Peoria

We spent two days in Peoria at East Port Marina, great people and a nice place. They offered us a car to go into town and get some supplies and stuff.  We will be coming upon a stretch in the Mississippi that has no available gas for something like 230 miles.  Having only 198 gallon tanks on board, we bought nine 5 gallon gas cans to help cover that portion of the trip.

Pictures from the top, a view of the banks of the Illinois river. The Spirit of Peoria, a river cruise boat, are the next two. The last one is the sun setting on Downtown Peoria, we were in the marina across the river.

Still Smiling :)

Calumet, Des Plains, & Illinois rivers

Barge that we tied
up to going thru
the lock

Going thru the lockLeaving lockHouse along the Illinois                                             

We started our long trek down the river system, there is allot of barge traffic, and on the weekend allot of of pleasure craft.  We have gone through 5 locks so far, and I still do not like them, unless there is a barge in there with us and we can tie up to them. Then the guys on the barge take the lines for me and tie them off.  Once we are tied off in the lock then all you do is wait until the water either lowers or raises us. There are many different sites along the rivers, one of the pictures shows what looks like a small waterfall, it is some sort of aerator for the water in the river .  We have seen some of the asian carp, and have been told that when we get closer to Peoria and Grafton, there will many more.  They do not like the noise of the boat motors, and become  so agitated they jump out of the water.  They have been known to jump 5' in the air, and the adults can weight as much as 40 lbs, and up to 4' in length.  I am very happy our boat sits high in the water, people have gotten injured when these fish land in their boats.  I will try to take pictures of the "flying fish".

We probably have a few more days on the Illinois river, then we enter the Mississippi river, where there is even more barges.  When we want to pass a barge, I contact the tow captain and tell him we want to pass, he will tell us which side to pass him on.  They are very friendly, so that is not much of  a problem.  The other thing I do, is contact the bridge operators, if the clearance is not enough for us to get through, we have to wait for them to either lift or swing the bridge. Our height is 18'7" to the top of the light bar, and some of the bridges are only 15'. So that's my day, locking through, talking to barge tow captains, and bridge operators, and putting the fenders and dock lines out.

                  

Weekend in Chicago

Navy Pier

Chicago is an amazing place, we stayed in Montrose Harbor by Lincoln park, with the skyscrapers behind us, it was truly beautiful. The bike and walking paths wrap around the city between the lake and the city. We must have biked & walked 50+ miles this weekend.  On Saturday we rented a car and went out to Hawthorn woods where Dennis and Carolyn live, Ian had a soccer game that we were in time to watch. Later in the day we went to dinner with Dennis, Carolyn, Doug, Greg, Connor and Ian, and on Sunday we drove up to Waukegon and watched Connor's baseball game. Carolyn and Dennis came back to the city to see the boat after taking the boys home and Doug and his friend Kerin joined us as well.  The weather was sunny, and mid 70's, not a cloud in the sky, and no wind for the windy city.
On Monday we left Chicago and headed on the next leg of our journey.  I say the next leg because we will leave the great lakes behind us and enter the river system.  Because our boat is 18'7" we cannot take the Illinois river where it connects to lake Michigan, one of the fixed bridges has only 17' feet vertical clearance.  We took lake Michigan to the calumet river which joins the Illinois river,  past the fixed bridge.  The calumet is mostly industrial views, with some tugs pushing barges, our speed is much slower on the river system, around 6 - 7 knots, which is approx. 8 miles an hour. We went thru our first lock, which I have been a bit nervous about.  It was a very small lock, the water level changed only 2 feet, and there was only  a small fishing boat in there with us.  Tomorrow we will go through another lock, not sure if it is a large one, but I do know there is allot of barge traffic, because we will be entering the Illinois river. Which brings me to the update on the asian carp.

As of Sept. 12th, the coast guard decided any boat that was over 20 foot in length, with a motor, could go thru the electric fish barrier without a tow or disconnecting all on board electronics. So we escaped having to pay the $500.00 for a tow. Yeah!!




