Captain's Log: We're On a Mission From God

Stinkpot on the Joliet wall

Did we really stay for three nights? Yes. Yes we did.

The setting: Joliet, Illinois! The humble burg where ‘Joliet’ Jake Blues was released from prison at the beginning of The Blues Brothers movie. The actual prison where James Belushi’s character played the tin cup was closed years ago, but we couldn’t help enjoying quotes from it during our stay. How did we get there? See? Now there’s a story.

Loyal readers of the Captain’s Log will remember that my most recent entry had us tied up on Sunday, August 31 in St. Joseph, Michigan. This free city bulkhead/dock on the St. Joseph River is a charming place to stop in settled weather, though I imagine that westerlies could bring in a rather nasty, bouncy seiche. This turned out to be a wonderful stop. Once settled in we took position on our aft deck to watch a huge laker, the Manitowoc, turn in the nearby turning basin come through the nearby drawbridge, and pick her way through the ridiculously thick and often dumb holiday weekend boat traffic. I mean we actually witnessed a pontoon boat full of people sitting in the fairway in front of the massive ship taking pictures. They were a single engine failure away from becoming a holiday statistic. I’m sure alcohol was not involved.

After the “show,” we enjoyed dinner at the Silver Harbor Brewing Company, which was quite good, and then kicked about town for a little while. We had been lamenting that we were out of fruit on the boat, and, as if by magic, a beautiful apple tree appeared on the street next to a children’s museum. We may have borrowed a few more than we could eat in the moment. I’m still not sure what variety of apple they were, but they tasted absolutely…umm…free! We made our way back to the boat to enjoy some time taking in the scene and the breezes from Stinkpot’s covered sundeck.

About an hour before sunset, we heard a community wind band striking up in the nearby park. Somehow, that is exactly the kind of atmosphere that makes us want ice cream. Our intention was to go to one of the nearby ice cream stands, grab a cone, and come back to listen to the music. That was optimistic. There are three main options for bliss in a cone in the downtown area, and two of them had lines stretching well over a block down the street—the third didn’t have any flavors we appreciated. While we both love ice cream, an hour or more in line for it is not an option for either of us. We trudged around a bit more in search of our quarry and ultimately found a convenience store where we bought a couple cartons of really good ice cream. We arrived by the park just as the concert was ending, and decided to enjoy our treat on the boat. Ice cream on the aft deck with the sun setting is hard to beat.

Monday morning we got underway to head west across the southern end of Lake Michigan (and change timezones to Central) to Hammond Marina in Hammond, Indiana—just south of Chicago, Illinois. We were hoping to meet up with an old friend there. As it turned out, he was away on business, so we consoled ourselves by enjoying an inexpensive marina stay and some delectable Mexican fare at Chela’s Birria Tacos, about a mile’s walk from the marina (not counting the half-mile of docks we needed to transit just to get to land). This restaurant put out first-rate, authentic fare. Our server didn’t even speak English—there was a lot of pointing and gesticulating while ordering—but she was persistent if personable, and the food was amazing. Stacey got the quesatacos with consomme—long cooked beef (think pot roast) in a crunchy-fried tortilla with cheese and served with a beef broth for dipping. I had the chicken fajitas, which was good, but Stacey’s quesatacos left us both speechless.

Returning to the boat, we rested for a little while, and then I filled our water tank in preparation for our early morning scoot into the Calumet River, leaving Lake Michigan behind.

Weather, nights, and even some days had been getting cooler, and the onset of autumn means that Lake Michigan becomes less dependable—to wit, I hear there were 11–12-foot waves on the lake Friday.

Tuesday, we rose with the dawn, dropped lines, and made our way into the river, just over the Illinois border, about ½ mile to the north. We were immediately confronted with needing to get through drawbridges, and even a few lower fixed bridges, which made Stacey start to wonder if we should drop our hinged mast to get under the infamous 19.7-foot railroad bridge in Lemont. That bridge is the lowest point on the entire Great Loop route, and it’s the bridge that governs how tall a loopable vessel can be. Stacey correctly observed that our mast was taller than our davit (our second tallest structure). The mast can be laid down in about 10 minutes with a few tools. The davit cannot. After a few minutes of thought and study of our “profile,” I judged her concerns to be valid. I gathered up the needed tools and down the mast came while Stacey managed the helm station.

Just exactly how tall are we?

We had a lovely cruise down the rivers as the Calumet gave way to the Little Calumet and ultimately deposited us into the middle of a line of loopers on the Chicago Sanitary Canal. No sooner did we make the turn onto the canal when our VHF radio crackled to life with a hail from M/Y Francesca—a boat neighbor from our time in Sanford, Florida. After a very short chat, we agreed to have a proper greeting on the wall in Joliet, where we were all bound.

To bring my bridge clearance narrative full circle, we did make it under Lemont’s low bridge by what appeared to be about a foot, which means laying the mast down was absolutely the right call. We dodged towboats and barges through the canal and finally found ourselves coming alongside the free wall in Joliet, where all the boats in our ad hoc fleet pulled up for the night.

The Joliet Town Dock has power that is free for the use of passing boaters, so we were pleased to plug in and enjoy the comforts of “land” for a little while. We greeted our Sanford friends, Chuck and Margaret, rested on the aft deck for a little while, and then took to our feet in search of nourishment. Stacey noted a Korean joint, Yura Nuna, that had 4.7 stars on Google and was known for good “sweet potato noodle bowls.” I will state here, unequivocally, their Google rating was well deserved. We each had a bowl, and Stacey enjoyed her first bubble tea.

