Day 38 – 11/10/23

Starting location: Columbus Marina, MS

Weather: Overcast, drizzle on and off. High 50s am. Mid 60s pm

Ending location: Anchorage at Sumter recreation area, AL, MM 270 on the Ten-Tom

Statute miles: Approximately 65

General summary: Flotilla planned to leave at 8 so we did breakfast, coffee, dog walk, filled water tank, and headed out. Nice to have a little extra time and light before leaving. Lock was only 0.5 miles away and we could see it from our slip. Lead boat communicated with the lock operators and we all kept in touch on VHF 69. Nine boats total passed through 2 locks without any issues or delays. We needed to schedule a mechanic stop for an oil change soon, which we arranged by phone to have done in Demopolis on Monday, so will anchor two nights before getting there. (One more thing to keep track of every 100 motor hours or so.) We passed from Mississippi into Alabama and will continue in Alabama through to the Gulf. Long day of motoring as we were the last boat in line and the forward boats preferred a pace of about 9 miles per hour. Was worth it! Views were pretty usual and it was raining, so not many photo opportunities, but we did pass a phone booth puzzlingly close to the river’s edge. There was nothing to tie up to and no good place to anchor there, so wouldn’t be placed there for boats. There was an RV park there, but not a good central spot for them either. Could this be a tardis or some way to tesser using an alternative dimension for an interstellar shortcut? (😆) Most of the group anchored at an inlet about 9 miles upstream from the lock. We wanted to go a little further to one that was next to a campground and had a boat ramp. Waterways guide predicted a 5 foot deep bar that required crossing, which we should be able to do. The flotilla warned us they heard it was now more like 3 feet. We decided to go ahead and try it as we could always backtrack. We took it super slow and it did go to 3 feet. We had a brief light bump with what was probably a sunken log, but no issues otherwise. Anchored in 10 feet with good swinging room. Took dinghy over and walked around the campground a bit. Rained hard in the evening.

Boater information: