Ohio River

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After a rolly night at anchor caused by the procession of northbound tows, we said goodbye to the Mississippi and entered the Ohio River. The first ten miles is highly industrial with barges lining the shores and tows criss-crossing the river making for choppy water with floating logs and sticks. This river is much wider and the water cleaner, the scenery is flatter and not quite as picturesque. What makes this the least favourable part of the journey is the construction at locks which is causing a backlog of traffic.

Transiting through the first lock, which is Olmstead, we were given a series of instructions by the lock master which was far too long for me to remember. We had to line up behind a barge who was to be escorted through a chamber. Apparently they don't want any wake because of construction, hence the escort. It turns out this barge was carrying hazardous material so we had to wait until they had fully cleared the chamber before transiting through behind this escort and barge. We were then escorted to lock 53 but could not enter the lock with this barge because of said cargo. We then went into the ugliest lock known to man and were advised to come to the 500 mark where the only flat wall existed. They failed to mention that this section had nothing to tie onto. We managed to loop a line around a flat steel rail that was encrusted with dead zebra muscles. This procedure took 2 hours in the blazing 100 degree weather. We then travelled 20 more miles to the next lock with lots of barge traffic, to arrive at lock 52 where there is a 3 day backlog of tows trying to lock through. We were told to wait by a red bouy and they would call us.

We anchored and took turns dumping buckets of cold water on our heads. Three hours later we locked through with a tow and reached Paducah Kentucky in the dark. We anchored where we hoped we were out of the channel. A tow came by in the night and had to do some fancy maneuvering to get around us but all in all a good night.

It turns out we were out of the channel. Having fun is hard work.

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