Kimmswick, MO

We are now at Hoppies Marina (a couple of barges on the Mississippi) 30 miles South of St Louis. Every nice Fern (70 years old) gives a talk on what to expect on the rivers downstream. It was worth the price of admission. She gave us a lot of good "local knowledge". The pictures speak for themselves.

Grafton, IL

Yesterday was a great day we did 120 miles on the river. We stoped 20 miles North of the Mississippi RIver for lunch and to walk Lisa Maria. We were going to spend two days here but now it will be at least three since the Ohio River is cresting and there is no room at Hoppies.

The first photo shows the Susan Darlene in jail at Grafton. :-)

The next picture is one Sue took of Tall Timbers in the morning.

And the last is the "Princess Potty" at Tall Timbers. This Marina does it's best to make one comfortable.

9/24/06 Tall Timbers Marina Havana, IL

We had dinner last night with Kori's mom and dad as you can see in the first picture. We had some of the best Italian food we've had in a long time. The ride from Peroria to Havana was only 48 miles and one lock. We only had to wait 10 mintes.

Tall Timbers is a small marina owned by past Argonne employees. We had a lot in common with me and Sue working at Fermi Lab and me doing experiments at Argonne. The nex picture is of Sue in the Marina with a Egret fishing behind her. The final picture is of the Marina.

So far we have gone thru 7 locks and cruised 264 miles.

Senca, IL to Peoria, IL

We left Spring Brook at 11:00 AM on 9/21/06 after a couple weeks of getting the boat in order and visiting our son Jeff in Dallas where he was pinned as a Chief Petty Officer in the U.S. Navy. Springbrook marina has the best Carver service department. If you have a problem call Tammy.

We arrived in Henry in the dark at 7:30 PM after waiting over 3 hours each of two locks we went thru. Henry Marina is a two anchor marina but it does have a bar/resturant, clean showers and $0.50/foot. In the picture above you can see a house boat almost backing up into a trawler.

We left Henry at 10:00 AM on the 22nd and arrived at the IVY Club around 1:30 PM. Very confusing finding the slip but a very nice marina. $1.00/foot and $3.00/gal gas.

By traveling at only 8 MPH we got 1.8 miles/gal. Wow. Better then our usual 0.6 MPG.

There is a sailing regatta today (yes in the IL River). We meet Kori's parents tonight and get to see Kori and Chris again.

Chief Jeff "Gumbi" Grumboski

Our family took a side trip to attend the "pinning" of my U.S. Navy son. Sue, Chris (my older son) and me flew in Friday and went to the October Fest in Addison and met Jeff's friend and parents. Satuday Jeff was number two of seven Chief Selects that were pinned as Chief Petty Officer in the United States Navy. Jeff is a Flight Engineer in P3C's and has been in every major battle since Kosova in 1994.

Springbrook Marina Doing Maintenance

It looks like we'll be in Sringbrook Marina (41 degrees 17.9' N, 88 degrees 37.71') until Thursday the 21st of September. This marina has the best Carver technici I havemy boat. was taken on the 12 miles of hell near Lamont, IL The barge was very helpful in telling us precede.

Leaving Chicago Sept 3rd Day 2

We left Chicago's Dusable Marina ay 6:55 AM. We arrived at Spring Brook Marina (a great place to stop) at 3:20 PM. The days trip was 78.1 sm. We went through 4 locks and had the Amtrak bridge open for us.

The Chicago lock opened after about 2 minutes wait and the Amtrak bridge had the same fast opeing. We were on a roll.

We lucked out at the Lockport lock. The first half of a 3x5 barge was just out of the lock and we were allowed to go in behinds the cans and into the lock. We waited 5 minutes at the most.

At Joliet the lock master talked a North going barge to let him bring up an empty lock of water so we could gonw South. That was grat with a 10 - 15 minute wait at the most.

At Dresden we went right in no wait.

I should have bought a lotteyr ticket that day.

We started the loop Cruising Day 1 9/2/06

We have started the loop. On September 1st we tried to leave Winthrop Harbor, IL but there was small craft warnings with waves 3 to 5 feet so we chicked out. We did leave on September 2nd with waves 2 to 4 feet out of North Point and 1 to 3 feet when we arrived in Chicago.

Sue's friend Cindy and her husband Ken visited us by riding their bikes from a hotel they were staying at for the week end.

The picture on the right shows our two burgees flying as we pull into Chicago. The burgee on the right is the DuPage Power Squadron and the one on the lef is America's Great Loop Cruising Association's burgee.

The weather was great that day and the trip on the Lake was pleasant.