Dubuque, IA

When I was in high school we had a joke: Why does the Mississippi River flow south? Because Iowa sucks.  Now that I just spent the day in the third Iowa city we've visited since starting our trip, I can only say mea culpa.  If you don't know what that means, you likely weren't raised Catholic.  Mea culpa is an exclamation of apology or remorse that is used to mean "I apologize." So far Iowa people and towns have been very pleasant.

Since we started the loop, every day has felt like Saturday.  Our "rest" day Saturday here in Dubuque was no different.  The National Mississippi River Museum and Aquarium is next door to our marina and had several outstanding exhibits on the entire river including the impacts of the river on the Gulf of Mexico.  Here is a shot of their ray tank in the rare moment when there weren't people petting them (taken from the 2nd level).

There were also boat building exhibits and a dredge that was open for tours.  The aquarium is definitely worth visiting if you're in Dubuque. After a visit to a delightful yarn store (really, is there any other kind?!) to get yarn to make myself fingerless gloves for our cold fall mornings, we had a fantastic 20 mile bike ride through downtown Dubuque and then along the Heritage bike trail to Durango, IA and back.  The trail went on for another 25 miles but we chose to turn back because of the threat of thunderstorms later in the afternoon. I was asked how the bikes are working out - and the answer is great! We have a couple of Brompton C series. They fold up small enough to put in an overhead bin on a large plane and are 26 pounds.  That makes them easy to take on and off the boat.  And they take less than a minute to "fold" and "unfold."  Here are some shots I took of Tony folding his up after the ride.

The wheels have 16" diameter so we won't be breaking any speed records, but they ride very comfortably on gravel as well as asphalt and maneuver well as long as you don't take a sharp turn at high speed. They are well worth the weight/cargo space that they take up.

We ended our day out to dinner with the other MacGregor 26X owners in our marina that Tony mentioned we met when we pulled in yesterday.  They have been cruising the US inland waterways on and off for around 11 years and we had a great time comparing stories (they're also ocean sailors) and comparing various modifications and configurations of our MacGregor's.  We now have some ideas of things we might experiment as we are always trying to improve our fuel economy.

Where’s your mast?

We are regularly asked this by those who know that the MacGregor 26X was sold as a sailboat. Today we were hailed on the radio by the captain of the Cassville, WI, car ferry as we passed by. He said he was a sailor and asked us where our mast was and where we were headed. Our short answer about the mast is usually “we left it in Minnesota” and if there is further discussion we explain that it is of little use on the river south of Lake Pepin, and causes delays at railroad bridges if it’s up and is a big obstacle and hassle if it’s carried on deck. Not to mention the sails, lines, spars and hardware that would have to be stored onboard. We made a choice to leave all that behind and so far don’t regret it.

We went 35 miles downriver today to Dubuque, IA, passing though one lock (#11). Soon after getting into the pool below the lock and dam, we came across another MacGregor 26 heading out on the river, and he had his mast up! We slowed to greet each other and he told us that it was not only wide and deep enough to sail there, but he was a member of a local sailing club in Dubuque.

It continued to be MacGregor 26 Day, for as we pulled into our marina, one of the only other boats at the dock was another Mac 26X, and just like us, they are mastless. We immediately made introductions after we tied up and dinner plans for tomorrow.

Kathleen and I ate dinner onboard, then took a walk along the Dubuque Riverwalk, part of a major redevelopment project on the city’s waterfront. There is a convention center, casino, hotel, aquarium & museum, walking paths, and the Port of Dubuque Marina, which was built mainly to attract visiting boaters like us. On our walk we also saw a restored Civil War-era shot tower, where musket balls were once made, and the historic Dubuque Star Brewery, which is now a winery. Tomorrow is a planned leisure and sightseeing day. 

Guttenberg, IA

We set another new record this morning—lowest temperature so far at 47F when we woke up. The cabin was closed up for the night and we were cozy and comfortable. Here’s the sunrise over Dragonfly and the river:

Today was a planned rest day to explore the lovely village of Guttenberg (pronounced with a short u, as in “gut”), population 1,800. Settled predominantly by German immigrants in the 19th century, it was named after Johannes Gutenberg, the inventor of the movable type printing press. A map-making error in 1848 misspelled the name with a double “t”, and the typo stuck. Fun fact: A 1949 referendum to change the name back to the original spelling was voted down by Guttenberg residents. 

