Day Five - Friday -  Diamond Island to Grand Harbor 

          This is a big day for AURORA and me personally. Several milestones will be encountered this day.  First, and one that has given me the willies since I decided to take the boat south, it will be the first lock and dam for AURORA and me. I’ve been through the Panama Canal locks but only as an observer, not the captain of the vessel.   I’ve watched a dozen videos, read the instructive notes from the other loopers and I know the procedure.  However, as life has taught most of us, book learning is not necessarily useful knowledge. Hence my trepidation. Secondly, we will leave the Tennessee River above the dam and enter the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway also known as the Tenn-Tom.  And lastly, it will be Kristine’s last day aboard as she will return to MKE for work and earn a little money so I can continue my chosen lifestyle as a boat bum. We will also meet my pseudo-nephew, Brett, who will join me as crew for the final 2/3 of the Southern Sojourn.

          Kris and I pull up our anchor with a little breeze still pushing us around and watch as GLASS SLIPPER does the same.  Both of us do a few doughnuts (go around in a circle) while Dennis on VELA NARCOSIS hand over hand raises his anchor chain.  He is obviously tiring but the anchor is not giving up its hold on the bottom.  After ten minutes we get on the radio and Wanda tells us the anchor is hung up on something big underwater.  Another 20 minutes go by with no progress and James puts his dinghy down and goes over to see if he can help.  By now we can all see that Dennis has raised the anchor high enough to have a huge branch protruding from the front of his bow but he cannot raise it any further.  Whatever it is beneath the surface, it is big and very heavy.  Dennis is breathing heavy as well and Kris and I stay as close as we can to the stricken vessel but without a clue as to how we could be of help. 

VELA NARCOSIS fouled anchor

James, with the wind picking up and the surface getting choppy, has deftly maneuvered his dinghy so he now has a hold of the tree branch but still cannot raise the anchor any further. 

Branch of underwater log

Finally, the two of them realize the anchor chain has wrapped around the log. Inch by inch they move the chain around and unwrap it until finally it releases the huge log and VELA NARCOSIS is free and clear. James is our hero, having saved Dennis from jettisoning his main anchor and chain to get free.  It is an auspicious beginning to the day but not in a good way. Luckily, the 11 miles to the dam goes smoothly, if slowly, in the current racing past us down river. The dam is obviously releasing water downstream but following Dennis we approach the lock. It is one of the higher locks on the Inland River System rising 85 feet before releasing us into Pickwick Lake. But first…. the lock.  

I have prepared a line with which to tie off to the floating bollard that will rise with us as we go up with the filling lock.  Kristine is on deck with the line in hand, me at the wheel, both of us wearing lifejackets as per rules for all individuals on a boat while locking through. The technique is simple.  One, drive the boat close to the wall, two, wrap the line twice around the floating bollard and secure it to the boat’s midship cleat. (a cleat that is halfway between the front and rear of the boat)   Now the boat cannot float away from the wall.  Finally, try to keep the boat from rubbing against the wall and dirtying your rubber fenders.  Simple… except for one fact.  My midship cleat is NOT in the middle. It is only about a third of the way from the bow, nowhere near the middle and as the water rushes into the lock, my stern pushes away from the wall tightening the line forcing my bow into the wall.  Kris tries valiantly to hold the bow off the wall but the boat weighs15 tons and it is far beyond her strength or mine or anyone’s for that matter.  Our anchor scraps nosily along the wall as the AURORA rises making white gouges in the cement surface while my stern is ten feet away from the wall.  I try my best to keep the stern in with the engine but because it is over one of the welling up geysers of incoming water, we continue to point 45 degrees at the wall and leave anchor marks and loud screeching all 85 feet up to lake level.  My first locking is an absolute disaster because I did not look carefully at the placement of my “midship” cleat.  I feel embarrassed but mostly… just plain stupid.

Leaving the lock I cannot look in the direction of the lockmaster, merely thanking him by radio for our safe arrival in Pickwick Lake.  I know exactly how to solve this issue but it will wait until we dock at Grand Harbor in a couple of hours.  My two traveling companion boats did not apparently see this bit of entertainment so I will have to describe it again in minute detail for them. These are the stories that are never forgotten. Sunny days, quiet anchorages are wonderful but forgettable. It is dumb mishaps that make boater’s tales memorable. Tying up, Brett meets us at the dock and comes aboard AURORA for the first time. While Kris shows him his forward stateroom bunk and he stows his gear, I am busily splicing together two 20 foot pieces of dock line to make a new locking line that will reach from my stern cleat to the bollard, make two turns on it and then all the way forward to that infamous “midship” cleat forward.  This will attach the AURORA both forward and aft to the bollard. We have another dozen locks to pass through before we get to Mobile. Granted from here on out the water flows downstream towards the Gulf and all the succeeding locks will be going down rather than up, but I will not be caught unprepared a second time. James and Stacey and Dennis and Wanda and Kris and I along with Brett go out to dinner and with smiles all around, celebrate completing the first of the three legs on our Southern Sojourn.     

AURORA out of Pickwick Lock & Dam