Hardin Illinois to Grafton IL - with a little detour to Port Charles Missouri


Today was another beautiful day on the river.  We left Mel's dock at 7am by ourselves to take a peaceful slow cruise down the rest of the Illinois River.   It turns out that when looping one wakes up early naturally and gets tired by 8pm.  Exhausted actually.   
Today was eventful.   We made it to the Mississippi River!   We had used quite a bit (more than half) of our 405 gallons during our journey through Illinois.   We didn't buy fuel in Illinois because it's over $5 a gallon for diesel.  We paid $4.14 in Indiana and $3.99 today in Port Charles MO.   Bargain!  
Today we arrived in Grafton borrowed a loaner car in the marina and drove 20 miles to Walmart to restock on groceries and supplies.  We are now fully stocked and fully fueled.   
This is good because after tomorrow we won't have so much as a dock to tie to for 240 miles.    There will be some places to tuck our boat into out of the main channel of the Mississippi but we will definitely be in current either way.  

Grafton (and others down in this part of the country) put roofs over their slips to break up the sun and make things tolerable.  We are on the end of a dock so we don't have a cover.  (Not that it's needed this time of year). 
Forecast is for one more amazing weather day followed by a full week of rainy cold days again.   We will continue transit on these days as necessary...  Cold here is relative.  

We hope to be down into Kentucky before Saturday when temps really fall again.  

Every day we fix things.   Every day something else breaks.   I must say a few things we fixed, however, have greatly improved convenience.  Little things like a single handle kitchen faucet where you don't have to twist knobs with soapy hands are huge steps up.   We bought a 240c 50amp power cord that was delivered back at Ivy Club in Peoria.  Plugging in one cable and pulling one cable off the boat to the stand is so much better than a pair of big cables.  I'd we someday need to hook up grester than 50ft away we have the cable now... But so far not necessary.   
There was a 'witches' festival here in Grafton today.  Pretty much a Halloween party for thousands of people.  Roads were packed and so were the entertainment establishments.   We ate on the boat... But we did walk through town and see some of the sites.   They have some family sawmills here that cut rough live edge panels that are gorgeous.  We are talking HUGE trees.    Someday I think I'll make a table from something like this.  Beautiful stuff. 
That's about it for today.   Tomorrow our goal is to make it through two locks (including the busiest lock in the US) and pass the St Louis arch!   (We intend to take pictures.). 

Lots of cool cars here today also...

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