Ottawa, IL

Traveled with Spirt of Whitby from Joliet to Ottawa. We had to wait until 10 am to leave the wall and go through the Brandon Road lock.  We locked through with six barges and the Spirit of Whitby.

We had to wait for this tow to get into the lock before they called us to untie from the wall and head down.

 Shortly after leaving the lock we had to overtake our first tow.  The tow captains are very appreciative it if you radio them before passing.

The Des Plaines river ended shortly after noon and we were on the Illinois river.  We will be on here until we meet the Mississippi at Grafton, Illinois.  While there was still some industry there was an overwhelming amount of trees.  Many with their lower roots exposed due to erosion of the river.

We thought Jack, Owen and Will would like this old Caboose.

At the Dresden lock, our first lock on the Illinois had a nice chat with the lock attendant and found out that while the river does freeze over the tows are able to break the ice and keep running all year long.  He did say that the upper Mississippi locks have to close because the ice is too thick for the tows to break.

We arrived in Ottawa at a free town dock, Spirit of Whitby tied up right behind us.  Getting in late we decided to just hang out at the boat and tour the town the next day and take advantage of the free dock for a second night.  The Fox River joined the Illinois river right where we were tied up.  This is the same Fox River we we started boating on further up north  in 1969.

Another old Caboose for the grand son's we found on the bike ride.

The town of Ottawa has a nice visitors center and quite a bit of history.  It was the site of the first Lincoln Douglas debate and the Boy Scots were formed there.  We stocked up on groceries and took advantage of the ride back to the dock from the store.  The closet rod we had been using in the side cabin had broke a  few days ago and we decided to take a ride to Wal Mart to get a replacement.  What we didn't know was that the last half of the way there would be up hill and the side walk would end just as we had to cross I 80.  Needless to say we got some good exercise. Later in the evening two other Looper boats tied up in front of us, they had to raft as the dock is only 100' long.

John & Mary