We left our heroes in New Johnsonville TN. I think Pebble Isle is now our favorite marina. The two marinas since then pale in comparison.
In answer to the quiz in the last entry, Bob and Lynda from M/V Erika Lin filled in the details about the strange vessel at the Pebble Isle entry: "The boat that sits at the entrance to Pebble Isle Marina was built by a man as his 'dream boat'. He spent some time sailing it and unfortunately he passed away. His wife inherited it, but abandoned it at the marina. The marina staff placed it at the entrance to their marina and had plans to restore the exterior and keep it in his memory. We visited Pebble Isle Marina exactly one year ago today and it looks like the restoration has been completed. You can view a "before" picture here on our blog:"
This is the before picture from Erika Lin:
You recall this is the "after" picture:
As someone traveling on a trip of a lifetime, it is pretty neat to see the manifestation of someone else's dream in that boat!! It is also a symbol of the classiness of the folks at Pebble Isle that they would do such a nice thing in memory of a boater friend.
From Pebble Isle Marina we continued down the Tennessee River to Clinton TN. This relatively small marina has great people managing it but not much to do or see in Clinton.
The town is famous for TD Streibling, a Pulitzer Prize winning author from this town. His home was turned into a library. The best thing to see in the library/museum is the original linoleum. That is saying something. No photos allowed inside though. The linoleum is too fragile. Seriously.
The town does have a few pretty buildings that were there it was a thriving town around the Civil War. I leaned against this wrought iron railing and almost had a big problem!
We arrived on Saturday, saw the town and visited a great restaurant in the community, Meo Mio, pronounced Meo (like the cat) My-o. Kermit and I both had Cajun spiced rib eye - delicious. To make it more fun, the marina courtesy car was a regular car. We transported 18 people in 4 shifts in this vehicle!! Both ways!! It was great fun! Except for the 1 sober driver, Michael, who had to make numerous trips in a dark, dark night.
This marina has an interesting architecture. The marina itself is tucked into a little bay off the Tennessee River.
The docks are laid out in a kind of box shape with entrances at three sides. It sits way down in the banks since the water is so low. Like many marinas in the south the docks are covered with metal roofs which echo when leaves and rain drop on them. It is also quite humid under the roofs.
The entire superstructure rises and falls with the water level on floating docks connected to bollards just like the kind used in many of the big locks we go through.
The side posts are hooked onto bollards that automatically rise and fall with the water level, heaving with a metallic heaving periodically. It is an engineering achievement I think.
We staying in Clifton on Sunday during a morning thunder storm with wild winds. It cleared up a bit in the afternoon so we had great docktails instead of dinner. Kermit is getting a little tired of the snacks instead of dinner so I made baked ravioli so we could have something more substantial than nuts and potato chips. I am not sure he felt better but the party was great. There were over 10 looper boats, probably more. I lost count with the wine. We are traveling with 4 other boats, 3 other boats we see regularly since Green Turtle Bay and now there are at least 5 other boats hanging around. Lots of folks from the Great Lakes now, especially Michigan. Must be 4 boats at least from Michigan. Really great people. 
We left Clinton in deep fog on Monday morning 10/15/12. We didn't intend to leave in deep fog. It just happened that way. We saw the fog once we were out of the marina. We got some amazing photos:
We have more photos of the fog that we will load to Flickr shortly.
We navigated using the gps almost exclusively since we could see nothing. In this photo of the gps you can see white through the windows because it was completely white in front of us. The gps shows radar on the right side with the boats marked as yellow blips in front of us and the chart on the left with the boats with AIS shown as little red blips ahead of us. It was pretty cool.
We traveled to Grand Harbor Marina where we could have an easier side trip to Shiloh battlefield but the river shows us the history. We are traveling only a few miles if viewed from overland but about 50 miles a day on the winding river. People on the river watch us. Some are aware that we are loopers. This fellow on the porch called us on the radio and said hello. He completed the loop 2 years ago and still watches the looper boats pass his home every fall. Nice guy.
The Civil War is critical on this part of the trip. Shiloh is the next marker around here. General Grant made his name by capturing two forts in Tennessee in early 1862. Shiloh is downriver from those forts and critical to getting to Corinth MS where two major railroads controlled travel and access to the south. We already toured Johnsonville TN which was a major distribution point for the north into Tennessee, destroyed by that rascal General Forrest in 1864 but this area was controlled by the North before that. General Grant stayed at Cherry Mansion in Savannah TN next to Shiloh during the encampment at this critical junction. Evidently the ladies of the house were southern sympathisers so Grant did not wear his uniform in the house.
Confederate troops of the Army of the Mississippi, about 12,000 under General Johnston, a West Point grad colleague of Grant's, gathered just south of Shiloh and made an early morning raid on the union camp of the Army of the Tennessee under Grant and Sherman. Fierce fighting throughout the day moved the union soldiers back to the river. The Confederates were winning. Unfortunately General Johnston took a bullet in his femur artery and died on the battlefield. General Beauregard took over for him. They took a rest for the evening.
Shiloh National Battlefield has signs like this all over representing battlefield highlights. The best part of the place is the 50 minute video that makes the battle come alive. It makes so much sense after seeing the video. Anyway, fighting continued on April 7, 1862 but Grant took the upper hand and pushed the rebels back to where they started. Then fresh troops from the Army of Ohio landed and really pushed the rebels back to Corinth. They were never the same. The rebels were really dejected that they lost their best general and got defeated in their home ground.
The 10 of us in our little group had the Grand Harbor Marina van so we rode around the battlefield. We saw the Shiloh Church that experienced fighting that day. And the many monuments to the 23,700+ soldiers who died that day. We also learned that the Union army invented or implemented field hospitals at Shiloh, reducing loss of life by having doctors attend the wounded close to the battlefield instead of hauling wounded to a town for treatment.
A stunning loss of life, especially when you consider that the north was pushed back a little then reclaimed the small bit of territory it lost the next day.
Such a picturesque place for such a bloody couple of days.
Shiloh is also home to Shiloh Indian Mounds, home to natives for over 4000+ years. It looks like hills but these are burial mounds and house mounds.
We returned to Grand Harbor Marina in Counce TN. We will remember Grand Harbor as the marina where Rusty got ambushed by three springer spaniels. They look like Paul and Maeo's dog Steinway but very mean. I beat them off and we trotted away amid loud and nasty barking. Rusty is fine. Kermit came with me the next time armed with a boat hook and rocks. No one puts Rusty in the corner. No one!
This marina looks out over a big red marker representing the corners of Tennessee, Mississippi, and Alabama. We are now at the place where the Tennesse-Tombgbee Waterway begins. We will goof around in the Tennessee River for a few more days then move to Joe Wheeler State Park in Rogersville AL for the Great Loop Rendezvous on 10/20 through 10/24. Life is good.
Tech Corner: Kermit added up our receipts and made some calculations. Overall we have traveled 1946 miles using 1711.12 gallons of gas. Average gas price is $4.62 per gallon. We are averaging 1.13 miles per gallon total. Since we slowed down we are averaging 1.54 miles per gallon. We put almost 200 hours on the engines. We left at about 519 hours and at the end of today's run we will be at 717 hours.We plan engine maintenance at Mobile AL around Thanksgiving - new impellers, oil change, and filters. We are not burning any oil at oil since our last oil change in Chicago.
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