Ditto Landing to Joe Wheeler State Park - AGLCA Rendezvous

Monday, October 31 - Friday, November 3rd. Ditto Landing, Huntsville, AL. No Trick or Treaters this year. Although we loved the photos shared via texts, instagram, and FB of our family and friends.

Darth wanted to start the process of determining why the batteries seem to be losing wattage. With a battery tester in hand, and checking the boat’s Victron Energy battery monitor—it seems the batteries lifespan only held 3 years of the 3-5 year life expectancy.

There were no swear words heard…nearby.

And now the electric heater needed fixing. Yes—the $20 heater was fixed without purchasing any additional parts. Of course it was….its the challenge and a Castan thing.

Huntsville, AL has an abundance of bike paths. We rode 21 miles all together on mostly flat bike routes. A man told us we could cross the waterway and ride along a dike next to the river. He told us there were alligators in the woods so stay on the path. REALLY? Alligators??? Yes, apparently alligators were brought there in the 1930s-40s to help with beaver overpopulation. Not so good for beavers and other critters —but the alligators are still there thriving and multiplying.

The bike route next to the river.

No one was attacked while taking this photo.

Friday, November 3rd. We left Ditto for Joe Wheeler State Park to clean and prep the boat for a complimentery Vessel Safety Check and the Looper Crawl during the AGLCA Rendezvous.

The Vessel Safety Check was extremely helpful from Captain Jeff who is a USCG 100 ton Master Captain & USCG Aux. Vessel Examiner. He gave us helpful tips for keeping us safe. We passed the inspection and received the 2023 Vessel Safety Check sticker for the boat.

The Looper Crawls are held daily after the presentations—this allows folks to board and see all the different boats that participate in opening their vessels. We opened our boat on Tuesday, even though our boat is amoung the smaller boats that are traveling the loop, we had alot of interest and questions. It was also fun to board the larger boats and drool a little over the room they have.

I called our boat the baby boat as we were docked in between Christine-left (Kris and Rusty) and The Lower Place-right (Charlie and Robin)

This skeleton was on the Christine. When I asked if this was part of their Halloween decorations, Kris said oh no—this is our skeleton crew!

Joe Wheeler State Park is a beautiful location and we enjoyed sunny days during the rendezvous. It was followed by a downpour the last day.

Love this one—Sweet Dreams.

Our sweet friends Cheri and Pete. We would be saying goodbye for now to them as they attend family. Hopefully we will see them in the future along the way.

Cheri took this photo as we were leaving on Friday. A little drizzle after a week of sunshine.

Friday, November 10th. We left Joe Wheeler with several boats to lock through Wheeler and Wilson Locks. The locks are within 7 miles of eachother and the total distance we would be traveling was 18 miles for the day. The first lock was full and we rafted next to Mark and Jacque on Aurora. It was a first for all as normally we have been alone in locks & always next to the wall on our own bollard. We had no trouble dropping the 42’.

As we approached the Wilson lock, we found out we would be locking through with several boats that had left earlier in the morning. We had to wait for barges and idled near for about 2.5 hours. This was going to be an adventure for sure. I believe the count was 20 looper boats + 10 Bass boats that were in a tournament. We heard that the Bass tournament helped get us through the lock as the lockmasters had committed to locking them down so they could check in their catches for the day. I don’t know all the rules for Bass fishing tournaments but I do know its serious business for the participants.

Our boat was towards the back(blue arrow)—the Bass-’go fast’ boats were up front. We locked down almost 100’ in Wilson lock.

Another view showing the Bass-’go fast’ boats. We are under the blue arrow.

Our inside view—just beginning our 100’ drop.

Almost done….. its just so amazing how the lock system works.

We arrived at Florence Marina and were given a very quiet slip past the boat launch where the Bass boats congregate. Our friends Mark and Jacque shared that they were woken up at 6:00AM the following day with two Rap songs, a prayer and The Star Spangled Banner on a loud speaker. We slept through the show.

Our constant companion Mr. Heron at the end of our dock in Florence.

Monday, November 13. We left Florence and traveled 38 miles to Aqua Yacht Harbor Marina in Iuka, MS. We passed Grand Harbor where we stayed before our side trip to Chattanooga—early October. It was very exciting to be back on our way into new territory. Darth scheduled an oil change and ordered four house batteries to replace the batteries that have been losing wattage when anchored. The oil was changed yesterday afternoon and batteries arrive tomorrow.

Our next leg of the loop will take us down the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway to Mobile, AL —approximately 450 more miles of river cruising. We are looking forward to continuing our journey southbound.