Tuesday, July 31 ~ LaCrosse!!!

Dave and Tony started up the engines at 6:45 this morning, eager to make it the WHOLE way to LaCrosse, Wisconsin.  Traveled 110 miles in 13 hours, and finally made it to Pettibone Boat Club, in LaCrosse, where they had their live Tuesday night music . . . what a great way to end a beautiful day on the river (high 80's and low humidity)!

I'm getting ahead of myself, as it was an interesting cruise to get to this point.  Let me back up a little:

Started this morning with some very interesting birds lining up for ? (their breakfast, perhaps?).

After that, Krystina needed to get a little exercise . . . so out on her jet ski she went!

Not sure who's getting the workout . . . the jet-ski or Krystina? :)

After some fun in the water, we came to Marquette, Iowa.  We often stayed in Prairie du Chien on many boat trips in previous years, which is the town in Wisconsin, across from Marquette. 

Again, if you're interested in gambling, you get to go out on the boat in Iowa! :)

At times the river was soooo wide . . .

and at other times, a small channel, like this one looking back at Lansing, Iowa. 

Shortly after Lansing, we came across this sign (sorry about the blurriness . . . Dave was tearing up the river to make waves for Tony to jump with the jet ski) :)

For those of you that are boaters and have seen this sign, it's a new one that shows the borders of Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin  . . . wow, we certainly are getting close to the end of this adventure. 

And when I use the term "adventure", that's what I mean, as when we pushed out of Lock #8, the Coast Guard announced a tow with 15 barges was blocking the channel just south of Brownsville (which was about 15 minutes from our destination of Pettibone in LaCrosse). 

We chatted with some fisherman to see if there was anyway they could check the depth of the river on the east shore to see if there was enough water for us to get through.

Unfortunately the fisherman didn't even have enough water.  So, we floated south for a little bit and began to get the anchor ready, when we saw another tow coming to begin to take the barges apart.  After a short while, the one barge that was removed was all we needed to create a pathway to continue northbound . . . however, now Captain Dave just needed to "thread the needle" :)

We had to leave the defined river channel and enter unknown depths of water to attempt to go around the barges.  An additional concern was since the barges were blocking the main river channel, there was a lot of current coming around the barges . . . and that current was VERY strong!  Dave called the captain of the tow and he said we wouldn't be in his way, but he couldn't advise us as to what to do because of the swift current.  So, we eased our way to the gap and . . .

with a little throttle and careful negotiating of the current . . .

. . . we were successful!!!  Captain Dave only said, "Beer me!" after that!!! :)

Here are the two tows removing the puzzle piece :)

As we looked behind us, we thanked the good Lord that we made it safe and sound :)

A little music and a cocktail at Pettibone's Tikki Bar was the way to end the day! :)