By Bob Van Leer

  In June and July, grandsons Rob and Chris Johnson, 19 and 17, respectively, and I set off on a Tom Sawyer-Huckleberry Finn-type trip but with the use of modern technology.

We trailered my 21-ft. Rogue River fishing boat back to the United States mid-south and ran almost 600 miles on two southern rivers, the Tennessee and the Cumberland.

   Planning began months before. Bill McNair's Jerry's Marine built the Boat for me several years ago. On Bill's advice, the outboard jet unit was taken off for the trip and replaced with a propeller. Shallow water was not going to be a problem but fueling up the boat was.

TAKE OFF DAY

by Bob Van Leer 

  Sunday morning was take off day. Sam took us out to the marina and we fired up the engine for the start of the trip. We had never been through a lock in a dam and our introduction was early.

  Just a few hundred yards below the marina was Chickamauga Dam with the busiest lock on the whole river system. This was the first of seven dams we would go through.

   We had never been through a lock before and really didn't want to learn in a lock crowded with other boats. Fortunately for us, boaters didn't appear to be early Sunday risers. We left at 9:30 a.m. and we were the only boat in the lock.

THE SECOND DAY WE RAN 96 MILES

  Six miles below the marina we locked through Nickajack dam, a 39 feet drop, and another eight miles downstream we crossed from Tennessee into Alabama.

  In another 16 miles we passed by the Bellefonte nuclear power plant. Construction started in 1974 but was never finished. This is TVA country (Tennessee Valley Authority), similar to Bonneville Power Administration (BPA) in the northwest. And TVA is in trouble also, some of it caused by a failed nuclear power program similar to BPA.

RIVER TURNS NORTH

by Bob Van Leer

  We continued west on the Tennessee river to Pickwick Lake. Here is where the Tennessee-Tombigbee waterway joins the Tennessee. We stopped at a marina in Iuka, Mississippi for fuel, our only stop in that state.

  From where we started, east of Chattanooga, the Tennessee River river runs southwest to Gunterville Dam in Alabama. From there, the river runs almost due west across northern Alabama to Mississippi. There the river changes course and runs almost due north across Tennessee and across Kentucky to the Ohio River, the border with Illinois.

   We crossed into Tennessee and stopped for the night at Pickwick State Park, another complex run by a state, this time by the state of Tennessee.

  Friday, June 28, we were locked through Pickwick Dam, the last dam before Kentucky Dam which is almost down to the Ohio River. Through six locks we have now dropped a total of 276 feet from our starting point. This is the largest lock we went through, 110 feet wide and 1000 feet long, with a lift of 55 feet - and our 21 feet long boat was the only one in the lock.

BELOW PICKWICK DAM WE STOPPED AT SHILOH NATIONAL MILITARY PARK.

by Bob Van Leer

  The battle of Shiloh was fought April 6-7, 1862. More than 103,000 Union and Confederate soldiers fought in the battle. Casualties were almost 24,000 killed, wounded and missing. A total of 3482 were listed as killed and 16,420 wounded. This was almost 22% of the men present for duty both days.

  Shiloh was the key battle in the drive by Gen. U. S. Grant that continued down the Mississippi River and cut the south in half. Pittsburg Landing on the Tennessee River was key to getting reinforcements to Grant the night of the battle. The reinforcements turned the tide giving victory to Grant. Curiously, the landing site, which is in the park, no longer exists. We landed there, but had to scramble up rock rip-rap to get to the park.

   Our day's run was 92 miles. We stayed at Cuba Landing Marina, Tennessee, 356 miles from our starting point. With the experience we have had, everything goes smoothly. Our boat and motor ran perfectly, we couldn't have asked for any better performance.

   The next day we ran another 92 miles to Kentucky Dam, just upstream from the Ohio River. We arrived at the Kentucky Dam Marina before noon. It was blistering hot, but a guide was available so we went fishing on Kentucky Lake.

THE CUMBERLAND COURSE IS SOUTH AND THEN SOUTHEAST FROM THE OHIO

by Bob Van Leer

  The two rivers parallel each other for about 40 miles south and are up to eight miles apart making a huge recreation area called Land Between the Lakes.

  We headed across the five-mile long Barkley Canal and turned south across Kentucky on the Cumberland. Our run from that day will be about 50 miles, an easy day.

  Eight miles upstream from the canal is the Kentucky State Penitentiary, locally known as "The Castle on the Cumberland". It is built in the style of an English castle and was completed in 1888. It is the only Kentucky maximum security prison and more than 160 inmates have died in its electric chair.

ON TO ST. LOUIS

  We headed northwest to St. Louis where we spent a couple of days visiting my sisters and families, Bud and June Pallardy and Lou and Ruth Chiodini. We spent the Fourth of July with them and the next day headed for home.

  On the return trip we stayed on I-70 to Reno. Our first night out we stopped at Russell, Kansas, former Sen. Bob Dole's home town. Local residents said he still has a house in Russell which he stays in when campaigning in Kansas. But none of them expected him to move back if he loses his bid for the presidency.