Take me to the Rivers

By Kate Lechnir

Take Me to the Rivers

Boating the Rivers of America from Wisconsin to Florida

Boating down the Mississippi, Ohio, Cumberland, Tennessee-Tombigbee Rivers, and Mobile Bay to the Florida Intracoastal in the fall of 2018 might be described in retrospect as a series of near misses. The river conditions were extreme, characterized by the worst fall flooding in recorded history. And at the end of our trip, the strongest category 5 hurricane ever to make landfall, Hurricane Michael, engulfed us within its eye.

Take Me to the Rivers chronicles my husband's and my fifteen-hundred-mile journey by boat to both remote and well-traveled parts of some of the greatest rivers of America. Setting out on a course to Punta Gorda, Florida, we began our river adventures on the Upper Mississippi River in La Crosse, Wisconsin, continuing all the way through St. Louis, Missouri. We then found ourselves in the wild and ruthless wilderness of the Mississippi River up to the junction of the Ohio River. We traveled up the Ohio to the Kentucky Lakes, where we rested for several days and got a glimpse of the elegant and pampered side of river boating. Continuing south, we entered remote areas that had yet to be charted in GPS. Traveling on the Tennessee-Tombigbee Rivers, through Mobile Bay, we finally arrived on the Florida Intracoastal. In October 2018, our trip was cut short abruptly and with finality in Panama City when Hurricane Michael destroyed our boat and our dreams of boating our way through retirement.

The book is written as a series of everyday short stories--stories about the people we met and the rivers that tried to swallow us alive. With its in-depth descriptions, it provides interesting insights for Quimby's Guide travelers as well as for those who have only been able to dream of boating from Wisconsin to Florida. In addition, the uniqueness of the river people we met on this journey and the extreme river and weather conditions we lived through will make this book appealing to an adventurous and curious audience.

Highlights that stand out in the author's mind include a 360-degree fascination with the Mississippi River bluffs, the World War that was averted with an LST-325 Navy warship, our only tourist trap destination in Hannibal, Missouri, the incredible spectacle of the St. Louis Arch, dining at Bobby's Fish Camp, the winners and losers along the Kentucky Lakes, the statue of the Mistaken Klansman, floating bollard mastery techniques, and Hurricane Michael in Panama City.

As much as I loved writing about these and other stories, our close encounters with the people we met along the way are the lifeblood of the book. It was a matter of life and death on the rivers in the fall of 2018. Many people shared their lives with us on this journey; many people helped to save our lives--the lives of total strangers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Newman Springs Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Oct 16, 2023
• ISBN: 9781684987160

Book preview

Table of Contents

Title

Copyright

Prologue

Part 1: The Upper Mississippi

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Part 2: Up the Ohio, A Side Trip on the Cumberland, Down the Tennessee and the Tennessee-Tombigbee into Mobile Bay

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

Chapter 16

Chapter 17

Chapter 18

Chapter 19

Chapter 20

Chapter 21

Chapter 22

Chapter 23

Chapter 24

Chapter 25

Part 3: Through the Eye of Hurricane Michael

Chapter 26

Chapter 27

Chapter 28

Chapter 29

Epilogue

Acknowledgments

About the Author

Take Me to the Rivers

Boating the Rivers of America from Wisconsin to Florida

Kate Lechnir

Copyright © 2023 Kate Lechnir

All rights reserved

First Edition

NEWMAN SPRINGS PUBLISHING

320 Broad Street

Red Bank, NJ 07701

First originally published by Newman Springs Publishing 2022

ISBN 978-1-68498-715-3 (Paperback)

ISBN 978-1-68498-716-0 (Digital)

Printed in the United States of America

To the loving memory of my husband, the captain of my life, who graced me and our son, Jake, with the best years of our lives.

Prologue

My husband Mike’s dream of traveling downriver from Wisconsin to Florida was the only item on his bucket list and the most thrilling adventure of my life. Mike had just sold our camper business, and I had just retired from Lac Courte Oreilles Ojibwe College as a site coordinator and English instructor. Our twenty-five-year-old son, Jake, was living and working in New York City.

