missouri

perhaps we should have been taking more pictures since we made it to missouri.

but it's quite something since here we've been. maybe it's many things. people here are a change. there's a new accent, with words like "heem" and "warsh." and there's something about we're come from minnesota that's far more impressive from here on out.

and we're deep in floodland. where all the houses are on stilts and half of them are unoccupied since the waters rose this year again and again.

and the factories and barges are multiplying. ten in one day yesterday.

and we're in canton, and we've been to alexandria of purple cow and wild dogs, and we'll be in hannibal and louisiana and st. louis. in weeks. and that's crazy.

lock 19: big one

we left our last town in iowa in the afternoon, to make it over to lock 19 in time for the meeting of when the winds die down and the sunlight still lasts a little while. we'd been hearing about this one from way back at lock 5a, this one's the biggest drop we'd see. scary scary. and horror stories got more horrible from burlington on. and it looked ominous enough, from miles away.



but when we got closer, the folks were nice and gentle to us. they even gave us a bag of apples from their tree, showed us how to tie up, and wished us all sorts of well.


and so we went:

fifteen or so minutes and then we were out. they said the water would be running seven miles an hour past the dam, but it was actually two. which is just fine, quite nice. and four more miles of iowa.

here's the truth of it.

it's gotten chilly.
duck hunters wake us up in the morning.

barges pass, more barges pass.

it rains sometimes.

it gets dark early.

we got more memory for our camera.

we've been taking lots of pictures.

and i hope you can tell we're smiling good.

okay, that's that.

Here and

now we are in Burlington, Iowa.
An odd sized town, full of many things, an australian coffee shop, many empty storefronts, a huge beautiful library, here, and we are dry and warm for the first time today.
The Iowa river came in and confirmed our suspicions of late that we are going
2 miles an hour.
amazing.
the town of keithsburg came and went
with its trains toppled from the flood
its watermarks at chest level
its old old buildings derelict and sighing
its populus, living their entire lives in this tiny river
view

and we spent the night tied up on a beach next to (as we will again tonght) our new friends

Doug and Laura from madison

floating now since Wabasha in a houseboat running solar power
floating a little past the current
a little past us in the current
but stopping just long enough for us to catch up
again and again

i think we're having
venison shitake stroganoff
with them tonight.
slumber party
and music.

We talk about the end of the world. about the economy crubling.
i wonder what signs will tip us off
(here on the river)
to it when it crashes.... maybe the barges will stop. maybe everyone will hide in their houses.

but the strings of cormarants flying north and then south
and the pelicans intermingling with them
the duck blinds fooling even us humans
the rain coming and the wind changing
the blankets increasing in number
the knitting increasing in haste

continuing on and steady.

breathtaking. color changing.
we're so lucky here.

AND WE'RE

back,
and my my, sorry for the lacking of updates here.
the truth of it is that we were on that farm out in coal valley illinois. the whole time. finishing the summer there was beautiful.
and coming back to the river now is an altogether wonderful thing.
quite a different story now. lovely.
the river is everything we'd dreamt it these days, the calm and the slow we were hoping for all summer seems to have come out for fall.
we've hardly seen a person since we left davenport, and so here it is, us and the river. and it's still quite beautiful as much as everyone everywhere always has said it gets all ugly down here, certainly, past the quad cities. but my my, sure fine, and the pelicans are flying south with us.
we're also riding a new system, the bikes got traded out for some wonderfully slouching chairs with bikechains and pedals underneath, far more comfortable and better tensioning on the belt to boot, much obliged to ian.
i don't know quite what else to say, so perhaps i'll leave it all at this.
from muscatine iowa, over and out, hblp, c.bernadette able.

come!

as we take residency at a farm, we'll one or the other or both be at the davenport freight house farmer's market every saturday for the next few weeks. mad farmer's gardens. we'd love to say hi... till then, much love. hb+lp.

the other crew change

so the story goes:

hannah came back up to clinton from the farm peaceful, meet andrew and lindsey peaceful, and eventually andrew back down to the farm, and further eventually hannah and lindsey keep drifting down.

and there was something new about it.

something like about staying and slowgoing deep breaths even more, long pauses, enjoy it now while the enjoying is here, crabapples and pretty little musics, sunshine and breezes.

