The Fall River Trip: Getting a little old - or Is It?

For those that know me, I don't like to repeat experiences as much as jump into new ones. One exception might be our annual river trip in October. That's when Bonnie and I leave Afton without any planned itinerary other than to go south as far as four or five days will take us, and then return. Fall is the best time on the river. For one, we have it almost to ourselves, especially during the weekdays . School is back in session, and the temperatures are (usually) not summer-like. That keeps most of the recreational boats safe in their slips or on their trailers.

This year we didn't have the river entirely to ourselves. We shared it with what I thought was a heavy flow of barge traffic. I don't remember in past years finding one tow in the lock with another parked on either side. One of the neat navigation apps on our iPad allows me to see river traffic in real time on a chart plotter. You can see two small ship icons in the channel in the example to the left. In the application, clicking on the icon gives you the name and type of craft, speed, direction and other profile information.


On this day, these icons were everywhere. Fortunately, we could time things to avoid the locks as they clustered during the course of the day, because otherwise we would have been waiting for a lock-through for six or more hours. Upon leaving Lake City on Lake Pepin, for example, we had one tow slowing in front of us as we re-entered the river channel heading south, waiting for another to exit the channel north bound, while a third was coming up from behind us. We passed the southbound tow, narrowly squeezing between it and a can buoy, only to come upon a fourth tow that had beached itself against an island to let the one we just passed go by.  Later, we watched as that same southbound tow beached itself against the shore just in front of the lock, to let yet a fifth tow emerge. That one had to pull hard a port to twist around the beached tow, who then powered away from shore to directly enter the lock. It was like watching elephants dance in a phone booth.

Another reason for our yearly migration south is to observe the migrating waterfowl. Birds everywhere. More eagles than you can count, and certainly more in less territory than they would normally allow. Eagles are very territorial and have been known to fight to the death to protect that territory. Apparently not at this time of year, though. There must have been at least a dozen from the end of Lake Pepin up to Red Wing - only about four miles. Bonnie took a picture of a log resting on the bottom in shallow water at the end of the channel as you enter Lake Pepin. An eagle was keeping watch over a bunch of Pelicans. What it didn’t capture was the three or four pelicans that were spreading their wings cormorant style, as if sunning themselves. We hadn’t seen that before. 

Another thing we hadn’t seen before was the effect of eagles on seagulls. Bonnie was feeding seagulls off of the back of the boat , as she often does, when three eagles started flying overhead. The seagulls disappeared, even though bread was still in the water. 

There is comfort in visiting familiar ports, and great relaxation in starting the day whenever the coffee is finished and reading complete, then deciding which port should be next if you leave at all. We returned to Afton, in time for Eric and the Whiskey Cruise, completely rested and fulfilled.

It's a great life!

T

Queen of the Mississippi leaving dock at Red Wing, headed to St. Paul from St. Louis