The Mighty Mississippi and Ohio rivers
October 19, 2023
These are the big ones! I was cruising with the Tenley Anna on the Illinois River when we merged with the mighty Mississippi River near Grafton, IL. It was strangely, awe-inspiring to arrive upon the breadth and majesty of both the physical river and our history from the First Peoples to European settlers to today’s industrialization. The river was calm flowing including the junction with the Missouri River, but it eventually became a major flowing entity not too far downstream of St. Louis, MS. From there to Cairo, IL about 350km downriver, it was a big and sometimes turbulent river! And, “it’s pro-nown-ced ‘k-row’ mister…”.
We took two days in Alton, IL to get ready for our 3-day run without marinas to Paducah, KY on the Ohio River. Alton will be remembered for two things: it is the home of Myles Davis and Mac’s bar that takes up most of a city block. The closest grocery store was Schlegel’s where they come and pick you up and take you back to the marina. Leslie and Kevin opted for that ride and just missed the store robbery as a bonus. I decided to walk. While it was a unique store to experience, both the people and offerings, they clearly didn’t sell much produce but did have an aisle of chips, bugles, pork rinds, and soda. Every grocery store I have visited in rural America has a produce section that is likely refreshed once every few months. How we eat in North America, our food sourcing and packaging, and the impact on the environment is a story for another day.
Back on the river, my first full day on the Mississippi River was filled with thrills and spills (almost). Right away I got a taste of the big locks, Melvin Price Lock (Lock 26), and that was straightforward. We then entered St. Louis passing its renowned Arch. Unfortunately, the river is very industrialized which overwhelms the big waterfront icon when you travel by water. Lock 27 is known as the Chain of Rocks Lock because its 13 km canal by-passes the rock filled rapids in the main stem that was a problem for navigation in the past. Entering the lock, I was asked via radio to move to the first bollard (the floating tie-up) behind the doors at downstream exit. The Lockmaster told me to loosen my line when the big doors opened. I misunderstood and tightened my line as the doors opened which pulled WW closer to that massive wall of steel coming at us. The door missed the bow by a few feet and my panic attack didn’t subside until beverage time much later that day. Had I loosened the line, the water flow in the lock would have dropped me away from the door – oh well, another rookie mistake for the books. That was the end of the Mississippi River locks, but to keep me from getting too bored, the towboats and their barges increased in size and numbers.
A “towboat” is tugboat with a pilot house (where the captain sits) that raises up and down. This allows the captain to see over the barges being pushed in front which can extend 300 m in length. The towboats are mostly pusher boats with a weird design that makes them appear to be sinking when not pushing. The name and function began with the early steamboats that would move showboats and barges by pushing or lashing them to their sides. It was a new use for steamboats as river travel by people declined. Today and from my observations, these big river tow and barge assemblages were minimally nine barges, 3-wide and 3-rows or about three football fields pushed by a single towboat. The biggest I passed was a 5 x 6 barge collection, almost five football fields. Sometimes they added 1-2 barges “on my hip” or lashed to the side of the towboat. Each barge is a shallow running steel hull with a lid (sometimes) and a regulated draft of 9’, which is how deep it rides in the water when full. There were many river reaches just 9’ deep where these barges travel. Between that plough effect and the massive double propellers of the towboats (up to 10,000 HP) churning up everything in their path, the rivers and particularly the narrower and shallower Cumberland and Tenn-Tom Waterway rivers were chocolate milk looking in their turbulent wakes. This gave me some confidence that there were no logs or other boat-wrecking debris in these rivers as long as I stayed in the towboat channels. I’ll catch up on barge and towboat impacts in a future story.
It is amazing to watch these captains maneuver massive barge assemblages up- and downstream, working with and against currents, and navigating sharp bends, other barges, and a couple of pleasure craft. Boaters monitor the towboats on VHF channel 13 announcing ourselves, “This is Pleasure Craft (or PC) Water Weaver heading downriver.”, where spoken directions of travel can be ‘down-bound’, ‘south-bound’, ‘out-bound’, and few other terms I never did figure out. Our job is to comprehend their instructions and then weave ourselves around the barges or wait for them to make their turns in bendy rivers. Here is a typical exchange:
“Tow boat heading downriver this PC Water Weaver heading downriver and approaching you.”
“Are you hailing me?” (We are the only two boats within 25 km of river.).
“Yes Captain, this is PC Water Weaver. How would you like me to pass you?”
“I’ll see you on my 2-whistle – com’ on!”
Prior to radios, passing on the river was controlled by boat whistles: 1 whistle blast meant pass me on the starboard (right) when overtaking, 2 whistle blasts was a pass on the towboat’s port side. Today you will hear, “see you on my 1” or “1-whistle”. But when you are head-to-head with a towboat, then “see you on my 1” means we will pass port to port: “Pleasure craft that’s my 2.” – another lesson learned. It took me a few passes to realize Captains can be humorous with pleasure craft directions and you need to remember you are your own captain. “See you on my 1. Com’ on PC get ‘er done” to which I might respond “I’ll just wait back here until you are done that turn”, or “No thank you Captain, I’ll see you on your 2”. You figure out quickly what’s safe for you, but even with your precautions it is a dangerous and sometimes scary moment when you pass within 50 m of these mammoth structures moving at 10 knots with no way to stop or change direction and creating significant turbulence and wakes behind them. Their language is often funny, if you can understand them, so I’m often calling back, “Captain, say again?”. “Com’ on bunny love” – that’s a big towboat calling its smaller assisting towboat. Overall, these are unbelievably skilled captains and pilots. They are mostly helpful and try to keep you safe, well at least the younger ones who haven’t yet ‘forgotten’ their safety training.
