Moving Along the Western Tennessee River

It is already Labor Day and time seems to be flying by. In our last blog we left you in suspense wondering what is a “Duck Parade” and what was “the men’s reaction” to visiting Graceland, Elvis Presley’s home. We’re sorry for the delay, but life on the river has been eventful.

A Duck Parade is just what it sounds like, a group of ducks parading after the Duck Master. The Peabody Hotel in Memphis, TN is listed on the National Register of Historic Places and is famous for it’s seventy-five year old tradition of maintaining a duck pond in its lobby. It was originally started as a prank by a group of young hunters who thought it quite funny to put wild ducks in the exclusive hotel’s pond. After the hotel owners saw how much interest it generated, they started the now famous tradition. The ducks live on the roof in a small “castle” and every morning at 11 am five ducks catch the elevator down to the lobby and they march on a red rug behind their human Duck Master to the fountain and pond. At 5 pm they reverse their path and return to their castle on the roof. While they are “away from home” there is a sign by their door saying “Gone to Work”. Thank you to our Nashville friends who alerted us to this interesting parade! Bill and our friend Harvey originally snickered when Diane and I requested a car trip to Memphis. They humored us and agreed to go to Graceland so we women could relive our childhood dreams of Elvis Presley. The visit to Graceland was enjoyable. His home was amazing with some of its very expensive “wacky furnishings”, but the best part was to hear many of his famous songs and to see many of his elaborate costumes. The guys admitted that they enjoyed visiting his home nearly as much as we did.

The evening was fantastic. We walked along Beale Street that is known for its many Blues music venues and restaurants. We made a lucky choice by stopping at BB King’s restaurant, which had a live band playing excellent Blues music. By 11 pm we were tired, the music was over,and we went back to the hotel. The next morning we visited Mudd Island on the Mississippi River. It has a hydrological (or water flow) scale model of the southern Mississippi River that is at least a mile long. It is amazing to see the depth and width changes that occur along the river as well as the size and location of all the major cities. The cities major street names are displayed and the city limits are properly proportioned and displayed in bronze. What a work of art! From here we drove back to the boat, only 150 miles away. We enjoyed the Minsky’s company for one more day before they had to drive to Kentucky to see their newborn granddaughter, Amber.
An osprey hitch-hiking near the flag on a barge loaded with wood chips

Bill and I left the Tenn-Tom, and moved on to the Tennessee River to join two other couples we had met in Alabama in the fall of 2006. They both keep their boats on or near the Tennessee River and were planning to get together for a week. They invited us to join them. We spent one week, swimming,

talking, eating potluck dinners (or pitch ins as they are referred to here), and cruising short distances each day, so we could spend more time together. By Saturday both sets of friends had to take their boats back to their marinas and head home. Bill and I decided to continue on to the start of the Tennessee River and to stop at a few places we had not visited before. We stopped at twelve new anchorages and two new marinas. It was just enough to reinforce our original thoughts that the Tennessee River is one of the best rivers for boating in the United States. There is a large plot of land between the Tennessee River and the Cumberland River that is a national recreation area called the Land Between the Lakes. There are no houses on the rivers in this area and there are lots of camping areas both on and off the rivers. Many of the anchoring areas are near one of the camping sites and there are usually long roads or trails for walking. We met several camping families and were happy to see parents as well as their children enjoying life in a tent. Land Between the Lakes has many other attractions that people with cars can enjoy.
The anchorages all had beautiful scenery, calm waters, and many wonderful sounds, colors, and smells of nature. Flowers, trees, and birds were abundant. Graffiti Cove even had man-made displays of flags on its rocks. Most of this was tastefully done. About the only complaint we had of the area dealt with fish attractors. The idea of a fish attractor is great – a combination of wire, brush, etc. placed in the water to attract fish for protection, from fishermen and other predators. These attractors were usually marked on the local map or chart used by fishermen of the area. We used these maps to get better detail of the many inlets and creeks. Once our anchor pulled up a fish attractor consisting of two big cement blocks, many tree branches, and many pieces of wire holding everything together. Unfortunately that mass combined with our anchor, anchor line, and float line created a Chinese puzzle which took Bill and I two and a half hours to master. I was in the water and Bill was on the boat with a collection of lines tied to different parts of the puzzle. I wonder how the people marking the maps missed that obstacle!
Animals always “catch our eye”. The goats and deer on these pictures are obviously enjoying their life on Swallow Bluff Island. They are the only inhabitants of the island and seem to roam around, stopping at least twice a day at the “beach area”. They certainly added interest when we anchored nearby for the night.

