" When Pigs Fly"

Cruising!

First Three Days

We’re happy to report our trip officially began August 9th! I would assume by looper standards it would be considered successful; no one was hurt, we didn’t run aground, not even  close as far as we know, we dodged a few floating trees and we have made our first three destinations ahead of schedule.

The genius has not cooperated in the upper Tennessee as well as it did in the lower Tennessee. When we started we were able use the auto-guidance feature to establish an ending destination and Garmin gave us a safe line to follow, cutting corners on the channel for a more straight line of travel. This worked great for the first two days. It was also nice because the ETA, time traveled, and miles to go information were all at the top of the screen. Now we have to travel the channel markings which extends our cruising day and we also have to figure arrival time using Speed x Distance = Time. Good thing I went to Captain School. We knew that we would lose the auto-guidance since the Corp of Engineers has not updated the river charts since June 1991; it will come back in Mobile so says the Garmin techs. By the way we had heard that Garmin is working on its own survey of the river and we saw a Garmin crew heading out to do just that when we were at Paris Landing. 

Our first day started leaving Buzzard Rock around 9:00 AM. We made the six mile trip to Green Turtle Bay to top off gas tanks and pump out two very full holding tanks. All the way to GTB we fought a 15 MPH wind. Once we were fueled we made our way through the canal into the Tennessee River. The same wind was present again in our face and now we were going against the current too, since the Tennessee flows south to north. This all made for a bumpy ride at times. Still, it was great to be on the water.

Captain Frank and all his gear

The area we traveled that first day was also plagued with thunderstorms. Luckily they missed us. We could see all the rain cells surrounding us on the new radar Anna and I installed just the day before but we were fortunate and missed all the storms. At one point the wind picked up quite significantly and we thought we were going to get wet. We hurriedly tucked away electronics, picked up all our loose items, chart books, plastic bottles, coke cans, found our ponchos, and discussed our strategy should it get much worse. Then as quickly as it started, it calmed down to light breeze. The wind picked up again as we were entering the break water leading into Paris Landing Marina. We have found there is some unexplained magic about entering very narrow channels and docking, the wind always seems to be present. In addition, when there is no wind his cousin GUST arrives unannounced.

Our Pig ran great all day. We traveled a total of 44 miles and used 59 gallons of gas for .75 miles per/gal. Considering the wind and current I’d say “not too bad”. We are trying to get .9 miles per/gal as our target.

We arrived at Paris Landing State Park located in Tennessee shortly after 4:30PM. We’re back in the land of beer. While landing the boat I know we looked like two monkeys trying to F&#% the same football as we tied up. The wind I mentioned before was still in the bay where the marina is located. We were trying to land the boat on a long finger pier as the wind was pushing us away. I just couldn’t hold the boat in place long enough for Anna to get a line on the dock cleat, but with some help from a fellow boater we were able to tie up. We are still working on our docking communications, and I’m not talking about hand signals.

Paris Landing is a state park. It’s a nice clean facility but as most marinas here it’s located in the middle of nowhere. However, they sell beer, even Red Stripe, and that’s a plus from where we have come. We spent the night and departed the next day around 10:30 AM on our way to Pebble Isle Marina.

Departing Paris Landing was quite an experience. It was calm in the bay but the river had white caps from the strong northerly wind. To depart we needed to run parallel to the rocky embankment of the road leading to the bridge through a very small, two boat wide channel with the wind at our port side. We had several waves come over the handrails of the boat while leaving the channel. We kind of looked like “The Deadliest Catch” for a moment. Once we cleared the channel a turn to the south was required. This was the first time we really needed the Pig to perform a high speed maneuver. She got up to about 12.5 MPH in some fashion of a slow flash and was grunting to make the turn with the wind and current. Once we got on the other side of the bridge the wind calmed down in about 15 minutes.

The big orange blob in the middle of the screen is an oncoming barge

There’s not much to report about the trip to Pebble Isle Marina except the banks were beautiful and the lake was now starting to return to the looks of a river. This was our first experience meeting barges and we met several that day.  Have to appreciate the skill of barge captains to navigate busy rivers with that sort of mass. 

 

Approaching barge

...and going

 

The floating green stuff

There was one other item which bears some note, along the way to our marina we saw what appeared to be several huge green masses floating in the river. We have learned that since the Corp did not bring the river up quickly enough these water weeds sprouted. They kind of look like big green flowing islands and, interestingly, seem to avoid the channel. 

Pebble Isle is a nice little marina off the channel. The gas price was the best for about 50 miles so we filled up. They also offer a discount for BoatUS members. They were helpful with docking though we still hadn’t prepared for the wind. This time it was blowing us toward the dock and we rubbed a little bit of the Pig’s “hair” off on the dock. Fenders are now a must no matter what the dock looks like, or what the captain says. We had trouble getting power from the first pedestal but we manually hauled the boat back a few feet and hooked up to another one. No problem after that. 

They have a nice little restaurant there at the marina so we didn’t cook dinner that night. We also met our first “real loopers”. On our way to dinner we talked with a gentleman who was just completing his 23^rd month on the river. He was just a few miles from crossing his wake. His tattered burgee on the front of the boat was a badge of honor, especially compared to our brand new one! After dinner another couple came by the Pig to share a few stories about their loop trip. We’re especially interested in learning more about locks and the gulf crossing and enjoyed both conversations.

Pontoon pulling quad tubes

The run on Saturday, August 11^th was a long one. We decided to make Clifton City Marina, about 62 miles from Pebble Isle. We had read a lot of positive reviews about this marina so thought we’d make it this far and sit still on Sunday. The marina is great but we learned two important lessons on this trip: Find some place to sit on the weekends and let the local boaters enjoy their water, and after about 6 hours of cruising, there is a diminishing return on the fun factor. We try to run about 7 or 8mi/hr and 60 miles is a long trip!

All the reviews said the staff at Clifton Marina is terrific and we totally agree! Several boats were coming in at the same time and they managed to help all of us get tied up and hooked up quickly. We probably made one misstep though. When we called for a reservation the day before, we were told there would be a band and they wanted to know if we had a preference re: how close we were to the outside venue. We didn’t offer a preference not realizing we would end up with a front row seat! The band was pretty good and entertained us as well as the rest of the crowd till midnight.  We had a nice evening. We are now off to explore the city of Clifton TN for which the 2010 censes reported a population of 2,310.

Tomorrow we’ll head out with the plan to go about 40 miles and anchor out for the night.  Then we’ll hit the lock at Pickwick Dam on Tuesday.  Two firsts, it should be an interesting week.

See you on the water

PS new pictures have been added to POI