Mustapha Island to Ravenswood WV

Day 11:  Tuesday, August 23, 2016

You can monitor our trip at the link: Second Winds Progress Live

Today was another great day.  Again, the weather was perfect.  Again, we awoke to dense fog.  Not long after we arose, a barge came down the river on the other side of our little island anchorage, blowing its extremely loud horn- three blasts every two minutes.

Janine’s choice for breakfast was cheesy eggs, bacon and toast.

We pulled our deeply buried anchor out of the soft Ohio River mud at about 9:00

Clear crisp cool morning on a blassy river.

and headed out to the main river in the now lifting fog. There was absolutely no wind and the river was like glass.  And, like yesterday, the humidity was a low 38% and the sky was clear so we slowly traveled along in the cool pristine air.

We arrived about an hour later at the Bellville Lock and Dam.  As usual, I began calling then on the radio but they didn’t respond.  I attempted to use the cell phone, but we had no service.  The locks all have a

Approaching the Bellville Lock

pull chain on the end of the approach wall for recreational boaters who have no radio so we headed for the wall. Just as we were about to make our landing, they responded to my final call.  The reception had a lot of static and I was not able to understand them but I knew that they knew that we were there.

When the gates opened, we headed in and, as usual, the lock hand was standing along the wall above the gate waiting for us to pass.  I called out to him  and he asked if we needed anything, ice, paper towels, anything!  I responded that we needed nothing and he came back with something like “are you sure?  We have an

The generous lock hand at Bellville Lock

ice machine in the kitchen.”  I said, “Well we have run out of ice but were going to get some when we get to Ravenswood.”  He told us that he would put some in a garbage bag and drop it down with a rope.  He returned with this huge bag of ice and what he called a “care package.”  In it was a roll of paper towels, 2 pairs of rubber gloves, 4 golf towels, two plastic registration holders on a key chain, a Frisbee, two trash bags for the car, and some literature from the Army Corps of Engineers about barge and river travel. It was amazing.  He held the lock for us while we stowed all of our booty. He also told us that all locks have this stuff and if we need anything it doesn’t hurt to ask.  For sure, we had never had such

Belville Lock and Dam from the downstream side

service on the big government locks.

I do recall that once when we were traveling on the Erie Canal, we had tied up and spent the night on the back side of an approach. In the morning, the young lady lockmaster brought us a newspaper and hot coffee.  The Erie has all but no commercial traffic and their livelihood is dependent on recreational boaters.

On our passage down the river, we passed Buffington Island.  It was here that the Confederate General, John Hunt Morgan, was stopped by Union forces as he tried

A hunting Osprey

to cross the river back into what was then Virginia.  Morgan had started in Tennessee with a 2,000 troop raiding party heading across Kentucky, Indiana and Ohio.  His goal was to cause a diversionary action to draw Union forces away from the fighting in the south lands.  At Buffington Island, he was badly defeated in the only battle that was fought on Ohio soil.  He escaped with around 600 men and continued on northeast until he was captured north of Steubenville. 

A classic beauty parked along the shore on the Ohio River

The state of Indiana and Ohio and memorialized his raid with a well-marked highway route which included descriptive signs at many of the points of interest along the way.

We pulled into Ravenswood where we planned to spend the night.  The municipal dock is small and not well set up for overnight mooring.  It works well for folks launching boats but is perpendicular to the shore and quite short.  We were, however, able to maneuver the boat onto the outside of one of the two fingers.

We walked the ¾ of a mile distance to town where we bought some steaks to be

At home for the night in Ravenswood WV

grilled.  We also needed some reading material so we went looking for a book store.  The only place where we found books was Dollar Tree where everything is a dollar.  We bought two other little things and came away having only spent 4 dollars.  What a deal.  And to think that the books were national best sellers.  NOT.

It was quite warm by now so we decided to get a frosty at Wendy’s.  And, since it was 4:30, we decided to indulge in a single with cheese for dinner.

Back at the boat, we spent time talking to folks who were launching and retrieving their boats.  Our sailboat on the river always sparks interesting conversation.  Three different couples/families offered to take us to town to get supplies etc.  We find this sort of generosity frequently as we travel along.

Today was a really neat day!