Slow But Steady Progress

Thursday was an uneventful day. We left Ottawa and made it through the Starved Rock lock in about 1/2 hour. That’s a record locking time for us so far. We decided to anchor out at Lower Henry Island for the night rather than make the run to Peoria. The guides state to approach the anchorage from the south west which we did. We ran aground and took three attempts to extract ourselves. I thought Karen was going to kill me. We went further south and came in again with much more water under our keel. We’re seeing tons of White Pelicans and American Eagles.

One of many groups of White Pelicans along the way.


I made blueberry muffins to warm the cabin and attempted some fishing. The fish don’t seem to like shrimp but appear to love hot dogs. Haven’t landed any fish in the boat yet other than the nasty Asian Carp. It’s been a chilly day and it’s now a very dark and cold night. 

Great Blueberry Muffin Recipe from King Arthur Flour.



Perhaps we should have left a little sooner to escape to cool weather. Perhaps we should have left later to escape the flooding. Well see what happens. Currently the Mississippi river is very high below Grafton Il., so we may end up there for several days. Fern who is the river guide for that area is telling boaters to stay put. Too much debris in the water and it's a hazard for pleasure craft to be on the water. Apparently much of the water and debris is coming out of the Missouri river from flooding up north. Karen was reading that the are about 60 barges backed up due to the flooding issues. I have to admit it's not too bad being at the IV Yacht Club for 2 days.
Last Mango on Game Day. IV Yacht Club.

We also cracked open the fantastic rum from Billy and Judy. This rum only gets a little ice put in it. Thanks guys!

Preparing for the next 3 days traveling and staying at anchor Karen and I decided to walk into town. We then decided it would be better for our health to return to the yacht club and either get a ride or use someones car. We had 2 different people offer their cars to us. Quite incredible. 

Even I could hear when trains passed by this house.

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