It didn't end up being! I no more than got the blog written when I looked up and out the windows from where I was sitting. The conversation went something like this; Ray asked "What is it?" I casually replied "Just looking. The wind has picked up and the anchor chain was making a noise." He got up and looked out the hatch. Next thing I hear is "We're sliding big time! Come on!"
Let's back up for a minute here. When we first anchored, Ray was setting it as usual. He thought we were still moving but the anchor did not sound like we were dragging. I thought we were still moving too, but he didn't hear that. By the time I went to repeat it, we had stopped moving so I said that instead. We sat up at the helm for a while and thought maybe we had moved just a little bit closer to a fishing jug than we originally were, but maybe it was just the way we were swung.
A while after we had gone below deck a pretty good rain squall was coming through. So back to where we both ran up to the helm. Ray started the engines right away and moved forward as we were very close to a spit of land at our stern. I got to the helm seconds later and turned on the depth finder to see how deep of water we were in. Looking back, Ray should never have put both engines in gear without knowing that, but of course this was panic mode. So I took over the helm making sure we stayed in deep enough water but in reverse while Ray went out in the blinding rain and lightning to pull up the anchor. Luckily he had his bathing suit on. It was so hard to see where we were although it was not quite dark yet. I couldn't tell if I was moving with the rain blowing sideways. I turned on the GPS for reference of location and speed. It was raining so hard and the enclosure was all closed up so hand signals were used which we are used to thankfully because we could not hear each other. Finally Ray came back to the helm and said "We've pulled up a wrecked boat on the anchor!" What? He said it was okay, it was just hanging on the anchor. I asked if I could maneuver the boat forward with it on there because I was struggling with steering it in reverse into the wind. Yes he said and went back out to the pulpit. It didn't take long and he was back saying it was a pallet, not a boat now that the rain had subsided somewhat for better visibility. He told me to get out in the channel and he would have to get it off of there. I was scared to death. He's hanging off the pulpit to try to knock it off and almost fell overboard. I put it in neutral. He came back to the helm and said he needed a hammer to break the pallet off. I went below deck hollering "I put it in neutral when you scared me almost falling overboard!" Back with the hammer Ray went hanging back over the pulpit again but got it off quickly. We returned to where we were originally anchored, but just a little closer to shore. We decided that we had to have dropped the anchor originally right on that pallet because it was caught in the top of it, not through where the forks would go if we had caught it while dragging. Also why it didn't sound the same when we thought we were dragging originally.
Ray thought he would be sleeping at the helm after all of that, but by the time we were ready for bed it had stopped raining and the winds were back to light and variable like forecasted.
After all of that excitement last night we decided we would just sleep in because it was going to be a short day anyway. Well, it ended up being short mileage wise, but it took a long time to do it. We didn't get up until about 7:30 a.m. About that time we heard a tow coming. It was "Joseph M. Hamilton" up bound. Well, we might as well wait until he gets ahead of us a good bit or we'll just be waiting for him at the lock anyway. Then we heard on the radio that the next up bound tow, "Dixie Express" was coming up in Fulton Lock. We decided to take our chances and get between the two tows and pulled up anchor at 7:45 a.m.
At 9:05 a.m. we put the anchor back down just before Rankin Lock to wait for "Joseph M. Hamilton" to get locked up. I called the lock on the VHF radio and told the lockmaster that I was aware we were surrounded by commercial traffic, but wanted to get on the list for locking up. He said he would hail "Dixie Express" to get their ETA and let me know. Thankfully "Dixie Express" was nice enough to tell the lockmaster to go ahead and lock us up next and that would give his crew a little break. So nice! Thirty minutes later we lifted anchor and got in at 9:50 a.m. and out at 10:15 a.m. I think maybe the lockmaster was just holding us in there so we wouldn't try to gain on "Joseph M. Hamilton" and try to get ahead of him for the next lock. It's kind of fun to look like we can go fast!
It was the same routine for Montgomery Lock. Anchor down at 11:20 a.m. to wait, in at 11:55 a.m. and out at 12:10 p.m. Back behind "Dixie Express" we could hear two pleasure boats overtake the tow and state to the Montgomery Lockmaster that they wanted to lock next. The lockmaster denied them saying that he had to lock commercial traffic first. I laughed to myself thinking you could get more bees with honey than vinegar.
By the time we got to our last lock of the day and last lock on the Tombigbee we could hear more commercial traffic down bound and this lock was only five miles up from Montgomery Lock, so "Dixie Express" would probably be here soon too. Again, same routine; told the lockmaster I knew we were surrounded by commercial traffic but wanted to get on the list. Nicely enough, by the time all tows called the lock the order would be "Joseph M. Hamilton" up first, "Kristi P. Smith" down, "Second Noelle" up, "Mr. David" down, "Dixie Express" up, then a turn around on the lock for the last two pleasure craft. We anchored to wait at 1:15 p.m., finally got in at 2:40 p.m. and out at 3:05 p.m. "Mr. David" said he didn't care if I took him on the one or two whistle when I came out, so I told him I would take him on the one since we were going to be anchoring on that side anyway.
By 3:30 p.m. we had the anchor down near Cotton Springs. We had talked for days of swimming in this Bay Springs Lake because it is so clear after being in creamed coffee looking water for so long. I did mention that it might be cold. We jumped in anyway. Yes, it was cold. That didn't last long. So we just sat on deck enjoying the evening, listening to the traffic in the lock still. It was after 6:00 p.m. and the pleasure craft had still not locked up. Then a storm came through worse than the one last night. We both sat at the helm to watch and make sure we didn't slide because it was blowing even harder than last night. We couldn't even see the mooring cells in the channel, not a quarter of a mile away. About that time was when the pleasure craft were finally due to lock up. They requested to come into the lock in those conditions. The lockmaster did not advise it, but he let them. One tied on each side. I said I would want to be tied in the lock rather than in that small rock faced ditch below the lock trying to see and keep it off the rocks. Ray had the opposite opinion, but they made it.
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