Demopolis, AL

We are having a lovely warmup, with an overnight low of 57F last night and a high of 78F today. The rain we’re expecting won’t arrive until tonight, now, so we were able to take a long walk around the marina, boat yard, RV park and surrounding grounds, then borrowed the courtesy van to provision in town. The marina is all decorated for the holidays, and hosts an annual Christmas on the River lighted water parade, which we missed by a week. The marina is also home to my friend Perry Phillips’ 40-foot sailing catamaran, Sun Spirit. I’ve done two offshore deliveries aboard Sun Spirit: from St. Thomas, USVI, to Mobile, AL, and Mobile to Miami, and have very fond memories of those voyages.

Demopolis (population 7,100) means “People’s City” in Greek. It was founded in the early 1800s by French loyalists to Napoleon who were exiled when Bonaparte abdicated. The French settlers believed that the climate was perfect for growing grapes and olives—it wasn’t, but cotton flourished and the location at the junction of the Tombigbee and Black Warrior Rivers made it a logical place to live and do business in the 19th century. The shift away from river transportation, boll weevil infestations in the 1920s and the Great Depression put an end to growth and Demopolis today seems to be another struggling river town that we’ve unfortunately seen too many of.

This evening we connected with the crews of five other Looper boats for a spirited game of Balderdash on the upper deck of the beautiful boaters’ lounge. Then Kathleen and I watched Love Story aboard Dragonfly, in memory of the late Ryan O’Neal.