Ladies and gentlefolks, it is my pleasure to formally introduce to you the following, in the order of rank I suppose.
Captain Max
Soon-To-Be Captain Chris
Captain Tuna (wait, Tana currently outranks Chris?)
Angie (She don’t need a title, the boating experience and all that energy makes up for any certification)
The Blog Writer, aka Skipper in Training, Currently Nowhere Near Any Boat Operating Equipment (this is gonna take a while!)
We arrived at the Redneck Riviera Saturday night in the dark and promptly proceeded to wake everyone else in the area with in-your-face spotlights. No one complained, maybe it is not a big deal. Anchor dropped, we had a delicious meal prepared by Capt. Chris, accompanied by Waterworld on Netflix. Remember that flop? Apparently, as a boater one is supposed to like all water-related entertainment (I don’t even want to call it a “film”). It was entertaining?…
The after-dinner hillbilly dance party on the flybridge was much more so! (Flybridge: an open deck on a cabin cruiser located above the bridge on the cabin roof and usually having a duplicate set of navigating equipment.)
We spent all of Sunday traveling into the night in order to make good time. This inadvertently put us at a lock in total darkness, which is not what you want to do on the river, sheesh! It was a little scary and we had to wait for over an hour idling in front of the lock, while a big barge came through from the other side. For those not familiar with locks… In order to make rivers deep enough in all their parts for boat traffic, while they flow from elevated parts of land to the ocean, they have to be leveled off at certain points, which is accomplished by building two sets of gates that allow the boats to “step” up or down where elevation changes drastically or there is an actual waterfall. If this explanation doesn’t make sense, there’s always Google. I could only get this one piece of video exiting our second lock. Also, we have to do this 36 more times!
We spent Sunday night at Bobby’s Fish Camp, ummm yeah. It was interesting, especially in the morning when we could see the place. No one chose to use their facilities for shower or laundry – that should give you an idea. But we at least got fuel and water.
The following night we came to a marina that is the extreme opposite, and it includes a salt water pool that everyone is raving about. For dinner, Capts. Max and Chris made surf and turf – steak and seared ahi tuna. Did I mention that they make all the meals, in addition to all the boat operating and mechanical tasks? It feels a little like Below Deck (reality TV show), but in our case the blue collar version.
This morning we were getting ready to take off first thing, but encountered some mechanical issues, which required for the boat to be taken out of the water. It’s a production and looks very impressive for a massive vessel like VK.
All better now and a nice sunset at the Demopolis Yacht Basin marina. We said goodbye to Angie – she had to go back to her normal life of building things on land. Tomorrow we hope to make good progress on our northward journey!
What fun!
Always interested in the details . . . Why the haulout? Sounds like a great trip so far! And food!
We were experiencing vibration, especially so on the starboard side, the fuel was burning way to quickly. Our props were not only covered in marine life, making us drag, but were also mangled. I’ll send you a pic by FB – can’t add it to this comment for some reason.
Interesting!