Wednesday morning came entirely too soon, and after the previous day’s excitement, I proclaimed that another day on this powered wall felt just fine to me. Stacey immediately agreed, so I scratched a few maintenance items off my list, including rewiring and adding a relay to our washdown pump so it wouldn’t dim the lights on the boat and kill our VHF radios while we were washing down our anchor and chain. Late morning, Stacey proclaimed she felt like she was coming down with a cold and wanted to cure it with soup. She, again, found a nearby cafe called Jitters that was known for soups and sandwiches, so we sent off in search of a hot bowl of comfort—and we found it in the form of potato soup for Stacey and a “chicken parm salad” for me.

As we sat in the warm embrace of the cafe, Stacey’s iPhone lit up with a message from Mark, a local who had just started following us on Facebook. Not sure how people find us like that, but he asked if he could help us with transportation for errands—an offer we quickly accepted. I am in need of some “boat wire” to rewire our galley, and there was what looked to be a chandlery nearby. We finished up our lunch and by the time we arrived back at the dock, it was just starting to spit rain. Mark was already there waiting for us. After a momentary “getting to know you” session and a quick tour of Stinkpot, we piled into Mark’s truck and were off.

The “Joliet Boat Store” turned out to be offices for a company that service towboats (tugs), not a place to get parts. Mark suggested there was another option nearby, Heritage Marine, which was a boat repair company. They didn’t have my wire, but they did have the impeller I needed to commission our dinghy motor. Part in hand and happy with our good fortune, we all jumped back in the truck and Mark returned us to the boat where I did some computer work for a couple hours, planning the next few legs of our journey south.

As evening approached, our thoughts turned once again to our stomachs. I had my eye on a soul food restaurant about a mile away. It was chilly and had been spitting rain on and off all afternoon, but we deemed it an acceptable risk and pulled on our walking shoes. Arriving at All That and a Touch of Soul, we were taken in by the smells immediately. Without waxing philosophical about the Philly jerk chicken and cheese sub Stacey ordered or the smothered pork chops I selected with sides of macaroni and cheese and collards, or even the sample of the braised oxtail that the chef dropped by our table for us to sample, let me just say that I have seldom had a dining experience that was such a perfect combination of gritty, local joint and “why don’t you just roll that whole pot over here for a little while.” I will be savoring that meal in my dreams for weeks to come.

Check paid and our trotters back on the ground, we exited the restaurant into unrelenting pouring rain. Stacey’s apparel revealed her forethought of this situation, but mine, alas, did not. Our quayside arrival had her mildly damp and me resembling a drowned rat. I changed into my pajamas, and we entertained ourselves with some of our St. Joseph’s ice cream haul before turning in for the night.

Thursday morning we again rose with the sun. I began considering preparing us to get underway, but I had one issue nagging me. In studying the charts of the Illinois River which lay before us, I realized that Joliet’s free wall was likely to be our last real connection to land for a little while. Despite Tuesday’s showers, moderate localized drought conditions had depths on the river down a foot or two from normal, and a dearth of ports that had sufficient depth for the new Stinkpot’s deeper keel would necessarily keep us from stepping off for some time. It sure would be nice if our dinghy was usable, since I ostensibly had the missing part in hand to make it so. I proclaimed that we should stay another night so I could do exactly that. Not sensing any objection to that plan, that’s exactly what we did. I spent the day tearing down the 15-horsepower Mercury: draining the lower unit, removing the lower unit, replacing the impeller (which I needed to cut off the shaft), reattaching the lower unit, filling the lower unit with new gear oil, and, finally, changing the oil and filter on the engine itself. It was a long day’s work, but it got done, and at the end of the day, I was rewarded by one of our legendary “app walks.”

As long as Stacey and I have been together, we have periodically done these walks. We pick an area with restaurants we want to try and walk to two or three different places to eat only appetizers. You can tell a lot about a joint by its appetizers. This time we enjoyed average bar snacks and an RC Cola at the Chicago Street Pub and stuffed mushrooms and a “Caprese Panini” (chicken, tomato, mozzarella, and pesto) sandwich at the more upscale Juliet’s Tavern. The former had very personable staff and forgettable food while at the latter, the opposite was true. Ultimately satisfied, we trundled back to the boat in the warming sunshine and began making our preparations for a dawn departure.

With the rising sun Friday, September 5, we began singling up our lines and disconnecting from power. At 7:44AM CDT I started the engines, and we were underway. We locked through Brandon Road, Dresden, and Marseilles Locks and ultimately had the anchor down at the Buffalo Rock State Park anchorage last night around 7PM local time—a long day of cruising, rewarded by some home cooking at anchor at the foot of a beautiful, cliff-rimmed oxbow anchorage. We turned in soon after the dishes were done.

Today did not start off well. During my engine room checks, I found fuel pooled under the starboard engine, blessedly retained inside a fiberglass sump. After cleaning it up with sorbents and checking for loose fuel line connections, I set to finding the source. I noticed some fuel in and around the secondary filters, so I changed them (not done during the commissioning). I’m hoping that was all it was. I didn’t have that all done and the fuel systems bled of air until nearly 11AM. In looking at our itinerary, I made the painful decision to remain here another night. We have a long run ahead of us to get to a reasonable anchorage and prefer to not run unfamiliar waters in the dark. This is a beautiful spot. We’ll sit right here and enjoy some leftovers aboard while I get other work done. Tomorrow we’ll weigh anchor with the dawn and make some miles, hopefully without a fuel leak.