Demopolis-Mobile - Dec 7-13

Thursday morning we waited at the Demopolis Marina a couple hours for maintenance to be completed on the Demopolis Lock. (our only lock of the day) Sheli had to again man the lines in the rain and cold while locking through.  This is getting old!    We covered 98 miles - some fast, some slow - the rains forced us to slow down at times. Our travel days for this part of the trip are much shorter due to fewer daylight hours this time of year. We arrived at our destination - Bobby's Fish Camp - near dark. (4:30pm).  Bobby's Fish Camp consists of a historic restaurant famous for their catfish with a 200 foot long floating dock. The dock already had 9 other boats tied to and rafted off by the time we arrived.  They were all willing to come out in the rain and catch our lines.  Steve and the other captains worked together to make sure everyone could get hooked up to power from the few electrical outlets.  Though we are not big fish eaters, we joined the others for dinner at the "legendary" restaurant. Captain "Why Not" had the catfish while the First Mate "I don't think so" threatened to eat her arm but opted for a burger instead.

Oh the weather outside is frightful, Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it snow!

At 6am on Friday morning, the electrical power we all struggled for the night before went out. All the boats went dark and cold in a hurry. We looked out the windows to find that the predicted snow storm was upon us. Yuck!  We had hoped to leave at first light however we needed to take on fuel which now meant waiting for the owner to start a generator to power the fuel pump. Always an adventure!  After pushing the snow off the bow and windshield we started to move slowly down the river.  Traveling today required 4 sharp eyes on the chart plotter, radar and the river.  It proved to be quite challenging to see the river due to sleet, snow, fog and ice build-up on the windshield. Our new Buddy Heater saved the day again as we needed to put it on the dash to defrost the windshield. We had hoped to make it the 118 miles to Mobile but due to the weather, we stopped 1 lock (our last lock) and 65 miles later. Just before dark, we dropped the anchor at the Alabama River Cut-off.
Boating in snow was a first and hopefully a last for us!

Saturday we woke up to sunshine and blue skies! It was still only in the 40s, but sunshine made a huge difference.  We could see out the windshield!  Woohoo! We traveled fast for the majority of the remaining 52 miles on the rivers to Mobile Bay.  Once we hit the Bay, we traveled 10 miles south in the shipping channel and then turned hard to port and made way for the town of Fairhope, AL. Our home for the next two nights was the Fairhope Municipal Marina. We enjoyed our time exploring the quaint town, awesome food and an afternoon dinghy ride around the area.

Monday we headed back across Mobile Bay to Turner Marine at Dog River located on the western shore of the bay near Mobile, AL.  We will leave the PV2 here under the watchful eyes of some fellow loopers while we fly back to Michigan for the holidays.

Merry Christmas!

What, no windshield wipers?

Captain's having Catfish!

Anything's better than catfish!

What happened to the good ole days when all we had to worry about was small craft warnings?

First time for snow at Bobby's!

Fuel up and let's get south!

Sweeping snow!

Busy day on the helm.

What, no defroster?

Finally sunshine!

Docked at Fairhope

Oyster dinner at Shux on the Pier!

Pickwick - Demopolis - Dec 2-6

After 2 months back home at the dirt house, we were very excited to get back to the PV2. On Saturday, Dec 2 we flew Grand Rapids to Memphis, rented a car and loaded up on supplies for our last leg of our journey down the rivers.  We found PV2 to be looking mighty fine under cover at Aqua Yacht Harbor.  The next day, we spent time prepping the boat and had lunch with Joe & Tammy who kept an eye on the boat while we were gone.

Destination - Mobile, Alabama!  12 locks and 450 miles to go!

At first light Monday morning we began our trek down the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway. We locked through our 1st lock, 38 miles down river. (As we exited the lock, we were hailed on the radio by the captain of "DougOut", the boat behind us inquiring about our dinghy lift. We were happy to provide information on our hydraulic lift as we are official Ambassadors representing FreedomLift. As we travel we will be promoting and demonstrating the ease and convenience of the lift. The PV2 may also be a working demo for FreedomLift at the Florida Boat Shows.)  We continued down the river the remainder of our 72 mile, 4 lock day and dropped the anchor at Smithville, MS.

Tuesday was cold and rainy.  The captain stayed warm and dry up on the helm while the first mate donned full rain gear to work the lines in the locks. Four locks and 70 miles later we pulled in with DougOut to Pirates Cove Marina near Pickensville, AL, which was a broken down and closed marina. We tied up to the somewhat dilapidated docks and ran generators as needed for heat and electric. While tying up, Doug was approached by a local asking what we were up to. Doug gave him $20/boat and he went away. To warm up, we went to DougOut for a hot bowl of homemade chili.

Just when we thought Tuesday was nasty, Wednesday brought even colder and wetter weather. The good news was that Doug gave us his portable propane Buddy Heater to use on the helm. What a life saver!  After locking down our 2 locks of the day with DougOut, we put the PV2 up on plane and traveled 25mph for the last 50 miles of our 90 mile day.  Our destination was Demopolis Yacht Harbor. Soon after docking, we used the marina courtesy car to make a run to Walmart to buy our own Buddy Heater as the predicted forecast was looking even worse.  Argh.

PV2 at Aqua Yacht Harbor

Handing off Freedom Lift Brochure

Cold First Mate

Captain Warm & Dry 

Wet First Mate

It ain't lookin any better! Argh!