Barge pushed by a tug on the Calumet

Chicago

Since our last blog we have been to 3 other ports, on the 8th we were in Grand Haven, Mich. That was a neat town, there was a lot of interesting things to do there, we took a trolley ride thru the town, and had dinner at one of the local restaurants. In the evening they have a  20 minute musical fountain show with color lights, which we were able to see from our boat. The weather has been great for the past 2 weeks, mid 70's and sunny.

 The next stop about 38 miles south was South Haven on Tues. the 9th, we walked to the town which was pretty close to the marina, it is filled with a mix of eclectic shops, antiques, museums and art galleries. The beach area is beautiful, very clean, soft sand and blue water, I never knew Michigan has such wonderful beaches.

Wed. the 9th we went to St. Joseph, about 20 miles further south, I actually remembered to take the camera into town this time.  On all the main street corners,there were  brightly painted animals. I was told in 2005 they had carousel horses on the corners. This is a port worth returning to, due to all the construction going on around the lake area, it will be very nice when all is completed.

Thurs. the 10th we arrived in Michigan City,  Indiana. How about that we made it out of Michigan.  We stayed at a huge marina, and walked to the outlet mall, if you didn't know better you would swear you were at Aurora Farms outlet. Another beautiful beach, but we are told that this ends the sandy beaches we enjoyed all the way down the Michigan coast.

Friday, 9/11 another gorgeous  day, I think summer has finally arrived. We headed out this morning to cross lake Michigan, we are at the bottom of the lake so it is narrow, only about 35 miles across to Chicago.  There was a bit of fog over the shoreline of Chicago as we came in, so some of the pictures are a bit foggy.  We went for a long bike ride, probably about 20 miles, we just rode the shoreline of Chicago, lake on one side and skyscrapers on the other, the bike /walking trails are filled with people just enjoying the day. Tomorrow we will rent a car and drive out to Dennis and Carolyn's area, we are going to catch one of Ian's soccer games and hopefully get a chance to see Connor, and spend some time catching up with Dennis and Carolyn.  Hopefully Doug & Greg will be around and we can catch up with them.

Leaving Michigan City, Indianaon lake Michigan

We have seen so many interesting places, it is hard to recall everything.  All I know is we are always doing something, or going somewhere. Oh yeah, and there is allot of wine being consumed.
Still smiling :)

Labor Day weekend in Muskegon MI

There are many historical sites in Muskegon, we visited two mansions that were built in 1887 - 1888. They are the Hackley and Hume Mansions. Mr Hackley and Mr. Hume were lumber barons, in the era when Muskegon was known as the "lumber queen of the world". The first 4 pictures are from the Hackley mansion, it is a 6,000 sq ft house with 3 floors, 15 stained glass windows, hand stenciled walls and ceilings, detailed carved woodwork, 7 tiled fire places, and only 2 bedrooms. It is done in Queen Anne architecture, by architect David Hopkins of Grand Rapids, who also built the Hume mansion next door. The Hume mansion, (next 3 pictures) is larger at 7,000 sq ft, and has 7 bedrooms, it is less pretentious in detail, but is more family friendly in layout.

We will leave here tomorrow and head for Grand Haven MI, which is further south down lake Michigan.  There seems to be a little problem ahead of us, it goes like this. Once we clear Chicago, and leave lake Michigan, you enter into the Illinois river. Well the army corp of engineers, has closed about 1 mile of the river. The reason is they are trying to stop the asian carp from entering into the great lakes. They feed on grasses and vegetation in the lakes and rivers, which would wipe out the habitat of the fresh water fish in the great lakes. So they are using voltage in this particular stretch which is closed to deter the asian carp from going further north. There is a whole bunch of recreational boaters, many are loopers like us, that are stuck and can’t get thru. The decision by the powers that be, have said as of today, the barrier will remain, and unless you have a steel hulled boat, you cannot get thru. The option is to disconnect all your electronics, pay a tow company $600.00 and they will tow the boat thru this barrier. We will keep you all posted if there is a change in this by some chance.
 I hope everyone had a wonderful labor day weekend.




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