Day 29, On the Move again, To Goose Pond

• Image 1 Nuclear plant constructed in 1974, never completed, never opened, stands vacant today

• Image 2 Racoon Mountain Lake 1,100 ft above the river. Water pumped to lake from river in slack KW demand time and released back to turbines in high KW demand time.

We rode bicycles around town most of our last day in Chattanooga. Picked up a few provisions at a local grocery store, carried them back to the boat in the bicycle basket which works out well. We had lunch at the “Southern Star” which we found by chance since it is where locals dine to a great menu. The place was packed with locals. With the threat of severe weather we chose to dine on board, capitalizing on all of the doggie bags we have from the Chattanooga restaurants frequented recently.

Another retrofitted shrimp boat arrived at the dock around 4:00 PM. Actually pretty cool looking converted boats for recreational use. Certainly bulletproof and seaworthy, had a single Detroit 6-71n for power.

Our last day and night in Chattanooga was showers, sun, showers, sun until evening when it really cut loose. There were tornado warnings a few miles above us.
We departed Chattanooga at 8:00 AM eastern daylight time to drizzles which cleared off around 9:00 . We crossed the central time zone around noon, gained an hour and arrived Goose Pond Marina around 4:00 PM.

The Tennessee River is different from the Mississippi in there are no wing dams, very few buoys and the river is deep (often 65-105’), commercial activity and barges are minimal. Also you wouldn’t know this was Saturday by the pleasure boats- there weren’t any! I like traveling this river.

We’re are staying at Goose Lake again on the trip back down the Tennessee– the restaurant is open – and we’ve been invited to join 2-3 other couples doing the loop . Allen & Gayle (From Canada) aboard Falkor (36’ Grand Banks) are on their 3rd loop trip. Also at dinner were Rick & Betsy aboard Rick & Roll (27’ Glacier Bay). Dinner was very good and I passed up dessert – very unusual for me but I’ve found this is not going to be any easy trip to continue to fit into my jeans. (Weight Watches end of trip).

We will decide in the AM whether to stay here another day or move on to Alred Marina in Guntersville. Our replacement circuit breaker for the HW heater is suppose to be ready for pick up at Alred and there is a Verizon store in Guntersville that we would like to visit for a new air card.