As Mike’s adoring and faithful first mate of thirty-five years, I was as determined as he was to get all the way to Florida. Some of my brother-in-law’s friends from the neighborhood bar weren’t so optimistic. They had a bet going to see how far downriver we’d get before one of us filed for divorce. Mike and I also had a bet on who would spot the first palm tree. As we left Mobile Bay and entered the Florida Intracoastal, Mike spotted the first scraggly, shriveled, almost-unrecognizable brown palm tree. We knew then that we had made it.

What we didn’t know at that time, having traveled more than fifteen hundred miles by boat, was that within a week of spotting that first palm tree, all bets would be off.

Our trip down the Mississippi, Ohio, Cumberland, Tennessee-Tombigbee Rivers, and the Mobile Bay to the Florida Intracoastal might be described in retrospect as a series of near misses. The river conditions were extreme, characterized by the worst fall flooding in history.

Mike and I found the physical challenges overpowering for a man and woman approaching their seventies. Although we were physically in pretty good shape and able to climb in and around our forty-five-foot boat, we were among the oldest couples that we met endeavoring this long trip by boat. I would describe us both as being a bit overweight, a bit arthritic, and a bit naive about the rigors that were to face us.

This is not a chronology, but real stories of our adventures and the incredible people that we met along the way. I have been amazed at how many people have told me that they have always wanted to do this trip down the rivers of America. I hope to give a good feel for it, beginning from La Crosse, Wisconsin.

Part 1

The Upper Mississippi

Chapter 1

July 2018

Upper Mississippi River

Mile Marker 696.8

La Crosse, Wisconsin

Pettibone Boat Club

How does one prepare for spending three months on a boat? It really was fun. Buying plastic dishes and plasticware at the dollar stores: towels, sheets, a boat chair, spices, laundry soap, and bug spray. By the time we left for our trip, we were quite self-sufficient on board. Gallons of drinking water were the most important staple to always have on board. Frozen pizzas, White Castles, mac and cheese, and some chicken and beef in our little freezer sustained us perfectly on those nights we landed at a marina with no restaurant or when we needed to anchor out on some remote lock or inlet. A type 2 diabetic, I had squirreled away enough snacks to last for an around-the-world trip.

But we thought we had an inkling, at least, of what river travel would be like. My husband was an old Mississippi River rat from Prairie du Chien, Wisconsin. I was comfortable on the boat because my dad was a great inland-lake sailor, and I had logged many hours on the lakes of Wisconsin. But now we had an engine room, two diesel engines, two bedrooms, two heads, air-conditioning, and a bridge.

I remember the first day we brought the Muff E. Lu to our dock space at the Pettibone Marina. The wind was picking up. The current was playing tricks on us and we would have more than gently smashed into the dock if it weren’t for Karen and Betty, our new neighbors on D Dock. They saw us coming and ran out to help us. That’s what people on the river do—help you land and safely secure your boat to the docks. We hadn’t even met, and I already knew we were to become good friends.

Mike and I beside the Muff E. Lu at Pettibone Yacht Club

We spent many weekends in July and August aboard the Muff E. Lu, learning the ropes and getting to know our dock mates. Karen and Betty and Mike and I enjoyed our evenings together on the dock. Karen could fix anything and was vexed to no end that she couldn’t figure out how to turn the water on in our on board washer/dryer. I can’t count the number of times she came over to our boat with an idea of how to get to the water source. We never did figure it out.

Betty and Karen are remarkably strong women who seem most comfortable solving technical, mechanical, and all kinds of Ms. Fix-it issues. From rebuilding the interior of their houseboat to performing surgery on their engine and helm, there is no task that those two ladies can’t tackle. Unlike men, they know when they need expert advice, and then and only then will they call their boat mechanic. They love to laugh. Their whimsical laughter can be heard all up and down D Dock. They took the time to get to know us, and they loved to share a cocktail or a glass of wine in the evenings. They were the two most unpretentious ladies I have ever met.

