LaCrosse, WI to Andalusia, IL
226 Miles (871 Total)
The river is a great many things to a lot of different people. It’s a way to get large loads of coal up to poweplants, a place to spend an afternoon fishing near a shallow bank, a body of water to sail on during a windy afternoon, a place to hunt ducks in the reeds, a place to cool off in the summer heat, a place to watch a sunset from its banks, a place to watch bald eagles soar across the sky, and a place to think about all manner of things, both serious and ludicrous, happy and sad, contemplative and sorrowful.
But for me, it’s a place to mostly get hit in the face with wind, to curse at the dumb waves that roll over the front of the canoe and get me wet, a place to never be able to escape from the horrors of the sun, and a place to let my mind wander around in circles as my paddle makes the same swishing noise for hours on end.
It’s mediative, annoying, and surprisingly evil. It’s a sadistic kind of existence where you are fully aware that the thing you are doing is mostly a pointless and monotonous thing, but for some reason you can’t seem to stop doing it or really feel the desire to walk away from it anyway.
“My earplug got so far into my ear I had to use my tweezers to get it out,” Qball said one morning as we packed up camp.
The river to Qball, apparently, was a noisy and aggravating monster.
I asked, “Are you okay?”
“Yeah,” he said. “It came out eventually.”
The trains have been incredibly loud lately which is probably why the earplugs were jammed so far into his skull. Train tracks parallel both sides of the river the majority of the time, and the noise that the trains make as they come barreling through small residential areas is deafening. Conductors lay on the horns, producing the loudest “beeeeee beeeeee” sound ever heard in existence. This blaring ultrasonic vomit bounces off the water and then bounces off the other bank of the river, reverberating the obnoxious tone over and over again as the half mile long train follows the bank of the river, chugging along behind a thin barrier of trees.
Sometimes there are houses right near the tracks. They sit literally only a few feet away. I can’t imagine why anyone would choose to live in these places. I suppose water front property is worth the price of never having a good night’s rest, or perhaps these people are deaf or hard of hearing to begin with so it doesn’t matter much to them anyway. Still, the shaking alone from the passing trains would be enough to knock plates off shelves and shake the coffee right out of your mug in the morning. I just can’t understand having to deal with that everyday. I suppose you could just get used to it after awhile. It’s amazing what people will put up with.
The river is much wider now and is filled with islands. You have the main channel to follow but it’s been more fun taking the back sloughs that get you away from the big barges and recreational boaters.
The recreational boaters were out in force over the weekend in Dubuque, Iowa. They like to drive their large luxury cruisers through the channel and create massive 4 foot wakes. Many will wave to us in pure ignorance of how unhappy we are with them. One guy almost ran into Beardoh and Sweetpea’s canoe and turned away at the last second.
“Slow the hell down!” Beardoh shouted.
“Sorry! I didn’t see you!” The boater said.
If he wasn’t so drunk he’d probably have an easier time spotting them.
Boating and drinking is a problem. Not just on the river but anywhere. A large pontoon boat pulled up to us later in the day. The driver had that glazed donut look about him, red nose and drippy eyes. He slurred his speech as he asked us what we were doing out here.
“Where you going?” He asked.
“To the Gulf,” we replied.
“Wow-wee! Do you want a beer? I have either Coors or Busch Light.”
We each took a Coors and put it in the cooler for later. It was two less he was likely to drink while navigating his pontoon through the channel.
A lot of the small towns on the river are run down. Savanna, Illinois was one of those places. We pulled up to the public dock one morning looking for a place called Crumbles to eat breakfast. It has been several days since we last had a hot meal.
A few homeless looking gentleman were picking up cans and bottles near the dock.
“Probably not a great place to leave the canoes,”‘ I said to the group.
One of the gentleman came over to us. He was older with all white hair and a small unkept beard. He wore a white shirt that had dirt stains on all sides of it.
“Y’all looking for breakfast?” He asked us.
“Do you know where Crumbles is?” asked Sweet Pea.
“Crumbles!” he shouted in disgust.His face wrinkled up like he had just smelled sour milk.
“You don’t want to go there,” he continued, shaking his head. “They want 7 dollars for breakfast!” He said this like it was some sort of crime the restaurant was committing. “Go down to the Savanna Marina Cafe. It’s good food. Breakfast is only 4 dollars there.”
We took his advice and traveled down to the Marina. We could see the men walking down the same way.
We arrived at the Cafe and they were there too.
The Cafe was simple and the two gals that worked there were inviting and nice.
The man that had told us about the place was sitting at the counter with his friend. He turned around to us and asked about our trip.
“Bill brings in a lot of customers for us,” said one of the waitresses when she came over to take our order.
“Because it’s good food,” said Bill.
And the food was good.
It was unclear whether Bill was having a tough go at life or not. I think the Cafe served him breakfast sometimes. He and his friend didn’t pay, and when he left, the two ladies gave him all the pop cans they had been collecting for the past week.
“You be safe on your trip,” Bill said to us as he left the diner.
The river, to Bill, was hard for me to understand. It was a place where he lived. A place he had probably lived for the majority of his life.
I thought about giving some extra money to the waitress and telling her I wanted to buy breakfast for Bill when he came in next. Something inside me felt sad and sorrowful for Bill.
But I didn’t want to offend the man. I was only making assumptions from the things I observed, and sometimes you can make a fool of yourself if you assume too much.
I slid a ten dollar bill inside my shirt pocket and put my wallet back in my water proof sack. We talked a bit with the waitresses and drank coffee and eventually got up to leave.
The air was cool when we went outside. The sky was blue and clear, and the wind was calm for once. A group of pelicans soared overhead in a V formation. They made flying look effortless. I wondered what they saw up there. They could see everything.
We got in the canoes and began the routine of paddling onward. The swoosh and gargle sounds of paddling filled the air. It was a good day to be on the river. After we got out of the small bay and entered the main channel, I reached into my pocket and took out the ten dollar bill. I put it back in my wallet and continued paddling on.
