Down the Illinois river from Chicago.....

Down the Calumet river from Lake Michigan

CALUMET RIVER

An electric fish barrier in an attempt to keep Asian carp from entering the Great Lakes.

Catfish farmers brought Asian carp into America to help clean up catfish ponds. Flooding happened and they escaped to the river system. The government put up a fish barrier to keep them from getting into the Great Lakes.

Asian carp are large and jump very high if they're scared. They quite frequently jump into boats.

A carp jumped into the cockpit of Island Girl, another looper

We join 6 other Looper boats coming from Du Sable marina in Chicago.  

The Illinois river begins!

Joliet Wall

Joliet, IL

Monday night 09/10/18

Looper boats along Joliet Wall for the night.

It was a good thing we met all the other Looper boats. Dealing with barges and locks, it gave us a bit of power. At each lock there is a queue of barges that are slated to lock through. They have priority. But because we are a fleet of 10, they put us on their roster to lock us through. After all, with that number of “pleasure crafts,” we could “be in the way”.

We got to the Dresden lock early, rafted (that's when one boat secures itself either by anchoring or docking against a wall and other boats tie up to the secure one) and had hotdogs for lunch, pretty much a party.

We had to wait for the engineers to survey the lock with this drone taking underwater sonar  pictures of the lock floor and wall.

Spring Brook Marina

Seneca, IL

Tuesday night 09/11/18

The Bistro of Spring Brook opened up just for us.  Service was slow but food was delicious,  and company was even better!

Cruise to Ottawa Illinois took 7 hours and we only traveled 10 miles! Once again, we rafted, had lunch and waited on the lock to call us through.

A towboat captain took a video of us leaving Marsailles lock.   Sea Jamm has the green top! (Click on the little box icon to see the video in full screen :-)

Patches of white pelicans of the Illinois.

A lot of white pelicans!

Heritage Marina

Ottawa, IL

Wednesday night, 09/12/18

We are now a fleet of 12 Loopers!

As we were pulling into the marina, Sea Jamm had our first encounter with Asian carp. I suppose all the noise from our boat engines excited them. None landed in our boat, but they were jumping over the fender of the dock!

IVY
 (Illinois Valley Yacht Club)

Thursday night, 13^th September

Bar Island

Beardstown, IL

Friday night, 14^th September

Our view from Sea Jamm for the evening.

We anchored between Bar Island and the east shore of the Illinois. Alan got to use his new anchor windlass which worked flawlessly (easier than winching it up by hand.)  It was the perfect anchorage for being out of the way of the barges and had swift enough current that it kept the boats from swinging. Alan and I grilled steaks on Sea Jamm. Ken from Island Girl launched his dinghy and taxied everyone over to our boat for after dinner drinks.

On our cruise, we passed the most western part of the Great Loop at mm 60.

Grafton Marina

(Key West of the Illinois River)

Saturday night, 15^th September

We got lucky. Grafton was having a crab and shrimp festival for the weekend. Party goers were rather loud on Saturday night, but we were so tired they didn't keep us awake.

Colorful and pretty little town.

We had breakfast in the place.  Pretty eclectic decor.

We have reached MM 0 of the Illinois River.  It is here that the Missouri River joins the Illinois and together they form the Mississippi.

The Mississippi

At this point, it doesn't look like we will get any weather from Florence.  Although we are not certain of flooding she could cause on the lower rivers.  But, we pause, remember, and pray for those on the east coast who weren't so fortunate.