I eventually did figure out how to prepare meals in our compact kitchen. It had everything necessary to cook decent meals for us, even a pull-out pantry. Yes, it had everything—except counter space. The front bedroom was large and gracious, and the master bathroom was perfectly suited to us. The back bedroom was underneath the bridge. And there was a second small bathroom there too. Mike was a notorious snorer; we bought the Muff E. Lu, knowing full well that I would be retreating to that small back bedroom most nights. There was a nice comfortable couch and plenty of secret storage spaces in between the two bedrooms. We bought a small wicker chair that fit perfectly in one corner of the living room. There was a removable table that we set up on rare occasions, but mostly we used two TV trays or we ate out on the bridge, where there was a nice big table and plenty of room for socializing—and a canvas top for protection from the elements. It was a great space to be in at night when being below deck felt cramped.

Mike and I felt so at home on that dock at the Pettibone Marina. But living aboard the Muff E. Lu did take some getting used to. Certainly, it took some time to adjust to living in such small quarters. It kind of reminded me of staying in a microhotel, except we would be staying for three months. You really can’t stay too mad for too long as your bodies are always in such close proximity. As fun as that was, the downside was that there was no privacy and no secret personal activities that went undetected.

One of our first nights sleeping on board, I heard a blaring siren in the middle of the night. I woke up totally freaking out, trying to figure out where the siren was coming from and what danger it was signaling. I had no clue. But from the sounds of it, I knew we must be in extreme danger. So I woke up the captain, whose snoring was no match for the siren. Naturally, he was not very happy and not very alarmed. Turns out, it was the weather channel on our TV advising us of impending fog. He glanced at me lovingly, but with a bit of an irritated after-glare, and told me to get back into bed.

Learning all the bells and whistles—all the switches, flashing lights, and most importantly all the fuses—was one of the hardest things. Also, of course, learning how to secure the boat lines properly, stow the lines when not in use, when to flush, and when not to flush, I felt fortunate that my working knowledge of the boat remained above deck.

The most difficult thing was learning to understand and monitor our GPS and our on board tracking instruments and showing our whereabouts to Mike so that he could then translate the information to pinpoint our exact location. This was particularly critical when we would leave the main channel in search of a marina for the night. For me, it was anyone’s guess as to which way to go. Mike always figured it out, with the help of my close-to-accurate location indicators and a cell phone call to the marina. We learned quickly out of necessity.

The older couples at Pettibone had traded in their river adventure days for wonderful dock space at a marina. They soaked in as much time as they could on their houseboats. Rarely did they take their boats out for even a short cruise. They were content just to be on the river.

One couple hosted their sixtieth La Crosse High School reunion aboard their houseboat. The hostess told me she had remained friends with her high school classmates all these years. I remember how she fussed to clean her boat before all her friends arrived that afternoon. I could hear the laughter and animated conversations streaming live. How lucky our dock mates were to still be so connected to their friends from long ago!

Another couple came to La Crosse every summer from California to live on their houseboat. And another couple, also La Crosse folks, had the dock space next to us. It seemed as though they were pretending to be out of town. The reality was that the husband’s mother was still living in a nursing home close by.

We bought our boat in La Crosse, Wisconsin, in early July. We named her the Muff E. Lu, a nickname my husband had given me early on in our marriage. I was so thrilled to have a beautiful boat named after me. We knew that we needed time to make certain the boat was mechanically ready for the trip—and to learn how to operate a large forty-five-foot boat. We didn’t have a clue, really.

D Dock at Pettibone

Younger people would arrive after work on the weekends. They had smaller boats but a lot of fun toys like jet skis, snorkeling equipment, fishing gear, and all sorts of tubes for their kids, lots of kids. They drank too much and partied too heartily. I think we were all happy when they arrived and broke the sound barrier, but by Sunday night we were even happier to see them go back home for another week.

Mike and I had a beautiful unobstructed view of the Mississippi. Many evenings during the week, the dock ladies would gather to watch the sunsets. It was a time to bond in a unique way as we reverently watched the evening shows. It was different every night. The sunsets were spellbinding, connecting us in an unspoken way.

One day, when our friend Karen came to our boat, she reminded us, We’re not company. We’re neighbors. And at that, she took off her shoes, boarded our boat,