We had breakfast at Sodes Perk, then got on our bikes for a ride along the 2.2-mile riverfront path, and continued on to Big Springs Nature Area, where we hiked a short distance to a spring that did not live up to its name, but was very pretty. We biked through town, exploring the residential areas and the main streets, which still have many of the original 19th century buildings. 

We also visited Lock and Dam 10, which we passed through yesterday before getting to the municipal marina where we’re staying. We toured the last remaining Lockmaster’s house on the river, built in 1938 and used until the early 1990s. It is has been beautifully restored to its glory days and is now a museum.  

We also watched a large tow pass through the lock, headed upriver. The process is fascinating, and appealed to the nerd in both of us. A typical river tow has 15 barges, 3 across by 5 front to back. The locks are 110’ wide and 600’ long, which fit 9 barges with a foot or two to spare. The tow captain puts the first nine barges in the lock and the tow is then split. The captain backs out with the tug and remaining six barges and waits. The first nine barges are locked through, and pulled out of the lock by a smaller tug. The lock is reset and then the captain locks through with the last six barges and reconnects to the front nine before continuing on.  The entire evolution takes about 90 minutes, and is the reason why we had to wait so long to get through Lock 5A. 

The crews on these river tows typically work 28 consecutive days, and do not go ashore during their stint. River transportation is by far the most efficient way to move bulk cargo. A 15-barge tow carries as much as 225 rail cars or more than 900 trucks, with far less fuel consumed to move it the same distance. 

After our outing, we had a picnic lunch in the park overlooking the marina, but were joined by a small swarm of pesky honeybees. We spent the rest of the afternoon soaking up the sun and 76-degree warmth and relaxing. Dinner was in town at the Fish Shack, a screened porch overlooking the river and run by lifelong residents of Guttenberg. We enjoyed a superb perch dinner, friendly locals and more of the chill river vibes that we’re liking a lot. Then it was ice cream at Joe’s Pizza & Arcade before returning to Dragonfly for our regular evening cribbage game.

It’s not the River City, but is a river city

We spent the whole day with Iowa to starboard and Music Man tunes were constantly in my head. We set two new records today cruising the Mississippi. The first was proximity of our marina slip to railroad tracks—our stop in Lansing, IA was about 30 yards from the passing trains, which sounded their whistles at full volume in town. Only two came through and woke us up last night! We also had another record mileage day, steaming 48 miles from Lansing to Guttenberg, with two locks. The day started out chilly and overcast in the low 50s, but warmed up 67F once the sun came out. Our locking events couldn’t have been easier—there was no other traffic, and the lockmasters had the lock ready and waiting for us after we radioed ahead.

We’re still within the Mississippi River National Fish and Wildlife Refuge, and the natural beauty is stunning. And we’re in the Driftless Area, a region of the upper Midwest that was spared the bull-dozing effect of the ice age glaciers and is unique on Earth. Often we are cruising past wetlands, bluffs and valleys that cannot be seen by car, and where there are roads, we see much more going 7 mph instead of 70. The bird life is incredible, with eagles, herons, egrets, cormorants, ducks, geese, gulls and pelicans.

In case you’re curious about the buoys in the pictures, here’s a quick lesson. Red and green buoys indicate the edges of the navigation channel. On the Mississippi River, the east side is red and the west side is green. We Badger alumni have no trouble remembering that the Wisconsin side is the red one. Red buoys are conical on top and are nicknamed “nuns,” after the pointed hats that nuns wore back in the day. Green buoys have flat tops and are called “cans.” The shape difference is so you can tell them apart at night. U.S. river buoys are neither lighted nor numbered.

Another day, another dredge; this one near Prairie du Chien, WI, where the Wisconsin River empties into the Mississippi. It was interesting in that it uses both mechanical (backhoe) and hydraulic dredging techniques. The blue barge in the center is an enormous vacuum cleaner, which sucks the river mud off the bottom and dumps it on shore through a pipeline (the orange buoys on the right). 

This riverboat, the Casino Queen, was moored at Marquette, IA.  Fun fact: Iowa was the first state to legalize riverboat gambling.

