Modern Life on the Mississippi North of St Louis

 

by Pa Rock

Weary Road Warrior

It was raining when our train reached Kansas City shortly after 9:00 p.m. last night, but Tim was there waiting patiently and managed to get me and my baggage to the car without dealing with much of the rain.  The nearly five-hour drive home today occurred without incident, though I did stop at the Amish cheese store in Osceola, and bought some treats for my good neighbor Rex, and his wife, in partial repayment for his bush-hogging work at my farm a couple of weeks ago - hard work for which he refused to take payment.  Rex and his wife are the best neighbors ever!

My second stop was a shopping rampage through the Springfield Costco, a restocking effort that was long overdue.

I wanted to conclude my Chicago adventure by relating some things I saw from the train window late yesterday evening as we crossed the Mississippi River going from Illinois to Ft. Madison, Iowa.  I had a window seat that was facing downstream as we slowed and carefully crossed the Big River at one of its wider points.  

(The river lock had been open to allow for a barge to get through during the train ride to Chicago last week, and it had taken quite a while to get the lock closed so that we could cross.  This time the lock was closed when we got there and there were no delays.)

Our timing on yesterday's rail journey was fortuitous because just as we started crossing I saw a small fishing boat a few feet beyond the railroad bridge.  (It didn't appear to be moving with the current, so it was likely moored to the bridge in some manner).  But I know this - it was a great fishing spot!  The boat had two adult men sitting on the two rear bench seats, and a young boy (around 12 or so) in the front with his line in the water.  Just as we were passing the youngster hooked a large fish, somewhere in the neighborhood of ten pounds) and was busy pulling it out of the water.  It had the flat shape of a bass or a crappie, but I'm not a fishologist so I have no idea what he had actually caught - other than it was a fighter, and so was the kid!

I hope it was the kid's birthday or some significant date that he will remember fifty years from now when he is nosing through cyber space and comes across this posting - and he will know that he and his big fish caught the attention of an old man on a train!  Good work, kid!

A speedboat darted under the bridge heading downstream at about the midpoint of the bridge.  It was tearing up the river and the young man at the controls was having a grand time.  As he ripped beneath us, I thought of Huck and Jim on their raft - and how amazed they would be at a speedboat!  

(There is a very nice marina on the Ft. Dodge side of the river, but I noticed both times I crossed that there were very few boats in the relatively new facility.  It is a beautiful spot just waiting for the hordes of tourists who will inevitably show with their water-going crotch-rockets that sound like chainsaws - and ruin the spot for the rest of civilization!)

There was another small fishing boat on the Iowa side of the Mississippi River, not too far out from the marina.  It had what appeared to be two men sitting next to each other in the back of the craft, and neither seemed to be fishing.  That boat, too, was stationary and may have been moored to the railroad bridge.

And the water looked clean enough to swim in.

That's the state of the Mississippi River north of St. Louis before it is joined by the Missouri River, the Ohio River, and all of their attendant barge traffic and pollution.  The northern Mississippi is a whole different river than the one most of us know.  Huck and Jim would like it up there!