In most of the central part of the Country it was a rainy Spring and Kentucky was no exception. We had planned to take a short trip up the Cumberland when we returned from Boise and before the canvas maker was ready to start on our top, however those plans had to be put on hold due to flooding on the Cumberland River.
As with most "home improvement" project, the work on our new fly bridge enclosure took longer than anticipated. The end result being that we ended up staying at Eddy Creek for six weeks instead of a month. Normally this time of the year is prime cruising weather but the rainy Spring made us sort of glad to have a roof over our head, so to speak. The new fly bridge enclosure is great and we are nice and dry and have windows we can actually see out of as we continue our odyssey.
The "gowrong" fairy visited the day we departed Eddy Creek. What, you ask, is a gowrong fairy? She is the standard bearer of the old adage "Anything that can go wrong will." We were excited and ready to be underway again but the longer you are at a dock the more completely you "move in" and so we had a lot of "stuff" to put back in place aboard Lauren Grace. The morning of any departure you must unhook the electric power cords and the TV cable (if you have it) and stow those as well. Of course we are unplugging the electricity just when we want that morning coffee and tea, because our boat does not have an inverter this means we must start the generator in order to keep the coffee hot. Also about this time we shorten up the lines so that we have just the bare minimum of one or two lines holding us to the dock. Of course, if you are lucky, a couple of the local dock residents stop by the say good-bye. Sometime during this process Larry got distracted, or maybe the gowrong fairy sprinkled invisible pixie dust over them, and the power cords never got put aboard. We motored out, fat dumb and happy to have a gorgeous day ahead of us. Looking forward to a new anchorage in the Land Between the Lakes. We have about one week to get to Joe Wheeler State Park where we plan a vacation rendezvous with my sister Christina and her family, our travel time is an easy 5 days so we have two days to use for delays from weather or to play with.
About 3 1/2 hours and 30 miles later we noticed a message on Larry's phone (which was down below so we never heard ring), it was to tell us that we had left the power cords lying on the dock at the marina! To say the captain was not happy would be a colossal understatement. We turned around and made our way back about 15 miles to Green Turtle Bay, took a slip for the night, borrowed their courtesy car and drove back to Eddy Creek to retrieve the cords. The really annoying thing was that the call had come less than 20 minutes after we left the dock and we were hardly out of the creek! Trying to make lemonade, I phoned Patti's restaurant to see if we could get in for dinner - not a chance (was I really expecting any other answer)!
The next day we really did get underway and made it to Pebble Isle Marina in New Johnsonville, TN. We have been there before and really like Pebble Isle, this time we went over to check out Johnsonville State Historic Park . This is the site of a small but unique military victory for the Confederacy. In November of 1864, in an effort to disrupt Union supply lines, General Nathan Bedford Forrest and his cavalry attacked and destroyed the river port depot of Johnsonville which had been seized by Union Forces. Forrest was successful and Union losses included three gunboats, eleven transports, 18 barges and over $8 million dollars in lost supplies. The most unique thing about this battle is that it is the only record of a naval force being engaged and defeated by a cavalry force!
In Tennessee there are many things named for General Forrest, a legendary cavalry officer who joined the Confederate Army in 1861 as a 40 year old private with no military training. Promoted to brigadier general in July 1862, he showed himself a cavalry leader of genius. Forrest ravaged Grant's communications in the winter of 1862/3 and did such damage in Sherman's rear during 1864 that Sherman announced that he ‘must be hunted down and killed if it costs ten thousand lives and bankrupts the Federal treasury’.
Of all the dams that we have transited Pickwick Dam near Pickwick Tennessee has always been the one that causes us the biggest delays, we have learned to allow extra time in our day when we are traveling through here. But this trip the forces of the universe smiled on us and we actually got through with no waiting! Good thing to because it was hot as hades that day and a long hot wait would not have been fun, actually waiting is never fun but here it is particularly bad because the channel is narrow, the current is often strong, and there is very little place to get out of the way of tow traffic and the turbulence from the discharge. The picture below shows the discharge from the lock that comes out on the lower end when they are lowering the chamber.
On Pickwick Lake there is a great pizza joint close to the marina, and the marina has a courtesy car. We had planned to anchor out because last night on the hook was just beautiful, however today is bloomin' hot and we needed to stop for fuel so we decided to stay at the marina and treat ourselves to pizza. I suppose it's no comparison to Patti's but it is really great pizza and we love that too. This place is great and I wanted to include a link in case you ever find yourself in Counce, TN with a hankerin' for something other than catfish but, alas, they have no website!
Joe Wheeler Park was a familiar stop for us, we have found it is nice to return to familiar marinas because we know what to expect in the docking situation and we already have the "lay of the land" - Wheeler is no exception. In fact we choose this as the rendezvous spot because we were familiar with the amenities available there. Christina's family arranged for one of the nice new lakeside cottages where they had room to spread out. My nieces and nephew enjoyed swimming & fishing off of the cottage dock. Once again we discovered that a ride on the big boat is boring for kids but they love anchoring and swimming off of the back.
Now we are underway again and traveled with three other boats from Wheeler up to Goose Pond Colony Marina on beautiful Guntersville Lake where we holed up for the big Fourth of July weekend. When local boaters are out enjoying their weekends on the water the wake can be excessive and we usually like to stay put during that time. The bonus here was that Goose Pond Colony is owned by the city of Scottsboro, AL and they had a great municipal fireworks display that we could see (and smell) right from our dock. We hope you all had a terrific & patriotic Fourth of July where ever you celebrated.
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