enough water for us to use that anchorage if we wanted to.      We saw some serious “drift” – logs, stumps, and tree limbs.  Some were so hard to see they scared me into paying serious attention to the water and what was in it.  Angela took the wheel for a while; she gets bored easily and she does a good job at the helm.  I typed notes until the computer battery went out.  The lower river was wide and deep and very attractive.   There are some intersecting rivers and some anchorages on the lower stretch of the waterway.  There are also some high, colorful bluffs on the river’s edge.  As we moved upstream, the tree tops became higher and higher.  The trees were taller, and they grew on higher ground, too.      I called Aqua Yacht Harbor, in Iuka, MS, to arrange a slip and some maintenance work for Monday, June 4.  I estimated we would be in there on Sunday night, which is the way it did work out. Our cell phones did not usually work on the Tenn-Tom unless we were near a city; reception was just not good enough to make or receive calls.      Lady’s Landing, at about Mile 80, had closed.  There were some buildings there, but no dock and no goats in sight.  We passed Mile 100 about 3pm, and we decided to go on to Bobby’s Fish Camp.  At Grand Mariner they told us there had been several barges added so there was plenty of space to tie up for the night.  Also, Bobby cooked catfish on Thursday through Sunday nights, and that was a Thursday.      When we got to the Coffeeville Lock, we were right behind a 63’ Hatteras named M/V CASE CLOSED.  Soon after our arrival the tow and barges in the lock came out, and we went in and up 34 feet.  We followed the other boat and tied up at Bobby’s with them.  What had been added was 100 feet of floating dock, not several barges.  The 63’, our 44’, and a 36’ houseboat shared the dockage, which also included a small fuel barge of about 30 feet in length. We ate with the crew from the larger boat, and we enjoyed the catfish and the conversation and the company.      After 5 days on the boat, we had covered 698 miles in 49 running hours with 48 hours on the generator through midnight. Bladon Springs to Gainesville, AL, Friday, June 1, 2001      We discussed running with CASE CLOSED and agreed to pull out at 6am.  We wanted to get away from the fuel barge so the houseboat could have access to it.  I got up at 5:30am, and CASE CLOSED was in the river a few minutes later.  I pulled into the river about 6, and we ran up to and passed VIPER (84’ Swiftships), a 40’ older boat, and CASE CLOSED at our 16 or so knots.  We got to Demopolis Lock before them.      The lockmaster did not answer me on channels 13 and 14, and we had the green light and an open door, so we proceeded into the lock.  About the time we got to the downstream doors, the lockmaster called me on the radio.  He then chewed me out for not speaking to him first, before entering the lock.  The tongue-lashing went on far too long, and I thought it was inappropriate.  We have been through plenty of locks without speaking to the lockmaster on the radio.  When the green light is on, you have his permission to go in.      Just above the lock, we pulled into the Demopolis Yacht Basin and fueled up.  We put 355 gallons of diesel in the boat, which was an average of 1.54 gallons per mile since our last fill-up.  That was much more reasonable than the calculations I had done at Dog River.  The people there were very nice, but it was still before 1pm, so we pushed on up the river.      The weather was cool and humid in the morning, overcast, light fog, and it looked like rain.  Later in the day it warmed to 80 degrees F, the humidity dropped, the sun came out, and it was a pretty day.      We ran to an anchorage at Mile 270, passing through Heflin Lock about 4pm.  That was the only lock on the Tenn-Tom where we actually saw a lockmaster.  He did not have a life jacket on, but they usually require one of us to have one on.  Heflin raised us 36 feet; Demopolis raised us 40 feet.  Our lock total for the trip was 6 locks.      The anchorage was called Sumter Recreation Area, which was managed by the Corps of Engineers.  It had a boat ramp, parking lot, picnic tables, charcoal grills, rest rooms, and running water.  None of that was any use to us, unless we used the dinghy, because there was no place to tie up the boat.  We wanted drinking water, but it was not close enough to the water’s edge for us to run a hose to it.  We had become aware of all the facilities that were available to the trailer boater, or the non-boater, which were not available to the larger cruiser.  Otherwise, the anchorage was fine for our overnight stay.  I slept for 30 minutes or so on the aft deck couch.  It was peaceful there.  Gainesville, AL to Smithville, MS, Saturday, June 2, 2001      We slept a little later than usual, and we pulled out at 7am.  I was getting to the point of waking up at sunrise, which was about 6am.  