Day 27

Tabbie once again drove most of the day. Maybe Grant will have to relinquish the title of Captain to Tabbie. We started the day at about 8:30. We need to go about 70 miles today. It is still cloudy, but at least it is not raining. Last night we woke to the sound of pouring rain several times. We were afraid that it was going to pour on us all day again. The river was very calm and quiet today. There was not much traffic of any kind-barges or fishing boats. The people here are becoming less friendly. We always smile and wave, but they hardly ever wave back. Grant thinks that it may have something to do with envy? A boater going full speed down the middle of the channel also yelled at Tabbie. Evidently there is a sand bar somewhere on the side he was traveling on, but without any buoys to mark it, and there are hardly any buoys anywhere on this river, you wouldn’t know. So she just put the boat in idle and let him fly by. All the books that we have read about traveling down the various rivers warn about not making too much wake and after seeing several craft just speed around, we can see why. It is a good thing that we are taking it nice and slow. People seem to get really mad about the wake.

We finally made it to the island that we were looking for. We have to stay out of the channel because of the barges and there was an island listed in our handy guidebook that would provide us with some coverage for the night. Tabbie got some practice driving at night, because we arrived there a little after 5pm. The current was pretty strong still, so Grant had to keep an eye on the anchor. In fact, at about 12 midnight last night, a large log must have hit the hull of the boat. Grant woke up and flew out of bed, thinking that pirates must be invading our boat. Tabbie was sound asleep until she heard all the cussing in the boat as Grant was looking for a flashlight or a wrench to use as a weapon. He did find his wrench, but by that time the pirates would have had us all tied up. A quick check of the water level in the engines and he was back to bed. No worries, we have had encounters with many other logs. We will just have to wait until morning to see if we are 2 feet under water again. The only worry is that Grant is waiting on a piece to fix the water pump. It can only be turned on manually at this point. Maybe abduction by pirates would be the better scenario.