This was my third time down the river, having gone once in September, 2003, and again in August, 2005. The first two trips were made with a good friend, Foster Harness. Unfortunately, Foster is not around to make any more river trips. I think he must have been looking down on us.
There were five of us in two boats. In my boat was my son, Dan,and a good friend, R.B. In the other boat was my brother, Milt, and his friend, Bill. Dan was not going to be able to meet up with us until the next day. We left last Wednesday, September 26, from Bluff Landing which is east of Broken Arrow about 10 miles on 71st Street. Both times before, we left from this landing so that we could say we went through every lock on the Arkansas River.
We got off to a somewhat late start so, after cruising all day, we decided to spend the night at Applegate Marina on Kerr Reservoir near Sallisaw. The operator of the marina was a most gracious man who offered to let us camp for the evening in his pavilion. We had running water, electricity, and a bathroom. It just doesn't get much better than that!
On Thursday, we cruised all day and went through several locks. We decided to quit early, about 2:30, and found a place at Aux Arc Park near Ozark, Arkansas. Again, we had water and electricity, along with a bath house which was a good 200 yard hike down the road. Dan showed up with my truck and the boat trailer, which we left parked there for Louise and Teresa to pick up the following day.
To explain this a little better, let me stop here and tell you what our plan was. The five guys were going to travel all the way to Greenville, MS. My wife, Louise, and R.B.'s wife, Teresa, were going to leave home on Friday, pick up my truck and trailer wherever Dan left it, and then meet us in Little Rock on Friday evening. On Saturday morning, the wives would travel to Greenville, MS, where we would meet and trailer the boats back to Oklahoma.
On Friday morning, the crew got up and headed downriver again. The first stretch was Lake Dardanelle, a run of 51 miles. At 30mph, that took a while. Then, when we got to Dardanelle Lock, we ran into our first obstruction. A barge tow had just started locking through and we had to wait about 2 1/2 hours to get through the lock. This put us really behind schedule, since we were to meet the wives in Little Rock.
Finally, about 6:30 pm, we got to Rock Harbor Marina in Little Rock, and met up with the women, who had already gotten us checked in to their B&B. We did go out to a restaurant to eat that night but the food wasn't a bit better than R.B. had been preparing on the river bank.
Saturday morning we said goodbye to the women and headed out again. There was a lot of fog early so we didn't get a really early start. We had a 13 mile run to the next lock where things really went sour. We were behind a barge tow going downstream and, when he was finished, they locked through another barge tow heading upstream. I don't remember how long we waited there (mostly because I consumed a large amount of whiskey) but it was a long time.
We wound up spending the night just below the Emmett Sanders Lock, No. 4, on a sand bar. This was at Mile 66 and I had hoped to get to Mile 10, so we were behind schedule about 56 miles. Sunday morning, everyone was ready to get home. Although nothing was said, all the gear was packed and loaded in the boats by 7:30 am and we headed out again. We had 66 miles left on the Arkansas River and about 40 miles on the Mississippi to get to Greenville.
At least on Sunday, we caught the locks better! In fact, two of them were open when we got to them. We finally got to Greenville about 2:00 pm and rendezvoused with Teresa and Louise. Eight hours later, after a long drive, we got back home.
The burning question I ask myself is, would I do it again? At 72, my old bones don't take sleeping on the ground as well as they used to. I guess the answer is, we'll have to wait and see. We saw a lot of amazing sights along the way and got to spend some precious time with friends and relatives. All in all, it was an enjoyable trip. Here is a picture that Dan took that pretty well sums it up.
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