2020 Wrap-up

 So once again I've been a bad blogger....Rest assured that we're both fine and fully vaxed so the Rona didn't get us. Honestly, when we got back to the house last fall we just got caught up in doing house stuff and enjoying SWFL. Bad excuse I know.

I'll pick up with the windless project from last spring. In the process of painting the non-skid the windless came off to help clear the work area. It was looking pretty sad from 30 some years of use.

A search of the Google machine found a chrome shop fairly close in Rome, GA. Once we got it to him we found out that it would take 8 weeks to get back! Turns out everyone was now working on their long forgotten classic car projects. Well, we had plenty to keep us busy with the other projects so it was no big deal. It came back looking great and was a nice touch to the updates.

Our original plan for 2020 was to travel the Ohio river all the way to Pittsburg but with COVID shutting things down we decided to scale back and travel the length of the Tennessee instead. When they closed the swing set here at the campground we knew that it was time to get moving. Seems pretty funny in hindsight.

We got moving in early July and headed downriver toward our old home at Green Turtle Bay in Grand Rivers, KY. We had visited many of these stops on past trips but there is always something new along the way. One sight was a barge used to transport rockets from Huntsville, AL to points south. It has an interesting shape and must be a handful in any wind.

Another familiar stop is in Florence, AL. We were happy to see that the restaurant was open for outside dining.

 

Another favorite stop is at Aqua Yacht in Iuka, MS. This marina is just off the Tennessee at the top of the Tennessee-Tombigbee waterway that leads to Mobile. We spent a few days here just relaxing after all the hard work. It's nice to be moving again! We took the dinghy out for some exploring.

 I'm not sure if we've ever crossed a state line in the dinghy but did on this trip.

A bit farther down the Tennessee we passed an area where there had been a landslide earlier in the year. The destruction was pretty sad to see. These homes had been high on a bluff and quite far from the river. It must have been quite a storm. You can read a bit about it here.

The last day of travel from Paris, TN to GTB brought a bit of unwanted excitement. Typically during our travels I'll go into the engine room to check on things and shoot various spots on the engines with a temp gun to confirm everything is operating normally. This day I noticed that the engine room was abnormally hot. Every temp on both engines was exactly where it should be but something was not right. Back at the helm we have a remote temp readout that said it was 130 degrees which is much warmer than usual. With all engine gauges normal we slowed down some and limped into GTB with no clear idea of what the problem could be. After giving the ER a day to cool down, I began investigating the next morning. After a bit of probing around I finally found the culprit. The fitting that connects the turbo to the exhaust had corroded away and separated. The turbo was just spewing hot gas into the engine room.

Luckily Paducah, KY was close by and has a very good turbo shop. It's actually the same shop that rebuilt our injectors. We dropped it off on Monday and by Friday had it back on the boat looking like new.

We had planned on spending a week at GTB anyway so there was really no delay, just a hit to the credit card... Also while there we picked up our most traveled guest, sister Kathy. She was joining us for the upriver leg of the trip. 

After the repairs we decided to take a short trip up the Cumberland river to check things out and visit friends. Along the way we passed the "big house", a place best seen from the outside!

Kathy Pic

Apparently they also keep an eye on us boaters to be sure we don't have nefarious plans...or maybe he's just wishing he was out here too...

Kathy Pic

All went well on the shakedown cruise and a few days later we were heading back up the Tennessee. It's nice to have a extra hand on board and Kathy helps out any way she can, including locking...

She also takes some great pictures to help with the blog. This Osprey nest is one of them.

One interesting thing we saw was the unique system they use when releasing water from the Wheeler lock. We were delayed while they locked through a split tow so we got to see this a few times. As they release water to lower the lock it churns up through a "pit" in the river. I've got a short video below.

While waiting for the lock Kathy was able to capture a bird doing some fishing.

Got It!

Get In My Belly!

There are also some very nice homes in this lower part of the river.

Kathy Pic

Sometimes while on a boat you have to wait for train traffic to pass just like in a car as seen here in Decatur, AL.

The following picture are just some of the impressive homes lining the river leading up to Knoxville. Most aren't my style but they are impressive!

This one is my style, do you see it?

Look closer...

A few more...

I do like the party castle on this one.

And one last one. I do like his daily commute helo.

Finally we arrive at Knoxville.

And we continued a few miles farther to where the Tennessee river is formed at the confluence of the Holston and French Broad rivers.

After a great trip along the length of the Tennessee Kathy jumped ship in Knoxville and left Jill & I to return the boat to Scottsboro, AL where we would prepare her for winter and drive back to Florida. We did take a side trip up the Little Tennessee river where we were in the foothills of the Smokie Mts. Too bad it was a bit cloudy.

So there you have our 2020 update. Not what we had planned (was anyone's?) but we had a great trip and found most towns "somewhat" open.

This year we "plan" on doing that Ohio river trip. We'll be underway about June 1 heading back down river to GTB where we'll prepare for the trip up the Ohio. I promise I'll try to be a better blogger along the way. As always, you'll be able to follow along using the Locate Us link on the upper right of this page along with the NEBO app if you use that (you should, it's free) just search for Chasing 80 in the app.

At the risk of being TL:DR I do have a bit of housekeeping.

1) I've been notified that Feedburner will no longer be supporting the feature that sends out e-mails of each update as of sometime in July. If you get updates from us via e-mail you may want to bookmark this page and check in every once in awhile. It says there is a way for me to capture the subscribed e-mails and send out the link another way but I haven't figured it out yet. 

2) Jerry A, if you see this the pump kit worked perfectly, thanks. Enjoy your retirement but I'll need you to send me your cell number for any further issues I may have. :)  Seriously, Thank You for all your help through the years!