In this edition, we finish the rivers and arrive in Mobile, Alabama, at the Gulf of Mexico! On the way, we stopped in Demopolis, AL, for Thanksgiving with our boating friends. We passed 25+ tows, and the last two nights before Mobile, we anchored out in the Alabama Buyous.
Day 178 – Sun, 11/19 – From New Site, MS to Fulton, MS – 20 miles, Travel Time: 4hrs 0min, Locks: 3
We had an 8:00 a.m. “appointment” with the lockmaster for our first locking of the day through the Whitten Lock. Three of us were at the Bay Springs marina, and two had anchored out. We headed out at 7:45 and were waiting at the lock at 8:00. We got held up for about 30 minutes as the fog below the lock was dense, and the lockmaster wanted to wait until it lifted a bit.
We got through the lock just fine and headed downriver. Our next lock was the Montgomery Lock. The lockmaster was waiting for us, so it was a quick in and out. We made good time and reached our final lock of the day, the Rankin Lock, just before 11:00.
Shortly after leaving the Rankin Lock, the lead boat radioed that there was a log in the water. Then they noticed that the log was moving under its own power and saw that it was a deer! It was on its way to the opposite shore, and when it saw the boats, it turned around; then, once the first boat went past, it turned around again and kept going back and forth. It didn’t seem distressed, just having a nice swim. Finally, after the last boat passed, it reached the far shore, climbed up, and disappeared into the trees.
It was just before noon when we reached Midway Marina, our stop for the night. With the unpredictability of the locks, we only planned three locks for the day, about 20 miles. We got lucky, and there were no tow boats to hold us up. Sometimes it can take all day to get through. We heard of a group in front of us that ended up waiting for hours at the Rankin Lock for a large tow to come through.
After tying up, Brenda and Edie from Brand New Day continued their Scrabble Tournament, and I took a walk around the marina. Our friends on Indigo had reached Midway before us. They had left their boat at Midway while they were away at a family function, so we moved ahead of them.
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Day 179 – Mon, 11/20 – From Fulton, MS to Columbus, MS – 60 miles, Travel Time: 9hrs 15min, Locks: 4
Monday morning, we all got up at the crack of dawn again and headed out just after 6:00 a.m. We had a long day ahead with four locks planned. Our first lock of the day was the Fulton lock, just around the corner from the marina. We had called before we cast off, and they were waiting for us when we arrived, so it was a quick lock-through as the sun was coming up.
We had clear sailing for the next 15 miles, and the five boats in our flotilla reached the Wilkins lock at 9:00. Again, they were waiting for us, and we could sail right in. The egrets were all lined up along the rails, waiting for the water to drop so that they could scoop up the trapped fish. We were commenting to each other on the radio when the lockmaster said, “If you like birds, we have a Bald Eagle sitting on its nest on the light pole at the end of the lock.” None of us had noticed that we were being watched!
Again, we had an easy five-mile run to our next lock, the “Cochran Lock” in Amory, MS. They were waiting for us, and we got right through. We were all hoping we would continue to be lucky for the rest of our trip down the river!
We didn’t meet any tows, and fourteen miles later, we got to the Aberdeen lock, our last lock of the day at 1:00. And as before, they were waiting for us, and we had a quick drop down.
We had a 26-mile run to the Columbus Marina in Columbus, MS, and got in at 3:30 p.m. with plenty of daylight left. We took advantage of our early arrival and topped off our fuel tanks. On our last trip in 2019, we ended up docking here after dark due to the delays in the locks.
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Day 180 – Tue, 11/21 – From Columbus, MS to Aliceville, AL – 60 miles, Travel Time: 8hrs 10min, Locks: 2
We had another long, 60-mile day planned, and tonight would be an anchoring-out night! We wanted to be settled by 4:00 pm so that we had plenty of light to pick our anchorage and get settled. The water on the Tenn-Tom Waterway was low, so many of the usual anchorages were not suitable, and we thought we might have to try a few before we found one that had enough water.
We all took off from Columbus Marina at 7:20. Again, the lock was under a mile from the marina, and we had called ahead, and they were waiting for us. Our timing was good, as the Stennis Lock was full of water, and a tug boat was waiting to come up, so they dropped us down before bringing them up.
Our next lock, the Tom Bevill Lock, was 28 miles downstream. Like most of the Tenn-Tom waterway, it is mostly just undeveloped land with the occasional fishing camp and a few industrial docks. We passed a large barge mooring area for a steel recycling plant and got to watch them unloading barges full of scrap metal into trucks as we went by. There was also a good deal of damage visible from the tornadoes that had passed through earlier this fall.