The Tennessee River has the only cultured pearl farm in North America. The original owner had investigated about two hundred sites in the US and Canada. He determined that the area only ten miles from his home had the best possibility for growing cultured pearls. The site is in Bird Song, TN and the racks of mollusks with pearl seed implants are kept in the water at the Bird Song Marina. Only a small percentage of the world’s freshwater pearls are produced in Tennessee, but over ninety percent of the other growers implant their mollusks with a seed created from a Tennessee River mussel shell. As we cruised through this area we saw many boats equipped for mussel “catching”. The old method was by “brailing” and the newer method is by diving. We saw one brail boat and many divers’ boats. Brailing is the process of dragging a metal bar with tines over the mussel beds. The boats for brailing have a super structure built up to support the metal bar. The open mussels clamp down on the tines and are later pulled to the surface. Diving to collect mussels is done with a compressor on the boat and the diver mucking around in the dark water with his hands to find and gather the mussels (yuck!!!). The boats always display a diver’s flag when someone is diving.
Shiloh National Battlefield extends along the western portion of the Tennessee River in Shiloh, Tennessee. An important battle in the Civil War was fought here. On the first day the Confederate army made great strides, but on the second and final day the Union forces were victorious. Both armies were fighting to gain control of an important railroad junction in Corinth, MS. The Union won the Shiloh Battle in April 1862 and moved south to capture the valuable railroad junction of Corinth. This second and bitterly contested battle was fought on October 3-4, 1862. Union troops were victorious. There are many important Civil War sites along the Tennessee and Cumberland Rivers. For any history buff that enjoys boating, cruising these two rivers would be a dream come true.

After enjoying these first two weeks in August, Bill and I became car bound. Bill’s sister, Betty, called us one morning to tell us that Bill’s Mother was in the hospital and was not getting any better. We ”parked the boat”, rented a car, and headed north to Indiana to visit her. Unfortunately she passed away at midnight and we didn’t arrive until 1:00 am. Mother was a wonderful person and we are so lucky that she remained happy and relatively healthy until she turned 98 this year. Betty and her husband Jerry, Bill and I, and our daughter Beth were able to spend a few days together before we headed to western Pennsylvania for Mother’s funeral. While she had spent her last two years in Indiana with Betty and Jerry, most of her life had been spent in Greensburg, PA.

On our return trip we drove on the Natchez Trace National Parkway through much of Tennessee. There are no buildings on it and commercial vehicles are not allowed to travel on it. The roadsides are well maintained and there are lots of tall trees, evergreen and deciduous. We passed many wild turkeys. Unfortunately they were not as excited to see us as we were to see them.

The first week back we stayed at the marina, relaxed, and got to know many of the people staying on our dock. It always amazes us how friendly the local people are and how willing they are to share life stories. That first week we were included in two "All Dock Potlucks" and one afternoon of socializing at anchor. For one of the potlucks, we brought a salad fresh from our garden, tomatoes, basil, mozzarella cheese, and Italian dressing. Our basil is so prolific we give bouquets of it as boat gifts when we go visiting.

The anchorage fun included at least nine other boats with kids, parents, and grandparents. Everyone had some kind of water floating device.

We are now anchored in Bay Springs again waiting for the rains and wind from Gustav to leave. Next week we plan on having the boat hauled so we can paint the bottom. The temperature is now in the 80's, so we feel ready to tackle that job.