We arrived at Green Turtle Bay on Wednesday, October 3, 2012 at just before 3pm. We tied up and cleaned up a little then left for dinner at Patti's 1880 Restaurant. Since then we have been to Paducah KY to pick up a van, then to Nashville, Grand Ole Opry, The Hermitage in Nashville, then back to Paducah to shop for supplies and return the vans. Docktails everyday at 5:30pm. Pretzels are not an option. We have to bring something special, somethiing different that has to be cooked or assembled. No dinner because we had too much fun, drink, and snacks at the docktail party. Lots of loopers, some we met before, most are new folks to us. We will interact with most of these people for the next year in one form or another. Many will be life long friends, I can tell.
Green Turtle Bay Resort and Marina is located on Barkley Lake in the Land Between The Lakes National Recreation Area, a United States National Recreation Area located in Kentucky and Tennessee. Both Lake Barkley and Kentucky Lake are manmade lakes created when the Tennessee Valley Authority created Kentucky Lake in 1938 with the Kentucky Dam on the Tennessee River to control floods and create power. Barkley Dam was built in 1960 by the Army Corps of Engineers on the Cumberland River. The two new lakes wiped out entire towns, relocated to higher, dryer areas nearby. The land in between the two manmade lakes is called... wait for it... the Land Between the Lakes!!! It is beautiful here - lots of boating, bald eagles, and other critters. We met regular dockers here who come all the way from Pennsylvania to dock here - 6 hours each way. They don't come for the weekend but months at a time whenever they can get away.
The nearby town is called Grand Rivers KY. Check out Green Turtle Bay Resort on Google Maps because I still can't get the Google Earth to work. Use the satillite option because it is truly beautiful. Jane Slanker's brother in law has a houseboat down here. We saw a houseboat that the owner made himself - called DahlHouse. Check this out! It has every possible comfort you would ever want in a boat all built into this houseboat.
A note about the local grocery store. This store is very sparsely filled with groceries - empty shelves everywhere. But they have a full and very wide selection of flour! Go figure. I bought some White Lily flour and made biscuits to take the the docktail party today (Monday).
This area is incredibly beautiful with trees and critters everywhere.
Green Turtle Bay is a large marina and resort with restaurants, loaner cars, gazebos, and a great service department. They have the only Towboat US in the area. When we pulled into the marina, Capn, the guy who handled the gas and pumpout, said he saw our little group at the Mississippi!! He went out to pick up a boat for Towboat US where the Cumberland meets the Mississippi and as he was towing a boat to a ramp he saw us passing several times. He specifically noticed our beautiful tourquoise bimini!!!There are at least 20 looper boats in the marina. They have a special deal. Stay 5 days and get 2 days free. So we are staying 7 days! You might think it would be wonderfully relaxing to stay in one place for 7 days. Maybe even a little boring. But you would be wrong. We are constantly moving. I feel like a shark.
We finally got the generator fixed. Evidently there was one little wire that needed to be connected here instead of there that makes the difference. We won't know for sure until we are anchored out somewhere without power. Naturally since we are at the marina the generator works perfectly, just like it has in the past when we were told it was "fixed". Kermit keeps turning it on almost everyday and it seems to work but we will see.
The railing has been repaired. It is not lovely anymore but it should work. The folks here removed the screws took the railing to their workshop, welded it and screwed it back in place. Kermit is not thrilled. He is talking to the Cruisers people about the cost of having a new railing put in but I suspect it is really expensive. I bet we will get used to the repaired railing.
About 16 of us decided to visit Nashville over the weekend. We would have preferred to go to Nashville by water. It is supposed to be a beautiful trip down the Tennessee River but we heard that the lock on the Tennessee River will be under construction in the next week or so for about a month. We have to be in Alabama on October 20 so it was out of the question. But Nashville is only about 2 hours away from here by car so we decided to rent cars and go for the weekend. So on Friday we made a gazillion calls. Kermit was the hero of the day when he got 16 tickets to the Grand Ole Opry even though the show was sold out to celebrate the 87th birthday of the Grand Ole Opry!!
We visited Tootsies, a bar that used to host lots of Grand Ole Opry muscians since it is located across the alley from the old Ryman Theatre where the Grand Ole Opry used to be located.
On Saturday morning our wires got crossed. One group with 10 people were ready to leave at 9am. The other group with 6 people (our group) was not ready to leave until 10am. So we got separated. We met up for lunch at the Wild Horse Saloon then again at the Grand Ole Opry. Nashville is an fascinating blend of kitschy touristy stuff, like this Pedal Tavern (you and your friends pay $20+ each and bring your own booze to rent this vehicle and pedal around town - we didn't do it!) and bars filled with muscians trying to break into the country music big-time.
While we ate lunch at Wild Horse Saloon we checked the schedule and saw that Mustang Sally, a group we enjoy at Put-in-bay is playing at Wild Horse later in the year. When we mentioned this to our looper friends Charlie from Mobile said they play the Mobile Mardi Gras every year!!! Sure enough, they will be playinig at Mardi Gras in Mobile in February 2013!! It is a very small world, isn't it? Speaking of small world, while I was walking around with Rusty I met a looper couple from Minneapolis. After talking for a few minutes turns out her parents went to the same high school I attended in Chicago. How is that for small world?
I was not really aware that the Grand Ole Opry was not located in the Ryman Auditorium any more. I guess I need to pay more attention. And I have visited the Opryland Hotel twice before but never realized the Opry was in town!
I also did not realize that the Grand Ole Opry was a live radio show. Kermit told me it was when he visited last year with the church group but I did not recall. It was neat to see the radio show operating, groups and equipment come off stage and go on stage. The commercials!! The lineup was pretty cool. Jason Aldean was the highlight. He sang 3 songs including some from his new album. His music is really driving and more rock than my impression of country. We also heard from Ray Stevens, famous for his song The Streak, and Little Jimmy Dickens, famous for his song May the Bluebird of Happiness Fly Right Up Your Nose. I really liked Mallary Hope, a new singer, and Casey James, a runner up from American Idol who is good. This is the lineup:
| 7:00 – 7:30 | 7:30 – 8:00 | 8:00 – 9:00 |
|---|---|---|
| Ricky Skaggs Opry Square Dancers Jimmy Dickens The Whites | Riders In The Sky Mallary Hope Ray Stevens | Jason Aldean Casey James Bill Anderson Steve Wariner |
Another interesting thing was they allowed flash camera!! That is Jason Aldean on stage. You can see him better in the big screen above the stage!!
On Sunday we visited The Hermitage, Andrew Jackson's home in Nashville. I never visited before. We particularly enjoyed the wagon tour of the enslaved workers quarters - the back of the mansion where everything happened to make the mansion life possible.
Rusty NOTE: On Thursday Rusty attended the docktail party with us and visited with a young chocolate lab who played rough, like a younger Rusty might have done. In the maylay, the young lab rolled right over Rusty and he took a tumble. He was limping a little for a day or so but seems fine now. He found the boatramp and enjoyed quite a few swims over the last few days. It seems to help him heal.
Tomorrow is our last day in Green Turtle Bay. I hope to finally get to the gym and clean the boat before leaving early on Wednesday morning. I am a little unclear about the next two weeks. All I know is our next planned stop is Joe Wheeler State Park in Alabama. More later.
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