Thursday, August 30, 2012

We left DuSable Harbor Marina and traveled one mile in rockin' and rollin' Lake Michigan around Navy Pier into the Chicago Harbor Lock.  We were required to don life jackets before we could enter the lock -- this was 116th lock in this adventure and the first time we were required to wear life jackets.  The water lowered about 2 feet and we were officially in the Chicago River.

There are 23 bridges through the City of Chicago proper but many, many more as we continued south -- I stopped counting at 40.  The river forms a "Y" and we continued on the main south branch which goes through the industrial section of Chicago and then becomes the Sanitary and Ship Canal.  Lots of warning signs posted along this area  which is highly toxic and the water turns odd colors -- like black, with bubbles at the surface -- and smells strangely.   We traveled through the electric fish barrier which is designed to prevent the invasive Asian Carp from going into the Great Lakes.

The scenery was industrial and there were many tug boats and barges along the way both coming and going.  We locked through the Lockport Lock after a 30-minute wait for commercial traffic.  These locks use floating bollards to tie up -- new to us.  It was 89 degrees and hot and we locked through the Brandon Lock after a two-hour wait. We had nowhere to tie up for the wait and the Captain saw an abandoned tug boat and we tied to it.

Commercial traffic takes precedence over pleasure boaters.  We arrived at our destination, Harborside Marina in Wilmington, IL.  I had hoped to do some laundry there, but learned as we were traveling that one of the transients before us decided to dye rugs in their equipment, thus green dye ruined both the washer and the dryer, so I was out of luck. It was just as well, because we had traveled 53 miles and were en route 11-1/2 hours, including waiting for the locks -- we just wanted to eat dinner, clean up and go to bed..  Here are a few photos:

Our last mile on Lake Michigan -- and it was rockin' and rollin'

Exiting the Chicago Harbor Lock into the Chicago River

These river locks use floating bollards to tie up

Brandon Road Lock

Harborside Marina, Wilmington, IL the water is covered with some kind of green vegetation -- there are mostly houseboats docked here

Read this about the Sanitary Canal

Electric Fish Barrier Sanitary Canal

Nowhere for us to tie up and wait for lockage -- tied up to an abandoned tugboat