Kentucky Lake...finally
Well it took us three weeks to make it down the Barkley Canal to Kentucky Lake. It's been an event filled three weeks...the final goodbye was a mess around our anchor....the biggest yet. Some Basshole had put down a bunch of branches tied to a rock and our anchor had found it as we twirled around Nickell Bay for a few days.
Matt and Sonja made it to the access and were very happy with their access campsite for two nights. Today we moved to Smith's Lake Access on the other side of the LBL peninsula. Matt found that the campsites were now empty after the weekend and he had the place to himself. We did a little fishing from the boat but only one small one so far. Maybe tomorrow.
We were able to get all the way in to the Lake access point campground right near Matt. Nice peaceful evening and a nice sunset. We have our courtesy wheels now at the lake access/Matt's campsite. Lot's of bass boats (bassholes with go fast boats) on the bay but no problem with wakes, it's a prety peacefull evening.
The night skies are amazing here as there is very little light pollution. Clear and bright stars!
We plan to spend a few weeks here and then move down to our winter dockage at Aqua Harbor.
We are having a sattelite TV put on the boat and may need to have our Raymarine unit worked on since it's been having problems since we had the debris hits in the Mississippi. We have nothing to complain about.
.....so we're struggling through it....
enjoy every sandwich!
Matt and Sonja made it to the access and were very happy with their access campsite for two nights. Today we moved to Smith's Lake Access on the other side of the LBL peninsula. Matt found that the campsites were now empty after the weekend and he had the place to himself. We did a little fishing from the boat but only one small one so far. Maybe tomorrow.
We were able to get all the way in to the Lake access point campground right near Matt. Nice peaceful evening and a nice sunset. We have our courtesy wheels now at the lake access/Matt's campsite. Lot's of bass boats (bassholes with go fast boats) on the bay but no problem with wakes, it's a prety peacefull evening.
The night skies are amazing here as there is very little light pollution. Clear and bright stars!
We plan to spend a few weeks here and then move down to our winter dockage at Aqua Harbor.
We are having a sattelite TV put on the boat and may need to have our Raymarine unit worked on since it's been having problems since we had the debris hits in the Mississippi. We have nothing to complain about.
.....so we're struggling through it....
enjoy every sandwich!
Happy Birthday to me.....
Yesterday it was my birthday and we ran around Land Between the Lakes (LBL) looking at the campsites and the bays on the Kentucky Lake we hope to anchor in. Water is low! The swimming area at one campground was dry! Very nice campgrounds and lots of options to camp. Backcountry camping is $20 per year per person and this allows you to camp about anywhere but the lake access areas seem to be pretty nice. Then there are fee campgrounds which cost $8 for the first night and $7 thereafter on an honor system. These sites have gravel pads, fire rings and picnic tables…nice. The organized campground costs $12 and goes up with amenities like electricity, water and sewer. I think we will go to Smiths Bay and catch up with Matt there….maybe a first night here??
Today we go town. The big event was the 14th annual BBQ festival in Paducah….quite an event. Too many places to choose from and a carnival type atmosphere. Home made BBQ smokers doing whole hogs, chickens, brisket, pulled pork, ribs, etc, etc…..deep fried everything potatoes, sweet potatoes, ice cream, pickles….corn on the cob….pastries, pies, cakes….
We had a couple of bbq pork sandwiches and bought a chicken and rack of ribs for the take home. Next year is 15 years….maybe we’ll be back for a shirt! I’ve seen these BBQ events on TV but never had the pleasure of attending one before.
The other fun thing today was a tour of an Ingram Barge Company Tow that had just been reconditioned and painted. This was a inland river tow that was 6,000 horsepower with twin wheels. We had the full tour….engine room, galley, quarters, bridge and working areas. These guys put in 28 days straight and then get 28 days off. The bigger tows that Ingram have work the Mississippi. They are over 10,000 horsepower and triple screw. I have a shot of a damaged propeller next to new ones I’ll post. It was the Roy E. Claverie….145 x48’ built in 1981 by Jeffboat….crew of 9…typically tows 15 barges on the Upper Mississippi.
