After a week of work and a trip home to move a kid back to college, we’re back at it.

Just before sunrise, we pushed off the dock in Grafton (we love that little town!) and headed south. Our goal was to make it to Paducah this weekend, and we hoped to manage it in two long days rather than three or four shorter hops. This is the disadvantage of doing the Loop while still working.

What a beautiful day to be on the Mississippi River! We were very fortunate to be able to cruise right into both locks of the day. We had heard stories of boats waiting for hours for a chance to lock through, but we were very fortunate. In the first one, we tied up to our starboard side. In the second one, the lockmaster had us just float in the middle of the lock without tying up.

In between the locks is the entrance to the canal. There is a giant arrow pointing left. What the sign doesn’t say is that to the right is the Chain of Rocks, which would lead to the certain destruction of our dear Our Dash. So we went left.

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Jeremy from Heritage Harbor in Ottawa told us (you have no idea how many of our sentences start with “Jeremy said,…”) to watch out for the long wing dam jus beyond the lock and along the side of the river. They are often under water, but not this one! It was nice and tall along the river.

Next up: the St. Louis Arch. We didn’t have a buddy boat, so we were on our own for pictures. We took many. We went by the arch, turned around, and went by again. My sisters grabbed a couple screen shots of us from the webcam. This was definitely one of those “I can’t believe we are doing this” moments.

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After the barge, we encountered a barge parking lot. Barges with no tows were just anchored smack dab in the middle of the river. They were easy to navigate around.

We hadn’t had any fuel since Ottawa (Grafton did not have fuel), so we planned to stop at Hoppies, the last permanent place to get fuel (there’s an opportunity for fuel from a fuel truck in Cape Girardeau, but we did not need this and didn’t investigate anything about it). We are pretty happy with our fuel consumption so far. We went from Ottawa to Hoppies, about 222.6 miles, and burned 133.3 gallons, or just under half a tank. The run from Hoppies to Paducah is a tick over 200 miles. Your mileage may vary (Literally. Your mileage will almost definitely vary).

Hoppies is an iconic stop for Loopers, though we didn’t know exactly what to expect. What we got was great service and a nice conversation. Since it was lunchtime, we asked for directions to the Blue Owl, as we had heard that was THE place to get a great dessert. A few weeks ago, I asked someone which dessert to get, and he said, ‘Just pick one. It doesn’t matter.” He was right. There were plenty to choose from, and Owen and I both made the exact right choice. I had a mini strawberry rhubarb pie, and Owen had an apple crumble. There was also a farmers’ market nearby and some cute-looking shops (cute-looking from the outside because we didn’t go in).

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Back at the boat, we were ready to finish our trek to Kaskaskia. The ride was uneventful, except that we saw the biggest tow yet: a 4×6. As we turned into the Kaskaskia River, we called the lockmaster on Channel 14. He was friendly and welcoming. We tied up on the right side of the wall (the dam side). We ran our generator for some much-needed AC. It was a peaceful stop. There’s a campground on the side of the river, and the lock runs all night. We used an extension cord to plug our fans into the lock wall to keep us cool at night. It was a toasty one.

It was a long day but a good one. We’re looking forward to our even longer day tomorrow!