Champ III: Going Places

The adventure starts here.

Aquarium Dock, Chattanooga, TN to Goose Pond Marina, Scottsboro, AL– October 24, 2013

We left Chattanooga at 8:00 eastern time.  The sky was overcast and the temps were in
the mid 40’s.  Some wind blowing but that is really not an issue on river travel. We did get some nice photos of the Chattanooga riverfront as we were departing.

Chattanooga was fun. They have a saltwater aquarium and a fresh water aquarium and we visited both.  There was a lot of walking as the exhibits start on the 4th floor and you walk your way down on ramps thru the various floor levels going from exhibit to exhibit.  We even saw some Macaw Parrots, a butterfly room and a screech owl. The turtles were interesting in that there were so many different types.  Several hands on exhibits were available including one with stingrays.

We also went to see an IMAX movie.  The movie was about the construction off the
trans Canada railroad.  It was started back in the 1850’s and it showed how some bad decisions were made on the route and what it really cost in terms of life and effort for those building the railroad.  The movie was really good with great visual effects and sounds.

We got the boost in boat speed on the river that we had hoped for.  For most of the morning we were able to run at 11.1 mph and made great time.  There were a few boats on the river but they were fishermen. We made great time to the Nickajack Lock just was west of Hales Bar Landing.  2 Pleasure craft were coming out of the lock as we approached and there no waiting, we drove right in.

The day did warm up some and we had mostly sunny skies so it just felt better because the day looked good. We did gain an hour when we went back into the Central Time Zone.  We had left Candy on Central Time because it was a short couple of days we were back in the Eastern Time Zone.

We arrived at Goose Pond Marina a little after 3:00.  This gave us time for some laundry, grocery shopping and going out to the local restaurant for dinner.  The marina itself did look different when we arrived because there were no boats at the transient dock and we had our choice of where to tie up. We did see one of the boats that had been in Chattanooga the first night we were there.  They are on their way home to Decatur Alabama, just a short ride for them.

The restaurant was not as crowded as last Saturday and the noise level was not quite as bad.  The acoustics in the place are terrible so when there are a lot of people there is
a lot of noise.