Home at last

Sorry; I was just too bushed to finish the story last night.

Yesterday morning we left the public dock at Clarksville about 6:45 in dense fog, carefully making our way up river on the lookout for the Clarksville marina and our next fuel stop. It was farther than we had thought, and we arrived to find no one anywhere around. The call box was ineffective. I finally went up the hill to the house where the owners live, and the proprietor agreed to sell us some gasoline. With full tanks, we left the marina headed for our next scheduled adventure, the Cheatham lock. We called ahead and were assured that the lock operator would help us with our first locking experience. It requires a good bit of hustling about, donning the requisite life jackets, putting out the fenders on the side of the boat next to the lock walls, and lassoing the floating bollard that rises with the water. All went as smoothly as we could have hoped. Soon we were lifted several feet into Cheatham Reservoir and were on our way to Ashland City.

It was beautiful cruising from this point all the way home, much of it from the flybridge in perfect September weather. The trip took us through some the mid-state's most beautiful country, past stately homes and small riverside cottages, through downtown Nashville, past LP Field and the Riverfront, around Bell's Bend and Neely's Bend and Pennington Bend and MetroCenter, past Shelby Park and Peeler Park, Gaylord Springs and Hermitage golf courses, the General Jackson and the Music City Queen, past Anderson's Bluff, through the Old Hickory lock and into Old Hickory Lake, and finally to Creekwood Marina in Hendersonville, arriving at 7:45 p.m., just as the last light of day was fast fading.

Thus ended a never-to-be-forgotten adventure, whose memories will remain with Daniel and me always. And now begins a new chapter in the life of Blue Heaven, a tough old boat we will try to return to her former glory.

Four days, more than 250 miles of cruising (plus at least 20 miles of back-tracking), and times of total relaxation puctuated by a few minutes of stark terror. Some of my take-aways from this experience are these:

• Time spent with family and friends is the most precious investment we can make.
• We live in an exceptional part of God's world, filled with natural beauty. We need to take care of it so that our grandchildren's grandchildren can enjoy it, too.
• There are more good, kind-hearted, helpful, Christ-like people out there than you think. We met several of them along our way.

There are too many great photos to place on this blog, but you can see the album at a Picasa site I will place here later today.