Chack Chack on the loop - Tennessee to Apalachicola

[helm]

We flew into Nashville yesterday - November 9th just ahead of Hurricane Ida approaching the Gulf. Gary, one of the locals living at Pebble Isle Marina, picked us up at the Nashville airport, stopped at the Waverly Walmart and delivered us back at Pebble Isle to rejoin Chack Chack. If you are making a trip that includes Kentucky Lake stop at Pebble Isle - they are great folk.

November 10th we got the boat sorted out again and made a 10:00 start for Pickwick about 120 miles to the South. We had great weather, all the hurricaine stuff had stayed to the South and East, all we saw as we cruised down the Tennessee River was less cloud cover and more sun.

Pickwick lock was open and sitting ready for us as we approached, a quick lock through and we were on Pickwick Lake on our way to Grand Harbor Marina for the night.

Tomorrow is off to Shiloh for a tour with with Larry -one of the locals - he said don't worry about finding him - he will be in his uniform. May be we should drop our Oregon flag and put up the Confederate banner!

On the Tennessee we passed Cherry Mansion where General Grant and his staff gathered for the two days at Shilo, steaming to (I think) Pittsburgh landing each day for the battle.

Another beautiful day on the water on our CD 25
Eric

[Byrdman]

Eric, Looks as if you have a few days of wonderful travel weather and some cool, but not real cold nights. Safe travels and keep us posted.

Byrdman

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Today we left at 8:30 with our guide Larry for our tour of Shiloh. This is a very well done historic site mostly untouched since the battle. Larry's family has been in Shiloh since the 1820's, he is very well versed in everything about Shiloh and we spent an enjoyable 4 hours with him today.

Around 1pm we headed south down the Tenn-Tom leaving Pickwick Lake and entering the great divide cut - 24 miles of canal dug through the hills 280 wide - it's an impressive sight - more dirt was moved for the Tenn-Tom then for the Panama Canal.

Whitten Lock was our first of three today and I think one the toughest we have had to do, the lock is North - South in orientation at the end of a long stretch of lake with a stiff Northerly breeze blowing up good sized wind waves. When they opened the lock doors for us all that wind and wave action entered the lock with us - we decided they needed to rename it the Whitten Lock and washing machine. We managed to hold on until the doors were closed and the ride improved immensely.

The next two locks where easy and we pulled into Midway Marina in Fulton Mississippi at 5pm for the night.

Eric

[helm]

Today started off with three easy locks on our way from Fulton Mississipi to Columbus Mississippi, we covered the 80 some miles in about four hours and were happy to make the Columbus marina.

The bad news was that the marina was jam packed full with boats waiting to go south, with things even worse in Demopolis and forget Bobby's fish camp.

Now Hurricaine Ida has caught up with us, the rivers to the south are flooding and the crest at Coffeeville isn't expected until Saturday and normal levels won't return until the end of next week.

With all the boats and high water we thought we were were stuck in Columbus for a week or more but then an epiphany - we have a trailer - called Donny - the guy who is taking our trailer from Pebble Isle in Tennessee to Apalachicola in Florida to see if he can take the boat down to the Gulf and bypass the flooding to the south of us. Hope it works- then we bypass the flood and the gigantic log jam of boats in Demopolis and Columbus and float merrily in the gulf on our way south.

Wish us luck
Eric

[Connie]

I enjoyed your trip in photos. I was from Mich...lived in St. Joseph area, so I really liked your photos of Lake Michigan...Saugatuck, South Haven, etc. I spent many springs, summers and falls in those areas...Chicago looked great also. It reminds me that I need to revisit those places...minus the winter!
Connie The Guardian

[JamesTXSD]

Definitely wishing you luck, Eric. The trailerability (is that a word?) is one of the best features of our C-Dorys... and not always to just get somewhere, but sometimes to get around something. Hope it all works out for you.

Best wishes,
Jim B.

[helm]

We spent four days in Columbus, Mississippi waiting for things to clear out to our South. There is a giant bottleneck between Demopolis and Mobile a distance of about 230 miles with only a few stops and Bobbys fish camp the only possible refueling site, couple that with the high water, current and debris in the rivers from hurricaine Ida and everything has just come to a stop on the Tenn-Tom. We had the option to trailer around the whole mess with our CD-25 as we have been positioning our trailer with our planned stops.

Well Donny Liles, who was taking our trailer from Pebble Isle in New Johnsonville Tennesse to Apalachicola had stopped in Nashville for the CMA's - his son's band is Love and Theft - and agreed to bring the trailer to Columbus.

Monday morning we went over to the fuel dock, pumped out, took showers and then a good ole southern boy - Thomas showed up with his 2007 Dodge dualie with 530,000 miles on it, hooked up the trailer, backed in and we power loaded then were off to Gulf Shores, Alabama.

