Day 32

We left Midway marina this morning at 9:30 to warnings about the high water levels and gusty wind due to the previous few days storms. Everything was going fine until after the second lock (of four) of the day. This is where the original Tombigbee river flowed into the man made canal. Grant was driving and yelled to Tabitha with what he saw (see pic). Both of us watched as a fully grown mature tree drifted into the manmade channel from the Tombigbee river, and it was moving fast!! Whoa, this is going to get interesting!!! Sure enough, we hit the current and away we went, fast and furious (ok, we were going at a whopping 15 mph, but it seemed fast all right!!) Grant decided it best to drive upstairs even though it was a bit chilly… It was like trying to navigate through a mine field, knowing that you only see 50% (at best) of the log that is floating down the river, and knowing at any minute there could be a slightly submerged log that you do not see and bang, there goes a week of travel to get a drive shaft replaced…

We made it to the last lock and debris was picking up considerably since we first encountered it. After approaching the lock we saw extensive debris on the outside entrance to the lock. Grant was hoping that once the doors opened it would provide for a path to enter, but no such luck. Grant called the lock asking for assistance, but the lockmaster was only able to tell him that the only way in was to push through the log jam… Great!! We approached carefully and eased our way through, only it didn’t go according to plan, and we got caught up alongside the starboard lock wall since Grant couldn’t steer the boat due to a 30’ log caught up under the boat. We managed to push our way into the lock and tie up the first bollard, and once the lockmaster began the process of lowering us, Grant worked on getting the log free. We fortunately did not have to get into the water to do so, and were able to free the rest of the small debris from around the propellers and were back underway in about an hour.

We decided not to try our luck on the hook, so Tabbie called the nearest marina and made arrangements to dock for the night. We pulled into Waverly Marina about 4:00 and were greeted by the owner, who was glad we stopped in. After we fueled up and secured the boat for the night we saw why the owner was happy to see a transiant, this place was not what you would expect a marina to look like. There were 10 year round slips with a fixed dock (which was underwater due to the high water) that had about 100 feet of transient dockage. The place reminded Tabbie of a trailer park on the water… Anyway, we were able to hook up to power, and were just satisfied to have a secure spot for the night.