On the Loop, there are a few “famous landmarks” that every Looper looks for. One of them is the “Phone Booth in the middle of nowhere.” Actually, if you look closely, there is a house back in amongst the trees, but it’s funny to see a phone booth on the bank of the river with nothing around it!
At noon, we reached the Tom Bevill lock. Here we had to wait for about 40 minutes for a tow boat to come through. At the Tom Bevill lock, there is a museum with an old “Snag Boat” on display. You can anchor above the lock and dinghy over to visit the museum, but we didn’t have time. A “Snag Boat” is an old paddle-wheel river boat that was used to clear logs and debris. The front of the boat has a large crane and an opening. They would steam toward a “snag” and ram the boat into it, then use the crane to pick up the logs to either move them or cut them up. This Snag Boat called the “Montgomery,” was built in 1926 in Charleston, South Carolina.
An interesting bit of trivia is that a large log picked up by the Snag Boat was called a “sawyer,” as it had to be sawn up to be moved. This was the origin of the name “Tom Sawyer” that Mark Twain used in his famous novel.
We were nine boats going through these two locks. When transiting the locks, we have to stay together as a group. You can go fast, but the locks wait until the entire group arrives before they put you through, so we tend to go the speed of the slowest boat. After the Bevill lock, we were able to speed up some to get to our anchorage. Our planned anchorage was 33 miles downstream. Some of the slower boats only planned on going 10 or 12 miles more.
We reached our chosen anchorage, the Warsaw Cut Anchorage, just after 3:00. We went in first, using our forward-looking sonar to scope out the depth. It was plenty deep, with 15-25 feet throughout. The only minor issue was a lot of floating vegetation, so we had to take it slow and push it through into open water.
We got our anchor set on the first try and radioed Brand New Day, who was anchoring with us, to come on in. They had to reposition once as a stump behind them might be an issue if the wind shifted.
By 4:00, we were all settled in for the night, and I took out the drone before it got dark to get some aerial shots of our anchorage.
Just after dark, a sailboat we had been playing leapfrog with for the last few days pulled into the anchorage. They spent about 45 minutes moving around us, trying to get a good spot, finally making it stick around 8:30.
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Day 181 – Wed, 11/22 – From Aliceville, AL to Demopolis, AL – 60 miles, Travel Time: 8hrs 30min, Locks: 1
We had a great night at the Anchorage. The only sound was the wind and a donkey braying from one of the homes nearby. We only had one lock to do, the Howell Heflin, about 7 miles downriver. As we were getting ready to pull up the anchors, we saw a few of the boats that we had been traveling with yesterday and who had anchored at another anchorage just above us go past.
We pulled up anchor and headed out right at 7:00 AM. As we neared the Heflin Lock, we heard lots of chatter on the radio from the boats in front of us, saying that they were stuck waiting for a downbound and an upbound tow to clear. We slowed down, and when we reached the lock at 9:00, we were told to expect a 45-minute wait. There was a bit of wind and current, so rather than waste fuel trying to stay in position, we pulled into a side channel just above the lock and dropped anchor. While we were waiting, a couple of the slower boats from the day before were able to catch up.
By the time the upbound tow was coming out of the lock and we got the call to come in, nine boats were waiting. We all packed into the lock; it was a bit like herding cats. You would think that by this time in the trip, boaters would have a pretty good idea about what they were doing, know to listen and follow the directions from the lock staff and be fairly proficient at handling their boats. It took us over 30 minutes to all get into the lock and settled.
The lockkeeper got so frustrated that he said, “Look, if you want to make it to Florida, you’ve got to listen!” We had one boat that went to a bollard that they were told not to and had to move. We had another boat that didn’t pull forward, so boats behind them had to maneuver around them. And another that couldn’t get to the wall, so we grabbed their lines and rafted them up to us. Chaos!!!!
In the end, we all got through, and after some passing and maneuvering after the lock, we were able to speed up to make some time going to our next stop in Demopolis, AL.
Another “must-see site” is the White Cliffs at Epes, in Epes, AL. These are white chalk cliffs along one side of the river. This formation was deposited around the same time as the White Cliffs of Dover in the UK. The river has eroded the chalk at a bend, and on a sunny day, they are blinding.
As we approached the cliffs and the bend in the river, we caught up to the downbound tow. We negotiated a pass just at the curve and sped up to get around him before we got into a narrow part of the river. Just as we cleared the corner, we saw a large log floating right in front of us. Barges on one side, shallow water and the river bank on the other, and a log in front. Not a lot of options! Fortunately, we were able to gun the engines and sneak around the front of the barge before we hit the log. We apologized to the Tow Captain for causing a wake, and he said, “Barges didn’t even notice it!”