The early weather was fog down close to the water, humid, cooler than usual, about 65 – 68 degrees F.      We ran upstream to the series of Tenn-Tom locks with canals in between them: Tom Bevill, Stennis, Aberdeen, all with 27-foot lifts, Amory (up 30’), and Wilkins (up 25’).  The Tombigbee River in that area was too meandering and too narrow to be useful for navigation, so they straightened it out and made it wider from Heflin through Whitten Dams.  Our lock total was now 11 for Trip 1.  We had a 30-minute delay at Amory Lock.  The lockmasters were nice.      Angela believed she saw eagles and/or osprey on several occasions.  The surroundings changed from remote, wilderness areas to occasional settlements with summer homes.  There were a lot of families out on the river enjoying the water and having a picnic.  Along the sandbars people had set up tents, or temporary canopies to provide some shade.  Kids were in and out of the water, waving and having a great time.      Just above Wilkins Lock, we pulled into Smithville Marina for the evening.  Mr. Jesse Cox was a pleasant fellow to deal with; he used to own the land under the Waterway there.  He arranged a ride for us to and from town, where we ate at Mel’s Diner.  We were a long way from Houston at that point: Mel didn’t have oil and vinegar or blue cheese salad dressings, horseradish for the red sauce, limes, or any vegetables, just potatoes.  She was pleasant, though, and my catfish was good.  Her husband, Bobby, took us back to the marina, which was a mile or two from the diner.      The marina had 220-volt, 50-amp power.  We were tied up to the fuel dock, a long affair exposed to wakes from the waterway.  The dock surfaces were originally white plastic floats attached to each other at the ends, but the sun had deteriorated the plastic material.  On some side docks we could see holes in the horizontal surfaces where the plastic had broken.  We joked it was where overweight people had walked.  The marina’s answer to that problem was to cover the broken areas with plywood.  Therefore, it was a plastic marina becoming a plywood marina.  Some of the slips were covered; some were uncovered.  The plastic floats moved up and down a lot as you walked on them.  There were mayflies everywhere, especially in the locks themselves.  Once they attached themselves to a surface, they seemed to stay there until they died.      I had hoped to get to Bay Springs Lake and to anchor there, but we just couldn’t get there on that day.  Four more locks were looking at us, and I wanted to change the oil and filter on the generator.  I did that before dinner.  We watched the television after dinner, which was rare for us.  They had cable tv, and we started watching a movie and just watched it until it was over. Smithville to Iuka, MS, Sunday, June 3, 2001      We pulled out at 8:20am, after sleeping a little late on a Sunday morning.  It was very nice outside, except for the mayflies.  The temperature was about 70 degrees F, and we had a nice breeze from the north to keep us cool.  At 9:30 we were at Fulton Lock (up 25’), and Rankin Lock at 10:10am raised us 30 feet to elevation 300.      One of those locks, I think it was Rankin (or Montgomery) called us on the radio, asking us to speed it up since he had a down-bound tow waiting at the upper pool.  We hurried and went through the lock, but there was no tow there.  After traveling upstream for 10 minutes or so, we passed a down-bound tow with barges.  We wondered if that was the one the lockmaster had us hurry for.       By 11am we were in Montgomery Lock, which raised us 30 feet.  Then we came to the big one, Whitten Lock, a lift of 84 feet.  I approached the lock and notified the lockmaster, but I used the name “Bay Springs Lock”.  He corrected me, saying they used “Whitten Lock” now.  Then we sat there for 45 minutes.  There was no place to tie up, of course; there never is at locks in the USA.  It was getting windy, and we were working at keeping ourselves off the banks.  I had assumed a tow and barges were in the lock and getting ready to come down, but we saw no water coming out below the lock.  Finally, the doors opened, and the lock was empty!     I called the lockmaster and asked him about the delay.  He said he was doing some work and could not come up to lock us through.  I was surprised by that answer, and we didn’t like the delay either.  Lockmasters are notorious for giving out very little information; they just tell you to wait, but not why.      While we were in the lock we heard a weather warning for some counties which might have been near our location.  Those counties were not shown on our navigation maps, so we weren’t sure.  Strong winds and possible tornadoes were forecast, along with rain and lightning.      The wind started getting strong and erratic as we were going up in the lock.  I had to use the engines and transmissions to keep us from hitting the lock walls as the wind pushed us and pulled us around.  