Ingram Barge has about 120 tows and is a privately owned company out of Nashville…big bucks there!
We’re still in Nickell Bay….caught fresh fish for dinner….busy anchorage on weekends with three houseboats rafted up, another nearby and lots of small craft traffic. Quiets down after dark and calm winds too. Okay maybe tomorrow we go to Kentucky Lake.
Today we go town. The big event was the 14th annual BBQ festival in Paducah….quite an event. Too many places to choose from and a carnival type atmosphere. Home made BBQ smokers doing whole hogs, chickens, brisket, pulled pork, ribs, etc, etc…..deep fried everything potatoes, sweet potatoes, ice cream, pickles….corn on the cob….pastries, pies, cakes….
We had a couple of bbq pork sandwiches and bought a chicken and rack of ribs for the take home. Next year is 15 years….maybe we’ll be back for a shirt! I’ve seen these BBQ events on TV but never had the pleasure of attending one before.
The other fun thing today was a tour of an Ingram Barge Company Tow that had just been reconditioned and painted. This was a inland river tow that was 6,000 horsepower with twin wheels. We had the full tour….engine room, galley, quarters, bridge and working areas. These guys put in 28 days straight and then get 28 days off. The bigger tows that Ingram have work the Mississippi. They are over 10,000 horsepower and triple screw. I have a shot of a damaged propeller next to new ones I’ll post. It was the Roy E. Claverie….145 x48’ built in 1981 by Jeffboat….crew of 9…typically tows 15 barges on the Upper Mississippi.
Ingram Barge has about 120 tows and is a privately owned company out of Nashville…big bucks there!
We’re still in Nickell Bay….caught fresh fish for dinner….busy anchorage on weekends with three houseboats rafted up, another nearby and lots of small craft traffic. Quiets down after dark and calm winds too. Okay maybe tomorrow we go to Kentucky Lake.
Learning something new EVERY day now....surviving a grounding!
Well it has been an interesting few days…particularly with the grounding yesterday!
We left Green Turtle Bay and headed up the river about 12 miles to Kuttawa Bay where we spend Saturday behind their breakwater. It’s actually an old road and bridge which they cut a hole in to make a channel. You can see asphalt under the piles of stone that they have put on the road to protect the bay during higher water in the spring. We are about 3-5 feet below normal pool which can make for some shallow running.
We kayaked around the bay, sunshined a bit and did our usual routines of running the generator to top up the refrigeration and at the same time charge all the electronic batteries that need it (GPS, VHS Radio’s, Phones, Computers, Flashlights, Radio, Camera’s, house batteries, jump start battery, etc.) There is a ton of stuff to charge. We need to buy new batteries for the inverter though as it seems to be shot. We usually do the generator routine after dark so we can run our tiki lights up on the bridge too.
After Kuttawa we went upriver thirty miles to Dry Creek, a narrow channel snaked up into the bay and we found good water in a cove to starboard and stayed there two days. We fished enough to catch dinner for last night and motored down the river in the dingy to the Tennessee Border. Nice slow troll along the rocky bluffs. We pulled in to a small bay to let a tow go by and found ourselves on the beach watching a Grand Haven Boat named Headquarters go by….golden loopers we met at GTB that were returning from Nashville.
We cruised downriver yesterday to another anchorage 20 miles back. There were a few buoys to mark our way into Dryden Creek Anchorage and some missing too, as we found out. We headed to port along the peninsula and in no time at all felt a bump and came to an abrupt stop. We were grounded and as far as we could tell, hard aground. The props were turning and in reverse we kicked up some great swirls of mud. Nothing. Vaughn went back to the swim platform to check depth with the handheld and reported 5 feet of depth and that the boat was about a foot out of the water in the stern!
A jet ski came by and offered to help. He recommended that we try one prop at a time and try to wiggle out. He hooked a tow line to our port stern and tugged on the boat as I tried props in reverse. The boat would rock and roll to the point Vaughn was holding on and things were tossed in the cabin. I would reverse the prop that was higher from the ground and really run up the RPM’s. It must have been a sight with this big beast rocking in the mud and belching blue smoke as we burned out the carbon for the day. After a couple of minutes I gave up and went back to release the jet ski.