From there, it was an easy run to Demopolis, AL, and Kingfisher Marina. We arrived at 3:30 and stopped at the fuel dock to top off, as Demopolis is pretty much the last fuel until Mobile, Alabama. Once we were settled in our slip, we chatted with Steve and Edie on Brand New Day and decided to stay an extra day and spend Thanksgiving in the marina. The boaters at the marina were planning a Thanksgiving Pot Luck dinner, and we thought it would be great to join in.
That evening we went out to a local restaurant for dinner, then to a grocery store and picked up a couple of turkey breasts and some fixings for the pot-luck.
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Day 182 – Thu, 11/23 – In Demopolis, AL
Thanksgiving Day! Thanksgiving morning was cold and misty. Brenda got our turkey breast into the oven, made some stuffing and gravy, and a couple of batches of blondies. While everything was cooking, she got together with Edie for another round of Scrabble. It is interesting that many of the words were Looper Words! Game, Dogs, Snag, Brews, Rage, Slaps!
When we arrived in Demoplois yesterday, we saw that the sailboat Wandering Winnie, with Bryan and Raco (his dog) that we had met up in Hammond, were docked at the nearby town dock. Bryan is not a Looper but is a new boater heading to Hawaii solo on his sailboat. He traveled with us through the locks on the Illinois and is a great guy. He has had a few challenges with his boat and was stuck over at the town dock waiting on parts. We reached out to him and invited him to come to the marina to share Thanksgiving with us, and we were happy that he accepted! Unfortunately, Raco was not able to join him, but we packed up a “doggie bag” of leftovers for Bryan to take back to him.
We all got together at 5:00 and 30 people showed up, quite a crowd! They had planned to hold it outside on the event deck, but the temps were in the low 50s, so it was decided to use the indoor laundry room/boater lounge where it was warm. It was cozy with 30 people, but we all fit. There was plenty of great food, and a good time was had by all!
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Day 183 – Fri, 11/24 – From Demopolis, AL to Silas, AL – 97 miles, Travel Time: 9hrs 20min, Locks: 1
While we were in Demopolis, there was a sign-up sheet for the Demopolis lock. You could sign up for either a 6:00 AM or a 10:00 AM lockage. We wanted to make as much time as possible, so we signed up for the 6:00 AM lockage. We got up at 5:00 and called the lock. Show up at 7:00, they said. Okay… So much for 6:00. The lock is 2 miles from the marina, so at 6:30, we dropped our lines and headed for the lock.
We went past Wandering Winnie on the town dock, arrived at the lock just at 7:00, and only had to wait a few minutes for the doors to open before going in. Twenty minutes later, we were through our only lock of the day! Only one more lock to go!
Again, most of the way was wooded with the occasional fishing camp. There was one very nice event center with a balcony hanging over the river. Also, the banks along this section look like they were concrete side walls to hold in the river. However, it’s just the white clay that has been sculpted by the river.
We arrived at Bobby’s Fish Camp, our stop for the night, just before 4:00. Bobby’s has been a looper favorite for years. It’s not very fancy, just a 150-foot dock along the river. During peak times, they will raft boats up to 3 deep to fit everyone in. They do sell fuel, however it’s quite expensive, but for some boats, it’s a necessary stop. When we were here four years ago, the restaurant was still open. They are famous for their catfish. Unfortunately, they closed the restaurant last year. Another case of the original proprietors retiring and the children not wanting to take over. They still collect for dockage, and if you call ahead, they will sell you fuel, but no one is on-site, so it’s self-docking. There are anchorages nearby, but we decided to tie up away from the frequent tows and have power to run the heaters for the night.
After tying up, we got ready for dinner. It wasn’t until 8:30, well after dark, that the owner stopped by to collect the fee.
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Day 184 – Sat, 11/25 – From Silas, AL to Malcolm, AL – 69 miles, Travel Time: 8hrs 10min, Locks: 1
In the morning, we called the lock, which was about 2 miles downriver. They said that they had one going down and one coming up. They said to show up around 8:00. There were 4 of us at Bobby’s and two more boats that anchored above Bobby’s joined us. Just as we were going into the lock, another boat called in and said that they were just above Bobby’s and asked that we hold the lock for them. Unfortunately, they were a slow boat, and it was almost 45 minutes before they showed up. Once the lockkeeper heard that they were on the way, he held the lock. They don’t like to empty and fill it if they don’t have to. This was our last lock on the Tenn-Tom, and the last lock on our trip! So, one more delay didn’t matter much.