By the time the upper doors were opened, the lake had whitecaps on it, and it was a big lake facing us, too.  We thought about pulling into one of the nearby coves to wait it out, but we figured we had seen much worse.  So we pressed on, and soon were out of the exposed lake and into the canal, or Divide Cut.      We passed a 65’ Pacific Mariner, and I called the captain and chatted with him about the boat.  I had looked at that design a few times and was impressed with it.  He lived in Memphis, TN in the summer and in FL in the winter.      We pulled into Yellow Creek, at the upper end of the Tenn-Tom about 2:30pm, and we were tied up at the fuel dock at Aqua Yacht Harbor at 3pm. There were two “River Taxis” tied up there, too.  We fueled up and moved to the transient dock, which was another long dock exposed to wakes from the waterway.  We tied up close to the shore, behind a West Bay Son Ship and another large, fancy yacht.  M/V CHOICES, from the Clear Lake, TX area, was tied up close to the fuel dock.  We spoke to Richard Armstrong and his fiancée, Kathy, a few times over the next two days.      Our main chore, after getting tied up and plugged in, was to take a courtesy van to Corinth, MS to the Wal-Mart there.  We needed a few grocery items, a new water filter cartridge, more paper towels, etc.  The Wal-Mart there was one of the original Super Centers, where you can buy groceries, oil, garden supplies, etc. all in one place.  By the time we returned and unloaded the courtesy van, the little cafe on the marina premises had closed.  So we drove the van to Pickwick Landing State Park, in TN, and ate the buffet at the lodge.  That was good country cooking.      The roads in that area were interesting.  On the road to Corinth, MS the hills and valleys were so different in elevation that the cell phone would work at the top of the hill and not at the bottom.  We felt like we were on a roller coaster going down those long, steep grades.  The asphalt was perfect, and the road was very smooth.  There were no buildings of any kind for miles and miles, and no shoulder to speak of on either side of the road.  The road to the state park, however, was along the water.  It was curvy, also two lanes wide, and almost devoid of shoulder as well.      At the marina I filled and drained the water tank a couple more times to flush it out.  Meanwhile, the cartridge in the filter seemed to stop the flow of water.  We changed the cartridge a couple of times, and then we tried the filter without a cartridge.  The problem seemed to be more of a vacuum problem, one we could solve by the method we used to fill up the filter with water.  With that idea in mind, we reinstalled the filter cartridge and thought we would have no more problems with water flow from the tank.      Our trip up the Tenn-Tom was complete.  Since leaving Houston we had added 76 running hours to the engine hour meters and covered 1,038 miles, for an average speed of 13.6 mph.  Our average fuel usage was 1.46 gallons per mile. Lay Day, Iuka MS, Monday, June 4, 2001      We had two mechanics on board during the day.  In the morning David came and replaced the little shaft on the starboard engine that makes the tachometer work.  We had ordered it the previous week, and Glendinning said it was a new design.  Maybe it would hold up better than the 10 others we had replaced over the previous 4 years.  He got the autopilot and the lights on the after deck working again, both apparently victims of corrosion of the wires.      Also, he moved the ground wire for the air compressor to a better ground.  What was happening was the port engine temperature went up 15 degrees and the oil pressure went down 10 psi whenever the air compressor motor came on.  That was not frequent, but we were watching the instruments carefully.  Whenever it did occur, we were alarmed; and we wanted to get to the cause and correct it.  He checked our shore power cables and cleaned and reassembled the connectors.  They were basically okay, with no burned wires or connections.      The other mechanic was James, and his specialty was the overheating problem on the port engine.  He brought a heat gun, and we took the boat for a sea trial while Angela washed some clothes.  That engine performed flawlessly, with no overheating and no high temperature on the gauge.  The only thing we proved was the temperature gauge read exactly the same numbers as the heat gun over a variety of RPM.      It was hot and humid, and the forecast called for rain.  There was only one washer and one dryer in the un-air-conditioned laundry room, and it was a long walk away.  Angela washed a few loads and called it a day.  The rains came after that, so she quit just in time.  I changed the oil and filters on the Caterpillar engines and added water to the two 8-D batteries, and I was tired after all that.  It had been a long day.  