From St. Louis to the junction with the Ohio River, the Mississippi River is a wide, up to 1.2 km, and wild river. There are more rock quarries and associated barge traffic, but otherwise it is a massive, free-flowing river. It has extensive sand bars and beaches, one the size of a small town. However, about every 100 m on both sides of the river there is a human-built rock wall, or wing deflector, which pushes the flowing water towards the center of the channel. This keeps the flow concentrated where it can work to keep the river deep in the center and deposit the massive quantities of sediment being transported around these deflectors on the shore, thus the long expanses of sandy beaches. There is a rich science and engineering world of river manipulation to control flows and sediment, and the US Army Corp of Engineers who manage these rivers are world leaders. The expansiveness of engineering along all these waterways is truly astounding, and beyond financial comprehension. The ‘Corp’s’ budget is about $8B annually and they have been doing this for almost 100 years. I think river transportation of goods is an enigma that needs to be explored later. The Mississippi River and all the rivers have been incredible to experience by boat, but I did feel that the engineering and commodity transportation had overcome the romanticized, free flowing river history described by early American adventurers and writers. Regardless, these are today’s somewhat constrained rivers and rivers are always working to be free, or more scientifically, physics dictates that a river will find its shortest route to the sea even if we don’t yet know how, which path, or how long it will take.
The only people I saw on the Mississippi River were some folks in small boats on a massive sandbar who appeared to be enjoying a day at the beach. We later met them at the Kaskaskia River Lock (see my note about this place in the Gallery) where we were tied up for the night. They were heading home after a day of treasure hunting and waiting for the lock to open. They called themselves the “Munroe County River Rats” and told me about many interesting finds along the changing river beaches such as ‘Indian’ arrowheads and pots as well as early settler and Civil War boat paraphernalia. That was one very big river for their little boats and it was getting dark, but they were very cheerful and happy to tell me about their life on the river and treasures discovered. I passed on the offerings of ‘tobacco’ and spirits and wished them a safe trip home.
We anchored out one more night at the mouth of the Ohio River. That evening the Asian carp came calling crowding our boats and I observed one of the reasons why they are doing so well. There were many fish everywhere holding in positions with their mouths open to the flow constantly gulping the alga rich river waters, or basically eating every moment of every day.
I thought the Mississippi was big, but the Ohio River was bigger and then the two became one. When I saw the magnitude of the Mississippi River at this junction along with the amplification of numbers and sizes of towboats and barges, I was glad I made the choice to skip the lower river and another 1,500 km of bigger and busier waters. I was headed to the Tenn-Tom Waterway for my journey south to the Gulf of Mexico. We headed east and up the Ohio River to our dock at Paducah, KY. My first really big and busy lock was the lift at the Olmstead Lock which nearly cost me a couple fingers when my lines weren’t tight enough and the Lockmaster was in a rush to flood the chamber creating quite a tempest. It is a very busy lock and I think we were an annoyance to be moved along as quickly as possible. Alas, another lesson learned.
Paducah was the first walled city I visited (there are a few on these rivers). The city is protected from the river by a 14’ high cement wall. The scale of the river flood and quantity of water needed to reach the top of the wall was simply not fathomable to this science geek, and the wall has been nearly topped by a flood. The wall is also art. The city commissioned a local artist to paint a grand mural of local history that is quite impressive. Paducah is a fun, visitor friendly place that includes the National Quilt Museum – yes, go there because it is a wonderful art gallery with a top-rated gift shop – and the Inland Waterway Museum where you can drive a towboat in a simulator. The city was named a UNESCO City of Crafts and Folk Art and well worth a visit.
The last thing about Paducah, it is named for the Padouca people first encountered by European explorers although there is no consistent early description of the mixed tribes that were called the Padouca. What is interesting is that so far in my travels, there have been few obvious links back to the original people of these lands. There is much on offer that romanticizes the history of European explorers and settlers, but it is rare to find First People commemoratives or place names. It may be that we don’t want to remember our recent history of settlement that led to the displacement of and worse for these First Peoples. Paducah for example was a likely stop for ‘Indians’ being shipped west by boat along the Trail of Tears that resulted from Indian Removal Act. I will keep working to revisit and develop fuller stories of the conflicts and outcomes for First Peoples. It is important that we understand what happened and not overly romanticize the past, both before and after the settlers’ arrival, if we are going to understand and overcome our relationship challenges today.
From Paducah we headed south again opting to travel the Cumberland River into Lake Barkley, a very big 57’ boat lift, versus the very busy Tennessee River and Kentucky Lake lock. We held up at Green Turtle Bay Marina for a few days while the Tenley Anna crew took some time off and I did a few of my perpetual boat repairs. My next adventure will continue down the Cumberland River to Nashville, TN.
Until next time,
Allen
Counce, TN