There are no marinas from Bobby’s to Mobile, so our next two nights would be at anchor. We decided to go as far as possible and still get settled by 4:00 before dark. We kept having to deal with tow boats along the way. We met or passed at least 15 tows today, the most we’ve seen in a single day. We think they didn’t move on Thanksgiving, and we were meeting the backlog.
As mentioned, you see some interesting things along the rivers, like the phone booth. Today, as we went around a large sandbar on the bank, we saw a barber’s chair out in the middle of nowhere! We also came across a sailboat that had run aground right in the middle of the channel. They were anchored and using their dinghy to try to get unstuck. Three tows were heading toward them in a row, and the river was somewhat narrow, so there was little room to maneuver and no time to pull them out. We called ahead to the tows, warning them about the sailboat. We hoped that the wake of the tow boats would lift them enough to be able to get off.
We had three possible anchorages to choose from. The first one was a creek that leads to an open basin. On our last loop, we stayed at this anchorage. When we got there, a barge was parked on the bank, blocking the entrance, so we had to pass that one up.
Our second choice was a side channel leading into a lake. The reports said that it was shallow at the entrance but then got deeper. We turned on the forward-looking sonar and crept in. We went from 20 to 6 feet, then back to 15 feet, so we thought we had made it over the shallow spot. The sonar showed that it was 0 feet about 50 feet in front of us, and I thought it was reading the shore, not the channel, so we proceeded. Suddenly, the front of the boat lifted up as we rode up on a sand bar. The sonar was correct! We were able to just back off into deeper water, but that anchorage wouldn’t work.
Just down the river was our third option, the Alabama River Cutoff, a natural creek connecting the Tenn-Tom with the Alabama River. This is a popular shortcut for fishing boats. We crept in and found that it was 10 to 15 feet, so it was perfect for anchoring. It was suggested that you drop a stern anchor to keep it from drifting across the channel and blocking it for the fishing boats. We were fairly close to shore, so we used our thrusters to swing the boat toward shore and lassoed a tree to tie up to.
Just after we got settled, Dove, a boat we had been traveling with, pulled in and joined us. It was still pretty bright, and there was no wind, so I flew the drone and got more anchoring photos.
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Day 185 – Sun, 11/26 – From Malcolm, AL to Hurricane, AL – 43 miles, Travel Time: 4hrs 40min
Overnight the water had risen about a foot in the anchorage, and it had started raining. We untied from the tree and pulled up the anchor just before 8:00 a.m. We were headed to the Briar Creek anchorage, another one that we had stayed at on our last loop. This is a great anchorage (if you don’t have a dog that needs to get to shore) as it is in a side channel, off of a side channel. It is very protected and has nice deep water.
The waterway continues to widen as you get closer to Mobile Bay. We met more tugs headed north, but given the wide waterway, it was easy passing. Also, the closer you get to Mobile, the more industrial things get. We passed the huge Outokumpu Stainless mill in Calvert, AL. They have a large construction project going on to convert from coal-fired furnaces to electric arc furnaces. It’s great to see all of the investment in heavy industry going on.
Just before we reached the turn-off to our anchorage, we reached the CSX Railroad bridge. It was down, and there was only 5 feet of air draft. Not enough for us. We called them on the radio, and they lifted the bridge for us by the time we reached it.
When we turned up the Tensaw River cutoff that leads to Briar Creek and our anchorage, we were concerned as it looked like the channel was completely blocked with weeds. We took it slow and poked through. There was plenty of water; there were just lots of floating islands of vegetation.
This area is tidal, so rather than anchoring with a bow and stern anchor to keep from swinging with the tide, we opted to anchor and raft up heads-to-tails. One boat anchors facing upstream, one downstream, and you tie up to each other side by side. This way, you have one anchor in each direction. It also allows you to have dinner with your anchor buddy!
The tide was coming in as we anchored, and the floating islands we passed on the way in floated past us. A couple of them had logs and other debris (like a Tide detergent bottle) stuck in them, and they were caught on the back of the boat. We used our boat hooks to push them off. I took the opportunity to attach the bright orange Tide bottle to one of the logs to make it more visible if it floated back down in the morning when the tide turned. We watched it disappear around a corner upstream and never saw it again.
Shortly after we anchored, another boat, Willie Dawes, joined us but anchored by themselves a little upstream. Just before dark, I flew the drone again to get some more photos of our anchorage.
