Chicago to Alton, Il

For the first time in several days, we have decent internet. So today is the day for me to catchup on this blog.

We left Chicago, September 10, a day ahead of schedule to avoid some incoming weather on the Lake.

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We began our travel on the Calumet River, passing several industrial sites. The big pucker factor was the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe Railroad Bridge with a fixed vertical height of 19.7 feet. This is the defining bridge for many loopers. If you cant make it under this guy, you can’t make it. We slowly slid under with about a foot to spare. Keep in mind, water levels are very low right now. If it were a year with high water levels, we could have been a foot too high.

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After an 11 hour day, night 1 was spent on the free wall in Joliet on the Illinois River.

Joliet does not hold a good reputation among loopers and while we had no problems that night, we have since heard stories from fellow loopers that keep that reputation alive. We talked to John, who we met in Chicago, who woke up the morning before only to find a dead body floating behind his dinghy. Upon calling 911, the responding cops weren’t too surprised. Seems they see this frequently. We also read about a group of loopers who woke up during the night to find someone untying boats from the wall. One boat was already floating loose in the river.

We were off the wall the next morning with a flotilla of about 10 others at 6:15. We had 3 locks to traverse this day and wanted to get a good start. When the first lock is relatively close to where we moor for the night, the plan is for someone in the group to call the lock master to see if he has any commercial vessels in the lock or waiting to lock and to let him know that we plan to lock through. Commercial vessels have priority over pleasure vessels such as ourselves. There’s no need to leave the dock at the crack of dawn only to wait hours to be locked through.

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The locks on the Illinois have floating bollards that we loop a line around and hold tightly as the water lowers. We have found that on the Illinois, the locks may only have 4, sometimes only 3 bollards to grab.

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To accommodate the large number of loopers wanting to go through at a time, we usually have to raft off to each other. With Subject to Change being one of the larger boats, we usually find we are the “Mother ship”, the one that grabs the bollard and then lets a line of other boats grab on.

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After a long wait at the Brandon Road Lock, our numbers had grown. We now had a group of 17 pleasure boats waiting for lockage. It was going to be a tight fit.

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At Marseilles Lock, we had to wait for this triple wide to restack his barges For his up river run. Locks on the Illinois can’t take in triple wide loads, so tows have to unstack the triples and take them thru in stages. Of course, this adds to our wait time.

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After a long 12 hours on the river, we tied up at Heritage Harbor Marina in Ottawa. We spent night 2 and 3 here resting up.

We left Ottawa at the dawn and continued down the Illinois River. We planned a relatively short run to Henry, Il.

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While many other loopers have the option to dock at marinas along the Illinois, we do not. Water levels are so low right now that we are unable to get into most of the marinas we pass. So, we have been getting creative when it comes to choosing places to tie up to for the night. Many loopers use an app called NEBO to create a track of their travels. It is the app I use for posting pictures showing our track to help you see where we are. This app allows other loopers to also see where you are. I have been using it to follow friends and to follow boats that also have deeper drafts to see where they spend the nights. It’s one way I found our spot for night 4 in Henry.

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We tied to an old lock wall that was used up until 1910. Yes, it was rustic and a bit unconventional, but it served its purpose and we had a wonderful, quiet night.

As we continued down river, we passed remnants of the past and flocks of white pelicans making their way south.

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After a short day, Night 5 found us just south of Peoria at Kuchie’s on the Water restaurant and bar. Unfortunately, Kuchie’s was closed that night, but the owner graciously told us to make ourselves at home and stay as long as we wanted.

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We couldn’t have asked for much nicer weather. The water was calm, days were warm, but the nights were cool enough for sleeping with windows open and just a fan. And most importantly, Maggie was happy that we provided her with grass to do her business on. Beardstown was our destination for night 6. Again, we had to bypass marinas and ended up at Logsdon Tug Service where for $1/ft you could tie to a old barge for the night, head into town for dinner and have somewhat decent WiFi.

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The wonderful weather continued to bless us, so we opted of make a long day of it and head to Grafton and a real marina for some major chill time.

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After another 12 hour run, we were thrilled to dredge our way into Grafton Marina. Even here, we were digging up mud to get into a slip. This was home for nights 7,8, and 9.

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Grafton has been called The Key West of the Midwest. It is a party town with lots of bars, restaurants, and live music. The perfect spot to regenerate, wash clothes, eat good food and enjoy new friends. Oh, and wash Asian Carp scales off the side of the boat.

As I write this, we have just spent our first night on the Mississippi and night 10 of the rivers at Alton Marina, just 2 hours down from Grafton. We will be here 3 nights as well. I’ll tell you about Alton when I write again.