A country trip through Mississippi and Alabama found us in Mobile then down the Eastern shore of Mobile bay to Gulf Shore, we hit a public launch right across the GIWW from Homeport Marina, I powered the boat off the trailer got a slip at Homeport and met Heather and Thomas in the lot to drop the trailer off his truck. The marina manager took Heather over to the Gulf Shore airport to drop off our rental car and we were having Sundowners and in the Cockpit at 4:30.

LuLu Buffett, Jimmys sister has a restaraunt that adjoins the marina and this week they are having a song writers festival - listened to some great music while we filled up on Gulf shrimp.

The AGCLA website says everybody is still jammed up in Demopolis and the anchorages above it, the current was high enough at Bobbies to break a cable on their long dock and a boat pulled a cleat off the dock as well. I think if we had a little more time we could have waited things out in Columbus but we wanted to be in Apalachicola this coming weekend and its warmer in Gulfport.

Eric

[Byrdman]

Hey Eric: Glad you made it fine down to Mobile. Lived there 1983-88... Great place. You should be fine there. Have some friends in Panama City who are loopers...and are just waiting for some of the AGLCA to make it there. We brought their boat down (not trailerable) from Annapolis down to Cocco Beach, FL ..... and I came home from there due to one of the 4 locks being closed on the ditch crossing FL. Looks like it all worked out fine as this years travel for the loopers continues. Funny...or not really....but, several crews got caught up last year a bit further north up river....again, due to the flooding from rains. Nice to have the option of a trailer.... even before we talk about the carp.

Safe travels and keep on posting.

Byrdman

[helm]

Great day today on the Gulf Coast after a little overnight rain the clouds cleared early and it turned sunny and warm. We headed out East on the GIWW staying inside up to Perdido Key and got a slip at the Oyster Bar.


We walked down to the beach and had a great afternoon hunting for shells and enjoyed the beautiful white sand beach with dophins right off shore. Warm and sunny we got back to the boat right at sunset.

Tommorow is off to Sandestin, then I think Panama City on Thursday.

Eric

[thataway]

Welcome to the Gulf Coast--sorry to have msised you. We were on the ICW most of the day between Bon Secour and Perdido Bay.

[volsman]

It's great you made it to the Gulf Coast. We are in Gulf Breeze, FL near Pensacola. If you need anything let us know. We will be glad to help.

[jennykatz]

Are you guys coming down to SW florida If you do send me a pm and we can meet up Mike (Pappion) and I can show you Naples and surrounding areas Have fun take care Jim

[helm]

Bob, we wanted to make a Pensacola stop but with weather forecast bad for Saturday we pressed on to Sandestin with the plan to be in Panama City tonight and Apalachicola on Friday.

Chack Chack will go into dry storage at Scipio Creek Marina in Apalachicola until we return.

We had a really nice run from Perdido Key to Sandestin with fine weather and the bays stayed calm. In Fort Walton we saw a nice Tom Cat up on its lift just off the GIWW but wasn't anyone around. Stopped by the Fort Walton Yacht Club where Heather and I had sailed in the Coronado 15 North Americans - brought back lots of great memories

Sandestin is a large resort with many restaraunts, multiple golf courses, shuttles for shopping and all for only $2.75 per foot per night - by far the most we have ever payed for an overnight - but it is a nice place.

Today off to Panama City where will stay at the city marina with walking access to the town. Weather is supposed to be good today and tommorrow sunny and warm during the day but cool at night.

Eric

[helm]

Thursday November 19 found off from Sandestin on the GIWW on our way to Panama City, we had another day of great cruising with Dolphin around several times, excellent weather and nice scenery.

We had originally planned to spend the night at the municipal marina in Panama City but the fixed docks where way to high for our C-Dory - I truly don't think Heather could get on or off the boat there. St Andrews marina just on the edge of Panama City was recently rebuilt and has nice floating docks. The marina has a large number of commercial and charter boats with a smatering of cruisers. St Andrews itself has a few restaraunts with walking distance but I think you would have to take the bus for any shopping or provisioning. Some of the locals suggested we go off shore from Panama City to Port St. Joe then back up the canal to the GIWW but on Friday we chose to stay inside on our way to Apalachicola

The trip from Panama City to Apalachicola is very scenic beginning in wide bays that eventually narrow to a dredged cut then across a small lake and into the Apalachicola river. The scenery varies from beautiful bays to passages thru cypress swamp to back down the rivers again - all in one day. Again we had excellent weather for cruising.

We had chosen Scipio Creek Marina in Apalachicola as the place to leave Chack Chack for a few months while we return to Oregon on the recommendation of our friends on FreeBird who we had met up with again on the Ohio River just below Kentucky Lake. Scipio is a nice marina with nice people and Chack Chack was cleaned up and set inside in dry stack all safe and sound until we return.

We spent a day and a half wondering about in Apalachicola - even saw someone with a brand new Venture 26 with the Wefings brand on the trailer, then flew out on the 22nd.

We will put pictures up when we get home.

Eric

[thataway]