There was a companion jet ski with two women on board and they said that the boat had moved a bit. It was also laying a little lower in the water too. So we tried it one more time. A little more wiggle and we were free! So a hard grounding, apparently in the mud and hopefully no damage to hull or running gear. There are so many rocks around that we felt blessed not to have had a much worse experience. It’s still floating and the props turn.
A little shaken, we carefully moved into the other bay to starboard and found some deep water to anchor in. We think the depth guage had cut out because we never got our shallow water alarm. We had gone from 17 feet to grounded in the space of a short cell phone call!
We launched the kayaks and did a tour around the two bays here. Nice place with undeveloped shoreline and reasonable protection from wind and waves. An abandoned boat launch nearby was covered with driftwood so we decided to have shore dinner, cooking our fish in packets over an open fire. Watched the sunset by the bonfire and considered ourselves very lucky indeed. What a day!
We left Green Turtle Bay and headed up the river about 12 miles to Kuttawa Bay where we spend Saturday behind their breakwater. It’s actually an old road and bridge which they cut a hole in to make a channel. You can see asphalt under the piles of stone that they have put on the road to protect the bay during higher water in the spring. We are about 3-5 feet below normal pool which can make for some shallow running.
We kayaked around the bay, sunshined a bit and did our usual routines of running the generator to top up the refrigeration and at the same time charge all the electronic batteries that need it (GPS, VHS Radio’s, Phones, Computers, Flashlights, Radio, Camera’s, house batteries, jump start battery, etc.) There is a ton of stuff to charge. We need to buy new batteries for the inverter though as it seems to be shot. We usually do the generator routine after dark so we can run our tiki lights up on the bridge too.
After Kuttawa we went upriver thirty miles to Dry Creek, a narrow channel snaked up into the bay and we found good water in a cove to starboard and stayed there two days. We fished enough to catch dinner for last night and motored down the river in the dingy to the Tennessee Border. Nice slow troll along the rocky bluffs. We pulled in to a small bay to let a tow go by and found ourselves on the beach watching a Grand Haven Boat named Headquarters go by….golden loopers we met at GTB that were returning from Nashville.
We cruised downriver yesterday to another anchorage 20 miles back. There were a few buoys to mark our way into Dryden Creek Anchorage and some missing too, as we found out. We headed to port along the peninsula and in no time at all felt a bump and came to an abrupt stop. We were grounded and as far as we could tell, hard aground. The props were turning and in reverse we kicked up some great swirls of mud. Nothing. Vaughn went back to the swim platform to check depth with the handheld and reported 5 feet of depth and that the boat was about a foot out of the water in the stern!
A jet ski came by and offered to help. He recommended that we try one prop at a time and try to wiggle out. He hooked a tow line to our port stern and tugged on the boat as I tried props in reverse. The boat would rock and roll to the point Vaughn was holding on and things were tossed in the cabin. I would reverse the prop that was higher from the ground and really run up the RPM’s. It must have been a sight with this big beast rocking in the mud and belching blue smoke as we burned out the carbon for the day. After a couple of minutes I gave up and went back to release the jet ski.
There was a companion jet ski with two women on board and they said that the boat had moved a bit. It was also laying a little lower in the water too. So we tried it one more time. A little more wiggle and we were free! So a hard grounding, apparently in the mud and hopefully no damage to hull or running gear. There are so many rocks around that we felt blessed not to have had a much worse experience. It’s still floating and the props turn.
A little shaken, we carefully moved into the other bay to starboard and found some deep water to anchor in. We think the depth guage had cut out because we never got our shallow water alarm. We had gone from 17 feet to grounded in the space of a short cell phone call!
We launched the kayaks and did a tour around the two bays here. Nice place with undeveloped shoreline and reasonable protection from wind and waves. An abandoned boat launch nearby was covered with driftwood so we decided to have shore dinner, cooking our fish in packets over an open fire. Watched the sunset by the bonfire and considered ourselves very lucky indeed. What a day!
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