We ate on the boat and retired early. Iuka, MS to Waverly, TN, Tuesday, June 5, 2001    We left the dock at 8:20am, and we motored over to the Pickwick Lock and Dam, Mile 206.7 on the Tennessee River, about 9 miles from its junction with Yellow Creek.  The river was beautiful in that area, with high bluffs, lots of trees, homes and condos and small marinas on the water, etc.  A tow and barge string was coming up in the lock, so we waited 30 - 45 minutes.  By 10am we had dropped 55 feet through the lock and were headed down the river.  That lock was our 16th of the trip, and the last one on Trip 1.      We noticed there were two locks there, the 1000-foot lock chamber we used, and an auxiliary lock 600 feet in length.  When we heard that Richard Armstrong, who was behind us, had to wait for 3.5 hours due to a “double load” coming up through the lock, we asked him why they didn’t use the smaller chamber.  Richard said it was because they only had one lockmaster at the dam.  Another friend of ours said that's true for recreational boats: they do use both locks with only one lockmaster for double-load barges.  Richard also said the lockmaster did not, for whatever reason, pull the first load of three barges out far enough so he could get into the lock, in which case he could have gone down in an otherwise empty lock.      The character of the river changed after going through the lock.  The banks were much lower, and the channel was narrower.  Homes on the rock-covered banks were built on stilts, to protect them from floods.  Indeed the rocks on the banks were placed there to prevent bank erosion.  As we moved downriver, there were some high, rocky bluffs, but the river was not wide for many miles.      The area between Miles 128 and 142 contained a number of creeks and rivers that merged with the Tennessee, and usually there were marshy areas outside the main river channel as well.  The width of the river was about one quarter of a mile there.  The Tennessee National Migratory Wildlife Refuge began at the lower portion of that area.  Further downstream it was called the Tennessee National Wildlife Refuge on our charts, which may have been the same thing.  It was on the charts until Mile 102, approximately, which area included the mouths of the Duck River and numerous other creeks and streams.      An interesting feature of the river was the harvesting of mussels, generally by small boats and divers.  There also were some dredging operations going on which were designed to accumulate the dredged materials on a barge, rather than simply to move it to another place.  We were not sure if they were harvesting mussel shells, or some other shells, or simply dredging for sand.  We were constantly slowing down for small boats along the river.      The port engine temperature read 202 degrees F for most of the day.  By the time we reached our marina, it was down to 195 degrees, exactly what we wanted it to be.  We pulled into Cuba Landing Marina (Mile 115.5) about 3:30pm and filled up with fuel and water.  The temperature was only in the low-80’s, but it was very humid.      Inside the marina store we met Captain Jim Akers, who seemed familiar to us, and we were to him.  We could not figure out where we had met, but he was an “inland cruiser” like us; and we shared a love of the rivers, particularly the rivers in that area of the country.  He lived aboard “Missa Lynda” at the marina with his trusted First Mate, Kristie, his dog.        We showered and changed and used the marina courtesy van to go into Waverly, TN.  It was about a 30-minute drive.  The road leading away from the marina was about as twisting and turning as you could want, if you like that sort of thing, which I do.  It was nice asphalt, with no shoulders, and very winding through thick trees and other plant growth.  We passed Loretta Lynn’s Kitchen and the Wildwood Valley Church of Christ, which I mentioned in our 1998 cruise logs for that area.      We went to Carol’s Restaurant, which had been recommended to us at the marina.  It was fairly good, and extremely well air-conditioned.  While there we asked them to put their large-screen tv on the weather channel so we could learn something about Tropical Storm Allison.  It was then right on the Galveston, TX coast, and family members had told us about the possibilities of rains and high winds at home.  It was not too bad, at least from what we could see on the television.  We also went to the local Wal-Mart to get a new supply of oil for the engines; I had forgotten it on our last Wal-Mart run. Waverly, TN to Grand Rivers, KY, Wednesday, June 6, 2001      Our plan was to run about 50 miles to the area where numerous anchorages were described in our guidebooks, anchor for the night, and make an easy run to our marina the following day.  Departure time was 10:15am, after a late start and a leisurely breakfast.  We noticed the engine temperature on the port side was almost always 202 degrees F, but no alarms went off.       Mussel divers were out in force.  