Pebble Isle to Pickwick Lake

From Pebble Isle we went to Bird Song Creek Anchorage, a nice protected spot near the famous fresh water pearl harvest fields. It is a bit of a schlep to get there but it is worth the extra miles.

                  We saw several of the boxes on the river banks; apparently it is used for catching Catfish.

                                              A Tennessee River light house? We are not really sure.

After a couple of days we moved to Lick creek, where we stayed last year.

That evening we had a huge rain storm and noticed that our front hatch was leaking. This is not good, as the hatch is right over our bed!! We dashed out and put a tarp over the hatch and the next day Gary took a few minutes to fix it up good again. It just needed to be re sealed, thank goodness.

Resealing the forward hatch.

After a heavy rain storm we had much water in the dingy.

It was a lovely cool day so we decided to take a dingy ride over to a camp site we had passed just to get out for a bit of a walk to stretch our legs.

Come to find out it is a little marina as well as a camp ground where we were promptly invited to sit down and have a burger and beer with new friends.

Denver, Gary, me, Lorraine, Brian and Donna at The Boat Shack

No ??

Burger to share.

From Lick Creek we stopped into Perryville Marine to purchase some Seafoam a diesel fuel additive hoping that it would solve our generator problem.

We ended up taking advantage of their hospitality and stayed the night.

The definition of cruising - working on your boats in exotic places.

The Generator has been giving us a hard time starting.

Fixing the blowers

What a funny face!!

Lady Finger Bluff. 

The current was getting stronger on the Tennessee river as we were heading further upstream. We anchored at Double Islands with a fair current keeping is straight on our anchor.

We met these kayakers a couple of times.
Barb and Gene Geiger are kayaking down the Mississippi .
They perform services at stops along the way. Check out the blog @ www.paddleforapurpose.net

The following night we gunk-holed in Indian Creek off the Big Plantation Campsite, where we went for a walk to check out the sites and properties for sale.

The American Queen , we saw her on her way South and here she is heading North again.

Interesting thing about water front properties on the Rivers is that your house should be built above flood level, which means some houses , even the ones on the 20 foot high banks, are built on high stilts. It is amazing to think the water rises that high in the spring, but such so it is.

Osprey

Bald Eagle

Hawk

Our next stop was at Diamond Ilse. We anchored in about 20 feet of water at a very fast 3kt current. The next morning we woke up and the river had fallen about 5 feet overnight. 

The current was so swift I didn't let go of the swim ladder at all.
For extra safety I have a line tied to me.

The rise and fall of the water is regulated by Tennessee Electric. Because the current was much slower we headed off to Pickwick lake, the closer we got the worst the current was.

Gary served me breakfast , locking up Pickwick Lake

We didn’t have to wait at the lock which was great! We headed straight to the Waterfall anchorage that we had been told about by our friends from MV Second Noelle.

It felt very weird to me, driving the boat up a  sand bar, beaching it at Waterfall  Anchorage

Fooling around, pretending to push Time& Tide back off the sand

Weird!!

Because we were able to pull T&T up on the sand we were able to give her a good wash and wax.

This anchorage is obviously party central. Even though we were there on a week day there were many boats in and out.

Beautiful Waterfall Anchorgae

That water was COLD!!

Most of the people were friendly and stopped by to say hello.

Charles and Stephen 

One is never too old

We even got them to take pictures of us under the waterfall. Unfortunately there is always the loud boat, with the loud (shitty) music and obnoxious loud drunk people on board who ruins it for everyone.  Fortunately they left and we had the gorgeous spot all to ourselves.

Captain Morgan?? We explored the area around the waterfall, hiking all the way to the top

After all the noise and partying at the Waterfall we headed to State Line Island where we dropped the hook in nice and quiet surroundings

When you anchor out as much as we do, it is the simple things that you need that become the toughest to get. To be able to do laundry you have to stay in a marina, to be able to use a courtesy vehicle to go and do shopping, you need to stay in a marina. Do have access to wifi (most of the times) you have to stay in a marina. Do you see the common factor here?

As we were anchored out, we figured if we took the dingy to Grand Harbour Marina to get fuel, we might be able to shop at their little store on site for some eggs and fresh stuff. As we passed the boats docked we saw Mike, whom we met last year when we stayed there. Mike and his wife, Lois are leaving in two weeks to start the Loop. We started chatting and then they kindly offered to take us to the grocery where we would be able to stock up on (mainly) fresh goods. Another example of the generosity of strangers.

Mike and Lois

The wind picked up a little the next day and rain was forcasted but we lifted the anchor and headed to Zippy Cove, ( a party spot in the summer but on a cool fall day it was nice and quiet.)

These friendly folks dripped by to say hello when they saw the Canadian Flag

Our next destination is Spring Bay with it's many anchorages and beautiful scenery. We are way ahead of schedule and don't want to get to Mobile before the end of hurricane season or while it is still stink hot. 

We have seen many deer on this trip : Be careful little ones, hunting season starts soon!!

I have no idea when I will have access to wifi to post his update, sorry for the delays, we are pretty much in the middle of nowhere.


......................to be continued