Leg 1 Complete. We're in Columbus, Ms.

Tuesday 11/3/09     Another beautiful day! So nice that we decided to take a down day at Grand Harbor. Of course Pam had to mess that up by doing laundry!
Since we've been travelling on the Tennessee we have run into several "Loopers". For those of you who don't know, a looper is a member of Americas' Great Loop Cruising Association and can be identified by the AGLCA burgee flying on their boat. The loop is a water route up the East coast, the Hudson River, Erie Canal, Great Lakes or other river routes through Canada, the Illinois, Mississippi, Ohio, Tennessee, and Tombigbee rivers to Mobile and then to Florida and back to your starting point. You can Google it if you want more info. Loopers come in boats of all shapes and sizes which makes for great boat watching. Most are competent boat handlers and some are not! Personally most of them drive me crazy with the lack of understanding they have about river travel. Oh well! They're having fun and that's what matters.

One different vessel we saw come through Grand Harbor was the C.G. Richter, an old ferry boat that ran between Door County and Washington Island in Wisconsin. Supposedly it was enroute to the Virgin Islands for new employment.

Our day concluded with a trip to the Catfish Hotel for a delicious catfish dinner on the banks of the Tennessee.

Wednesday 11/4/09     The day started with coffee at Grand Harbor with Chip Lucas (harbormaster) and Fred Meyers a noted author of many cruising guides who slips his boat at Grand Harbor. Interesting conversation with the usual BS tossed in. After coffee and once the fog lifted we headed down the Tenn'Tom Waterway, Columbus bound.

We passed through the Jamie Whitten Lock and dropped 75'. Just a word of caution when passing through the Whitten lock. Wear your raincoat! Look closely at the picture and you can see the water streaming in from the sidewalls. We did three more locks that dropped us another 90' and anchored for the night near Smithville, Ms. in time to have cocktails and a cigar before the sun went down.
Thursday 11/5/09     Hoping to wake up to fog so we could have a lazy morning, Mother Nature thwarted us once again. Another clear sunny morning so off we go. A quick call to the Wilkins lock and 15 minutes later we were going in the chamber. Today though we would not be alone. Three loopers who had been staying at the nearby Smithville Marina came out in time to lock down with us. Not a big deal and all were competent boat handlers but it sealed our fate as to what speed we would be travelling  for the day since the locks are close together and the lock masters will wait for all to arrive from the previous lock even if your boat runs three times faster than the others. That's OK. We didn't have far to go anyway.
We went through three more locks and dropped another 80'. Following the last lock Tourist was able to get up and run for a bit to burn off some carbon build up in the engines. We arrived at Columbus Marina shortly before noon to find that they were filling up fast due to Tropical Storm Ida that is threatening the Gulf Coast. Demopolis yacht Basin in Demopolis, Al. has sent word to Columbus and the other marinas to the north not to send any more boats south since they have no more room for any transients. Demopolis is the last marina before Mobile.