We are getting our underway routine down and are a pretty good team. We mostly split the crew and helm duties equally, including locking and docking.

State #3!

We had a whirlwind visit home for less than 24 hours where we managed to pack in our required business, an AWESOME Sharon Shannon concert at The Celtic Junction (Thanks Tom Lockney for the ticket), visiting time with Tony’s mom and traded out some items we had on the boat that we realized were extraneous for some warmer clothing items that have already come in handy.  To our surprise we found we couldn’t sleep in our own bed now that we’re used to our palatial V-berth!

We were socked in by the fog this morning in LaCrosse and so did not get underway until after 10:30 once it burned off.  Since we’re likely to have lots of fog over the next month or so while we have very cool nights and warm days, we promise we won’t constantly post pictures but we couldn’t help ourselves this morning.

We clocked our longest travel day thus far on the loop with 34 miles to Lansing, IA and you’ll see in the coming days that we’re done monkeying around.  Much of the land outside of the shipping channel was marshland and we saw countless pelicans and seagulls, often hanging out together, along the way.  I have always associated both of those birds with the ocean but I now know that it is the brown pelican that lives on salt water and appeared in Finding Nemo and the American White Pelican that inhabits inland rivers all over North America in warm weather. 

The sun peeked out sparingly on our voyage through some beautiful rugged terrain.

We were able to enjoy the river with very few human sightings until we got to Lock 8 at Genoa, WI where we had to wait for two separate barges to get through before they could lock us down.  At first we started to play leap frog with the tugs (here we are leaving the dredging barge in our “wake”) 

until a thunderstorm passed over just as we were approaching our stop for the night in Lansing, IA.

requiring us to slow down and dock at the marina in the only 30 minutes of downpour we saw all day.  The poor marina manager ended up getting as soaked as we were in the deluge that lasted just long enough for us to arrive and get tied up. In the end we made it to Iowa safely and looking forward to an even longer travel day tomorrow.

Lazy Sunday

After some overnight sprinkles, we woke up to overcast skies, temps in the mid-60s and a light north wind. We walked to breakfast at Kramer’s Bar and Grill, which was already starting to collect patrons at 8:30 AM for the 3:30 PM Packers-Bears football game.

Today and tomorrow are planned days off—we are renting a car at the La Crosse Airport later this afternoon to drive home to St. Paul to take care of some personal business. 

Kathleen practiced both her concertina and fiddle on board in the marina. Strange but true: a mourning dove crashed into the side of our boat while she was playing. It survived the collision, and floated away on the surface of the water; we do not know its fate.

Below is the luxurious V-berth where we sleep. It’s six feet across at the aft end and seven feet deep. In 30+ years of boating, this is the most comfortable bed we’ve ever slept on!

Kathleen made our cozy blanket, which of course has a Dragonfly theme.

Our onboard shoe storage is still a work in progress. So far we prefer the pig-pile system.

Winona, MN to La Crosse, WI

This morning we woke up to a chilly 52 degrees and a lovely mist on the river.

After the fog burned off, we turned Dragonfly’s bow south again and immediately came upon the American Symphony, a 175-passenger cruise ship, docked on the Winona waterfront. Cabins are only $5,400 for the voyage from St. Paul to St. Louis!

Every day we’ve passed huge tow boats, with barge rafts that fill the entire camera screen.

And every day we’ve seen dredging operations. The Army Corps of Engineers is tasked with maintaining a minimum nine-foot depth in the channel on the entire river. So far we have not seen any depths shallower than ten. Here’s a video of a dredge in action:

We motored downriver 29 miles and through two more locks, to La Crosse, WI, and docked at the Municipal Boat Harbor, a very nice marina that is tucked away in an industrial area. The weather on the voyage was just about perfect—partly cloudy, temps in the upper 70s and light south winds. We walked into town for dinner, and came across this statue of Gambrinus, a medieval Flemish king who is said to be the inventor of beer. In fact-checking this legend, I quickly learned that the Sumerians of Mesopotamia began brewing beer as early as 8,000 BC.

Upon returning to the marina, what should we see but the American Symphony again, steaming downriver as the sun was beginning to set. A nice surprise and a fun way to bookend another terrific day on the river!