During the night, the wind picked up quite a bit. The anchorage was fairly protected by trees, but still, we were glad that we had plenty of anchor chain out to hold two boats on one anchor!
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Day 186 – Mon, 11/27 – From Hurricane, AL to Mobile, AL – 29 miles, Travel Time: 3hrs 30min
We only had about 30 miles to go, and we were hoping for the tide to come up a bit before we got to the skinny water heading into Dog River, so we didn’t leave the anchorage until 8:00.
We left the anchorage and headed back to the Mobile River. A short while later, we saw the Mobile, AL skyline in front of us. At the end of the Tenn-Tom waterway, where it meets Mobile Harbor, is a big barge terminal. It is where they stage the barges that bring material down the waterway to be transferred to ocean-going ships or rail cars. We picked our way through the barges tied up to the banks and the little tugs pushing barges around and entered the Port of Mobile.
The Port of Mobile is quite busy. There are several container terminals, bulk-goods terminals, and terminals for unloading chemical tankers. There are also a couple of shipyards, so it’s a busy place.
We made our way through the port area and towards Mobile Bay. Mobile Bay is a long shallow bay that connects the Gulf of Mexico with the Port of Mobile. There is one deep water channel that the ships use and a few relatively shallow side channels that lead to the marinas on the shore. One of the interesting things about the Gulf of Mexico is that, unlike the East and West coasts, there is only one tide cycle per day. We got to the bay just as the tide was starting to come up.
The wind had steadily increased overnight and had continued to build in the morning as we headed to the bay. When we cleared the port and into Mobile Bay proper, the winds were at 15-20 mph and were kicking up some pretty good waves. We made our way down the bay toward the Dog River channel, which would lead us to our marina. The Dog River channel is narrow and shallow, with lots of shoaling. In places, it is only 6 feet deep at high tide, so even in good conditions, you have to be very careful going down the channel.
Just before we reached the channel, we met a large container ship going into port. We slowed down and got over as far as we could, then let the wake settle before we turned into the channel. When we turned, the waves went from on our nose to on our side. At 2-3 feet, it really rocked the boat and made staying in the channel a real challenge! Both Brand New Day and the Frog struggled, and we were both cringing, watching our depth gauges shift from 3 feet to 1 foot as the waves lifted and dropped us. After 10 minutes of rocking and rolling, we got into the protection of the shore and made it into Dog River. We both breathed a sigh of relief!
We were staying at Turner Marine, and Brand New Day was staying at Dog River Marina. The two marinas are side by side. We stopped at Dog River to get fuel and a pump-out before going over to Turner to tie up.
That evening, we got together with Des, Mike from Mad Cruzin, who joined us on Steve and Edie’s boat, Brand New Day, for a pizza party to celebrate finishing the rivers!
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Day 186 – Tuesday, 11/28 – In Mobile, AL
Tuesday was a project day, taking care of some of the little fixes and, in general, cleaning up and arranging the boat. We were planning a trip home to Palm Coast by car and needed to pack up the things we were bringing home.
In the evening, we took the loaner van and went into Mobile for dinner at the famous Wintzell’s Oyster House with Steve and Edie for a farewell dinner. We enjoyed traveling with both of them. They were leaving in the morning to get some repairs done across the bay and leave their boat to go home for the holidays. We hope to catch up with them in the New Year to do the Keys!
. We had an excellent meal! As we left, the full moon was over downtown Mobile with all the holiday lights. Beautiful!
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Days 187-193 – Wednesday, 11/29 to 12/5 – In Mobile, AL & Palm Coast, FL
We picked up a rental car on Wednesday and packed it for our trip home to Palm Coast. We have not been home since we left on our trip on May 22nd! We figured it was time to water the plants and feed the cat. (Kidding, our neighbor has been watering the plants, and we don’t have a cat!)
We left on Thursday morning and made the 8-hour trip across the Florida panhandle to home. The condo was in great shape! The plants were doing amazing (Thank you, Kathy!), and it was great to sleep in a bed that wasn’t moving. On our last trip in 2019-2020, we went home three times and spent several nights in hotels due to rough weather. This time, we didn’t go home, and aside from a couple-day side trip to visit New Hampshire, we slept on the boat every night.
While we were home, we did a bunch of laundry, had my Bronco serviced, and caught up on the goings on in the neighborhood. Just enjoying a non-moving bed!
On the 5th of December, we packed back up and drove back to Mobile. We’ll pick up the trip from there in the next blog!
Thanks for visiting! –Tom & Brenda
