On November 4th we left Mel’s River Dock with me grumbling about my cold breakfast. The next typical stop would have been Alton at 32 n/m away and with no locks, it would have been a relatively easy run. However, there was a country music festival that Kathy and Matt’s niece was attending so we wound up making it a two-day trip. (We are glad we did because Alton’s pump out* station was shut down for the season, but Grafton’s was still working.) Thankfully it was starting to warm up outside.
The scenery became a bit more, well, scenic:
Grafton is an interesting river town. They have self-proclaimed themselves as “the Key West of the Midwest” for the ratio of bars to people, I guess. The economy of the town seems to be dependent on the large marina there. St. Louis basically has no marina’s as it is a hub of commercial barge activity. From what we heard the barge companies have fought every attempt to put in a big marina for pleasure boats like you’d find in Chicago. I can’t blame them. From what we experienced going by St. Louis, it would be like putting a general aviation FBO (fixed based operator) at O’Hare airport. Not a great idea to mix small general aviation planes with the "big iron" passenger/cargo jets.
Grafton’s fuel dock wasn’t operational, but the bathroom, showers and laundry were working so we took showers, and I did two loads of laundry.
Grafton's Marina:
With no other place to go, the St. Louis pleasure boat crowd goes to Graton and Alton, and the bars follow. We “mooched” around Graton and watched a bit of country rock. I was hoping for some Blue Grass bands, but the invitees to perform were geared more to the “whoop and holler” crowd instead of the Milk Carton Kids or Billy Strings recommended by my friend, Blue Grass aficionado, Matt Costigan (who got me to see Bill Monroe, Steve Goodman and Earl Scruggs back in the day.)
Nancy:
Sites:
Nancy and Kathy went up the ski lift and caught a nice shot:
At about 8:00 pm the boat across the dock, directly in front
of our bow with its stern and four huge speakers facing us started blasting
hip-hop. We were not amused. I was not allowed to ask them to “cool it”
but mercifully someone else must have complained and they shut off the music about
forty-five minutes later. (Earlier in
the day they were partying and watching the Missouri football game and one guy
was leaning against our boat. Also not
cool, but I let it go.)
On November 5th, after pumping out, we headed out of Grafton and .5 n/m later we were on the Mississippi River! The Big Muddy!
We did the short run down to Alton uneventfully and we took on 57 gallons of fuel. Unfortunately, the Alton Marina has covered docks, so our Starlink satellite internet was unable to connect to satellites. I know, “first world” problem. Good news is that it was warm enough that we could put away the space heater.
We did get serenaded by a bag piper on the dock:
Kathy and Matt of KatMat and Nancy and I then walked into Alton for dinner. Our first stop was at Morrison’s Irish Pub where I finally got a pint of my favorite beer: Smithwick's Irish Ale.
Site of a Lincoln/Douglas Debate:
Our friends Mike and Randa Just had recommended The Old Bakery Beer Company restaurant which noted that the world's tallest man was from Alton. Kathy pictured to show scale:
Sunset over the river:
Although I’d take exception to one of the guidebook’s assessment that Alton is a “top five” destination on the G/L, we did enjoy both Graton and Alton. Very interesting river towns and we are glad we broke this run into two stops. (That said, I imagine that stopping in Grafton on a September weekend could be a “zoo” with all the party boats.)
Dave
*Our “human waste” is stored in what is called a holding tank. We have an indicator light that lets us know how full the tank is at any given time. Green, yellow, red. We were in the yellow and the next opportunity to pump out was not for a week. It would have been a close call to make it that long.
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