We were constantly slowing down for them.  We passed M/V CHOICES (http://www.choicescruising.com/) about noon.  They were headed for Green Turtle Bay Marina.  Richard was doing his usual 9 knots, and we probably weren’t doing much better than that on average.          Right after we passed them, a couple of thunderstorms struck with scary winds, heavy rain, and lightning and thunder.  We were to idle speed, and the boat was heeled over due to winds of 30+ knots from the west.  We needed the radar, the compass, and our charts to stay in the channel and not go outside it.  The autopilot helped, too.  After the first storm passed, we called Richard to see if they were okay.  He had the charts on his chart plotter, which was better than having paper charts.  Then the second storm hit, which was much like the first.  Overall, they lasted 30 – 45 minutes.      The weather reports were not encouraging, and the skies were dark.  I worried about the engine temperature, and Angela was not looking forward to an anchorage.  So, we changed plans.  I called Green Turtle Bay Marina  (http://www.greenturtlebay.com/)  (Mile 31.8 on the Cumberland River) and arranged for mechanical help and a transient slip.  We pulled in there at 4:15pm, after some bumpy hours on Kentucky Lake.  The lake then was over a mile wide; it was two miles wide at the confluence of the Tennessee River with the Big Sandy River.      We filled up with fuel and backed into a slip on their transient dock.  It was a good location for access to the laundry room, so Angela could finish the laundry.  But getting into the slip was tough due to the several sharp turns required.  Those turns are harder to make when backing up; but we got it in there, tied up, and plugged in.  I made reservations for dinner at Patti’s, and we included Richard and Mannie Lasiter, his friend from Arkansas, plus two new friends from Corsicana, Texas, Fred and Laura Brown.  Fred and Laura were also on the transient dock, and they were planning to cruise the Cumberland River and then go to the Great Lakes and the Canadian canals.      We had a nice evening, and we enjoyed the company of fellow boaters at the famous restaurant in Grand Rivers.  Everyone there was friendly, and we all shared a love for the water and our boats and our boating experiences. Lay Day, Grand Rivers, KY, Thursday, June 7, 2001      I was up at 6:30am so that I could meet with Sandy at Boatworks “no sooner than 8:15am”.  She said they would have a mechanic over soon, so I went back to the boat.  I helped Angela with some cleaning, and I typed on my cruise logs.  Jeff came over and removed the heat exchanger and left with it about 12:30pm.      We had some lunch and finished the boat cleaning.  I brought the logs up to date.  Jeff returned with the heat exchanger after cleaning it out with acid.  He showed me a little of the debris that he was able to salvage during the cleaning.  Included with it was some rubber remains of a vane on the impeller, which had been changed in November.  I decided that, in the future, every time we changed the raw water impeller we would remove the heat exchanger and clean it. We’ve just had too many overheating problems that were solved, finally, by cleaning the heat exchanger.      That evening we ate at the Commonwealth Yacht Club with the same party as the previous night.  The food was fair, although Angela ordered chicken that was inedible.  After the replacement halibut arrived, it was time for desert.  The specialty of the house was baby back ribs, and the other meats were not recommended. Grand Rivers to Gilbertsville, KY, Friday, June 8, 2001      Jeff had said he would be there at 8:30am, but he wasn’t.  We went out to the fuel dock and helped Fred and Laura off, getting some good photos of their boat for them.  We also saw Richard Armstrong and said “goodbye” to him.  The marina attendant, Terra, confirmed later on the radio that he had gotten through Lake Barkley Lock, which he was concerned about, since the Kentucky Lake Lock was closed due to repairs and all traffic was being diverted to the Barkley Lock.      I called Boatworks and inquired about Jeff, and he came over to the boat.  He checked the engine while it was running, but basically he had finished his work the previous night.  We were leaving anyway and did not want him to go along for a sea trial, so he left and so did we.  We didn’t have far to go; I estimated we added only 12 miles that day.  I wanted to get the engines up to full temperature, which we did.  They were both perfect, about 195 degrees F.  I was satisfied we had done the right thing to have the heat exchanger cleaned.      We went through the Barkley Canal (Mile 32.6 on the Cumberland River) into Kentucky Lake (Mile 25.3 on the Tennessee River).  It is a huge lake: 184.3 miles long, 2,400 miles of shoreline, and a storage capacity of 6,129,000 acre-feet.  The Kentucky Lake Dam (Mile 22.4 on the Tennessee River) is 8,422 feet long and rises 206 feet above its foundation.  