They weren’t kidding when they named her the Mighty Mississippi. Or the Muddy one for that matter.
We got to have some turbulence and jump a wave or two. No one tossed their cookies yet, because it’s small potatoes according to Capt. Max.
I have to digress here into the American English idiom territory, because you may have noticed a Google Translator option on this blog. It’s there intentionally for all the foreigners (mainly my parents) following our adventures and they are having lots of fun reading about cookies and potatoes, I mean about boating! I sampled some of this text in Russian and it’s as if a slightly delirious overly zealous robot was trying their best to convey the true feeling of this trip experience.
Anyway….
We had a couple of long days, trying to maximize the daylight hours for travel, while at the same time being as conservative as possible on our fuel consumption, because going against a stronger current makes VK a very thirsty girl. Inevitably one night we ended up tying to a “live” barge minutes before night fell while raining and got lucky that the barge owners were feeling gracious that day. At our next stop while on the hunt for some engine oil, we stopped at a local fueling dock but decided against more fuel, because the next pump down the route was cheaper.
Guess what, yep – we ran out of fuel. In what seemed like the worst possible spot at first, though actually ended up being the best. We were in a man-made channel that veers away from the main river between two locks. As soon as that happened, we dropped anchor in the center of the channel, requested the lock master to hold traffic and let the boat drift around the anchor while working on getting the engines re-started with some extra fuel we had in spare cans plus a few more gallons hand delivered to us by very helpful barge handlers. They couldn’t actually pass by us floating in the middle of the channel, so might as well help those in distress. Overall, it’s been our experience that people want to help and generally offer guidance and share their experience.
Coming up to St. Louis looked cool and very metropolitan compared to the rest of our route so far. We left the wheel unattended for a moment to take a whole crew pic on the bow (my face looks pained – BRIGHT LIGHT! – but at that moment all was still well).
When the generator and engines were finally started (they had to be bled – an official term – to get the air out of the machinery), we pulled up the anchor as dark clouds overtook us, dumping rain that would accompany us through the second lock and to the closest fuel dock at Alton Marina. When the tanks are empty, it takes a long time to fill them up! I probably sat monitoring one of the handles for close to an hour. Needless to say, when that was finished, there wasn’t much daylight left to go anywhere, so we stayed at Alton, under a really cool bridge, with nice amenities (pool, hot tub, laundry) and a very pleasant and helpful night attendant. We also met an older couple from Minneapolis on their own boating adventures, who chatted with us for a while and also sent us some information about our route.
All of next morning was spent on much needed maintenance with oil and filters, which ended up greatly improving how our engines are running. Hooray! We progressed a little further north and anchored for the night just off the channel, watching big barges floating by and local small boaters speeding around us.
Today we’re stopping at Two Rivers Marina where that MEGA CANDLE is waiting for us. Our goal is to reach the Quad Cities by Sunday mid-morning, which is a little over 200 river miles away!