Aug 21

Havana Boat Club to Beardstown (anchored south about two miles behind Bar Island) 36 miles

Another lazy morning in Bed with fog and cloudy skies we managed to stay dry all night so I am not sure what leaked last time it rained hard.  Maybe from one of the cabin hatches.  Somethings on this boat are a mystery to me.

Once up we moved quickly to get things moving.  We had english muffins and of course good coffee to wake up.  Today I managed to remember to enter the course on my GPS so Dianne did worry today about the need watch out while set up the course on the GPS.  This being a river there are a lot of turns and bends so the average course requires about  50 ploted turns and that does not even keep the course exactly on the river all the time.  

The water level is way down according to the owner at the marina we stayed in last night.  So his advise is to stay in channel as much as possible as any movement out will likely result in a grounding.  My boat seems to get sluggish at 3 ft so I believe I am touching there.  At times when I do see 3 ft my sonar needs to be cleaned.   To do this the sonar is pulsed however I do not like having to do that.  

More cabins on the river today i have mixed feeling about this as it shows good use of the land.  However it does reduce the ability to use it as recreational land.  

Things seen:

• 2 people on shore actually catching fish (big ones too)
• 4 barges one we had to pass going down river and three going up.
• 14 fish jumping
• 1 house that had floated down stream.  It would appear someone had set up a small camp on the site
• 2 bald eagles
• 5 egrets watched one catch a fish
• 6 blue herons
• a couple of buzzards
• 14 other boats out only one just cruising the other were fishing.

Our plan was to tie up to the Breardstown dock but there were not any docks.  During the planning stage of this leg I noted all lot of standby stop just in case so we used one of them.  It was an anchorage off Bar island a couple miles past where we were to stop.  We are monitoring our anchor alarms and we seem to be very stable for the last two hours. 

Aug 22

Beardstown to Florence IL 46.6 miles and one lock  

We left the bed is good time not early time but that was OK.  We phoned ahead to the lock this morning and they opened the lock as pulled in.  We had to tie off on just one point.  I had to tie tie two ropes together to have enough to have enough to lower down the 8 ft.  But it went well.  

We continued down the river with great milage per gallon over 7.4 miles per gallon.  I will be so disappointed when we start up steam on the Ohio and the Tennessee.  

Not a lot to report seeing today:

• 2 tows one just moving some barges and 6 barge tow heading north.
• 6 fishing boats moving around (yesterday double that) Note no shore fishing people today
• 2 osprey eagles
• 1 goose
• 3 blue herons and only 1 egret

We saw an interesting sign yesterday night it read as follows:

Due to Numerous Asian Carp.

Warm water temperatures

And warmer weather 

a 2 foot alligator has been seen in the area

If you sight report location to Animal control.  

Most likely a released pet!

We are still swimming though.

Very poor connectivity so pictures will take forever to load so they will have to wait till we get to the Mississippi River at Grafton which should be tomorrow.