It was built in 1938 – 1944.  The lake is so large that the flow of the Tennessee River can be halted for periods of time to reduce flooding on the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers below the dam.  It was awesome to image the amount of water represented by an extra inch of water on Kentucky Lake.     We made a slight detour into the old rock quarry at Mile 30.2, where graffiti was painted on the sides of the old quarry in all colors.  The depths in there went to 200 feet, and there was room for 100 or so boats to raft up for the day.  Just outside the entrance we turned up into Pisgah Bay, site of planned boat races on the weekend.  The bay was part of Land Between the Lakes, and the races were part of a schedule of varied activities through the boating season.  There were also a number of very nice looking anchorages in the bay.      We went to Mile 31.4 or so on the Tennessee River and found the secondary channel markers that led us to Moors Resort, at about Mile 30 on the LDB of the Tennessee River.  We discovered Moors Resort in two ways: one, through the internet, at http://www.kentuckylake.com/ and http://www.moorsresort.com/, and two, through a fellow Carver 440 owner who had a slip there.      Our contact with Moors was a nice young lady named Kim, and she met us at the slip and helped us tie up.  I knew I was going to like her when she said, “Your ship is beautiful”.  The covered shed was almost empty, but brand new.  It was recently built to replace a shed that had burned the previous year.      After getting tied up and plugged in and checking out the resort facilities, we made arrangements to rent a car.  Kim got us a ride to Draffenville, and we picked up a two-day rental. I washed the boat, and Angela fixed dinner. Lay Day, Gilbertsville, KY, Saturday, June 9, 2001      On Saturday we slept a little late, and then I got into the engine room to remove the air filters.  One came off easily; the other required bringing a bracket off the engine back to Houston for repairs.  Also, my spare air filters were really my old ones, which also needed cleaning.  We received calls from our family telling us of Tropical Storm Allison and the “worst flood in the history of Houston”.  No one was hurt, but Chuck had brought my Suburban over to his house in preparation for picking us up at the airport on Monday.  Water had gotten high enough in front of his house to get some, but not all, of the carpets in the car wet.  Others in his neighborhood got their car seats wet due to even higher water.  I found out later my offices had 16 inches of standing water from the storm.  Speaking on the phone was not easy; cell phones did not work very well in that area.  We went to a pay phone and called Chuck.      We ate breakfast and drove down Highway 68 to the Golden Pond Visitor’s Center, at Land Between the Lakes, a 170,000 acre National Recreational Area (http://www.lbl.org).  (Interestingly, the area is impossible to access by boat; there are no piers, docks, or marinas on the shores of Land Between the Lakes.)  We saw a presentation at the planetarium on navigating by the stars; and we visited Homeplace 1850, where people in period clothing, with tools of that time, operate a farm that has been authentically reproduced there.  Additionally, for that weekend, musicians from different places were on site to perform, conduct seminars, and play along with visitors who also brought their instruments.  It was a beautiful day, and we were very comfortable in the shade of the many trees there.  At the end of our day at LBL, we drove through the Elk and Bison Prairie, where we saw one elk (back in the trees), and numerous bison, including some very young ones.      After dinner on the boat, we changed and went to the Kentucky Opry in Draffenville                            (http://www.kentuckylake.com/kentuckyopry).  It was good, clean, family fun, and we enjoyed it thoroughly.  Sometimes the music was a little off key, but the entertainment was great.  All of the musicians sang; and three young (10 – 16 years old) female performers were just precious with their sincere, innocent renditions of songs of love and devotion.  Except for their few solos, they sang back-up and mainly danced in the background on the stage.      One incident occurred that epitomizes the casualness of the place.  We noticed a young girl (maybe 12 years old) swaying to the music in the area in front of the seats on the far right.  She had been sitting there in the front row with an adult who was taking photographs of the various performers, but the adult had gone somewhere else and left this girl there.  She was up and out of her seat, swaying and dancing with the music, and then she was up on the stage, doing the same things the other young girls were doing.  She was probably part of the family, and she got on stage whenever she felt like it.      