Tuesday Oct. 7, 2014

 Departing Port Charles Marina to Hoppie’s

We departed the Port Charles Marina early this morning at 0738 at mm 222 on the Mississippi River headed to an institution on the river called Hoppies at mm 158.5 for a trip of about 64 miles. We had to pass thru 2 locks just north of St. Louis the Mel Price Lock and Lock 27. These are the last 2 locks on the Mississippi River all the way to New Orleans. We were the only boat in the lock both times.

Exiting the last lock on the Mississippi River north of St.Louis

 

Once past the locks it busy dodging tows and barges in the St Louis area. The debris in the river was also a little disconcerting. We had to hand steer around the debris which at times looked like small islands floating down stream. Some of the debris was huge logs. Definitely would put a hurt on us if we hit one. The day was sunny and warm so the cruise thru downtown St Louis was nice except for the above reasons. It is interesting that there are no boating facilities where you can tie up on the river in downtown. I think the city is reeling missing something here.

Debris in the river in St. Louis

As it is Alton Marina in Alton, Illinois is the only marina until Hoppies in Kimmswick, Missouri. We arrived at Hoppies at `1505 hours. The marina is owned by Hoppie and Fern Hopkins who are legends on the river. There marina is the last marina for fuel until you reach the Kentucky Lakes some 228 miles down river. It is not a problem for us because we hold 500 gallons of diesel fuel so our range is over 1250 miles on a tank. Although you pay a little extra for fuel here I like to support people who choose to support the boaters. Fern has a briefing every evening recommending anchorage, alerting to problem areas making recommendations and answering any and all questions. It like listening to Moses. She has seen it all and done most of it too. In attendance was Harbor Lights ( Warren), Midas Touch ( Mike and Marian they have been there for a week waiting for parts to repair their boat), 2 guys on a sail boat ( Andy and Chris aka Fish) they used to work on Extreme House Makeover with  Ty Pennington. You the one with “ move that bus”.

Here we are tied to the dock at Hoppies. River luxury !

 

 We toured the town but most of the stores close at 4 pm so it was a quick tour. We plan to have a late start tomorrow so Colletta can get back to do some more shopping. We had dinner on the boat and called it a night. Slept well until 4 am when a north bound tow with barges sent such a wake that we both woke up and the boat bucked around for almost 40 minutes. Ah, life on the river.

This is for my brother in law Gary who will appreciate the picture below. When you want to keep you river barge close to the shore just tie it to your wrecker truck so you can just reel it in closer if need be. What ingenuity. LOL