It was a special rock-and-roll night, with songs from the 50’s and the 60’s.  Mr. Clay Campbell was master of ceremonies, band leader, lead guitar player, and major singer.  Several member of his family were in the band, and his wife, Barbie, took the money at the door.  Angela didn’t like our seats, so she took it up with Barbie, and she did get some better seats for us.      We heard of one couple who had been there every Saturday night for the past ten years.  There were busloads of groups there, like church groups, and an RV cruising group, and a GE retirement group, etc.  It was a friendly place.  Clay Campbell was out back selling T-shirts during the intermission, and I overheard him talking to a young boy who wanted to audition for the show.  Mr. Campbell treated him with all the respect anyone could deserve, and he gave him specific instructions as to when and how to appear. Lay Day, Gilbertsville, KY, Sunday, June 10, 2001      We really slept late on Sunday, and I got up to clean the four air filters.  Angela and I then went to the Sunday buffet at Moors Restaurant for $7.99 each.  The restaurant didn’t have a non-smoking area, so we sat outside on their deck under a large tree.  The weather was glorious, as long as you were out of the direct sun.  It was hot in the sun.  The food was good, country cooking.      We noticed a lack of non-smoking areas in restaurants in that area.  Perhaps growing tobacco is a major business there, and the locals don’t see anything wrong with it.  We have been told that’s the way it was in North Carolina, for example.      Otherwise, there was a permissiveness about the place that was relaxing, a friendliness that was charming.  We saw kids driving gasoline-powered golf carts, young people out in boats that seemed too large and expensive for them, and lots of jet skis.  We saw families in bathing suits walking to and from the pool and their cottages.  Fishermen and families having a picnic lined the sides of the waters around the resort.  It was a water wonderland.      There were bass boats, houseboats (some rented by The Moors Resort), flat-bottomed fishing boats, ski boats, cruising boats, pontoon boats, jet skis, etc.  We saw very large and noisy “muscle boats” on trailers with two and three pairs of wheels.  Quite often they were delivered to the boat ramp by bright red two- and four-door trucks, with gasoline or diesel engines; and these were parked on the green grass outside the restaurant or on another piece of unpaved ground that would accommodate them.  On Saturday night, they were coming out of the water at 11pm, and it was dark about 8:30.      Kim followed us to Draffenville to bring us back after we dropped off our rental car about 1pm.  The remainder of our day was spent in typing notes in the log, packing to go home, and miscellaneous chores.  The possible downside to that marina was the rocking caused by the waves out in the lake.  They had a breakwater, but it wasn’t good enough.  We were constantly looking outside for who was rocking us, but we rarely saw anyone to blame.  It seemed the waves were coming from the lake.  They weren’t high, either, just enough to keep us constantly moving up and down. Fly to Houston, Monday, June 11, 2001      We flew to Houston from Paducah, KY via Memphis, TN on NW Airlines; it seemed our best choice at the time.  We ended Trip 1 with these statistics: Miles    1,250 Running Hours    92 Running Days    10, plus a short run to get to Moors Resort Travel to/from the boat days    1 Lay Days    5, including the short run from Green Turtle to Moors Total Days in the Trip    16 Generator Hours    81 Fuel Consumed    1,795 gallons Average Speed = 13.6 mph Average Fuel Used = 1.44 gallons per mile, or 19.5 gallons per hour Locks    16      We excluded three running hours on the port engine only which occurred at the hold-up at Louisa Bridge in LA, and in the mechanics’ use of that engine checking the temperatures.      We changed the Racor filters on the CATS once. We changed the oil and filters on all three engines once.  We removed and cleaned and reinstalled the port heat exchanger to reduce temperatures in that engine.  We had repairs made to the autopilot, the aft deck lights, the shore power cables, the starboard tachometer shaft for the Glendinning, and wiring at the upper helm.  We added water to the batteries once, checked the sea strainers once, and cleaned the air filters on the CATS once.      We anchored once in TX and once on the Tenn-Tom Waterway.  At Morgan City we tied up to the City Docks, which was free, but we had no water or electricity, so it was like an anchorage in many ways.  Bobby’s Fish Camp was the same except it cost $0.50 per foot per night.  We stayed in marinas the balance of the nights, with water and shore power.  Slip fees ranged from $0.60 to 1.00 per foot per night, except at Moors where we had a flat rate based on a longer-term stay.  Electricity was billed separately there.