and since we seem to be addicted to a farm in coal valley and its inhabitants, we decided to break from our pauses and river and hitch down to davenport from camanche for the farmers market. that was pretty fun. it only took one ride and there we were, and then suddenly there was a plan of another crew change,
lindsey gets to go back to the farm and sleep a cold off in a bed and with blankets,

hannah gets the company of one ian (of yon farm), one buddy dog (of yon farm) and one becky (of moline and the soon to be launched and downstream partnering sugar shaker) to bring bernadette the rest of the way to her resting spot in the quad cities. oh man.

the new crew, tho these pictures get ahead of themselves really:

can't speak for lindsey's half except that she sure seems good rested and made a nice shirt,

but on the river there were wonders, adventure surprises.

from the start and we had a ride back up river to the camanche library dock on a 96 foot yacht dinner cruise boat named lady tampa bay (yet another way to see this river my my), complete with dinner, they parked next to bernie for the night and the yacht got more attention than we did, hah.

and then yes, ian and han off and down, breezing, going to meet becky in princeton. it was quite a lovely one, ian caught on quick. lovely but/and crash landed (one paddlewheel came off 300 yards away, one motor ran out of gas 100 feet away, we paddled one wheel and one oar into a public dock next to go fish, met by a dozen denizens, drinks and dinner on them, who). was crazy but the morning was better, becky came, we got on and out, ian and becky even fixed the paddlewheel right on, the mayor even came by 7 times with longsleeves and food for us.

becky caught on fast too. and we made it to le claire that night, policemen happy to see us, residents and their gardens produce, pelo velo our personal sponsor giver of beer and coffee and the best tshirts yet, and the wind was blowing from the east perfectly on our only west stretch of the river. perfect lock and dam, perfect free ice cream from hampton's remember when, perfect landing on campbells island.

and just when we didn't think we necessarily had a place to live in the qc, a friendly boat told us we could have their slip at the island marina. well, becky left that night, and ian and i got to spend one last night on bernie for now, campstove and tent, view of alcoa factory, and buddy on bow. we met dave the marina owner funnily in the morning before the marina and then met him again inside the gates. seems we've got a worktrade for rent.

the qc papers already came, they were nice, and when we woke up this morning at our base here the mad farmer's gardens, the paper had bernie smiling on the very front page of the very paper. (and funny, mad farmer's garden on the cover of the radish, we're a bunch of celebrities here and laugh over breakfast). and that's that about that. lindsey and i are going to go finish moving off today, maybe do a little grinding on a boat, take final proper measurements and desires for the jet propulsion.

and now comes the chapter of that boatwork and this farmwork, it is good.

A Call for a Home in the Quad Cities

So we're approaching the quad cities now, where the plan is to stay a few weeks, repair some damages to ol' Bernie, help out on the "brother farm", take a small break. Our leads as for a safe place to dock Bernadette have fallen through. So Please Get Back to US if anyone knows of a dock with an open slip where Bernadette could stay for 2 or three weeks, preferably somehwere that is at least somewhat restricted, or where there's a good bit of monitering, becasue we're not going to be living on board nor probably there every day, and preferably at little or no cost. Please. We're making all of our wishes on this one.

Pool 13

Like a desert. I swear I saw heat waves coming off the water. And the expanse all around of no human activity. We ran out of water. Thankfully there was beer. We ran out of battery. Thankfully the pull start started. Because our legs were pretty tired. Heeding little advice given us, that pool is huge, that pool is crazy, make sure you're prepared. And Andrew has a fish bone stuck in his finger. We see bird shit island. We see the islands all around and the cormerants flocking up around, the cormerants, illinois cormerants no sign of them before Bellvue. Hours alone in the middle of the desert water lake.

Hannah comes back after a week

A week now, a little more than a week, C. Bernadette had a crew change.

Andrewc for Hannahb and what revolutions. The discovery of single person steering, loving Bernadette gently, raft swain raf's'n, in the wind, turning and using the billowing cloth, the weathervain, design feature, to know. Using the pee-board for a kitchen sink, not only a toilet, sink, washbasin. Setting up the tent onboard.



These things driving her from Dubuque to Clinton and a million adventures. A wingdam, tailwinds and strong current, requiring (after watching Bernadette skid away from us along the submerged rock ridge behind her first, or second or third tow attempt) six people (or seven?) pushing her into position for her final successful tow back out into the chanel.



Staying the night nestled in some wingdams and visited by Corey, bringing gifts, bringing company while we cooked the experimental beans (someday we're going to release the C. Bernadette book of raft cooking).



A little check up from the DeWitt of US fish and wildlife, with no compassion, robot man, following orders in such a way to pad his ego, not letting him get us riled up, not knowing what to do with the 125$ ticket we ended up with, all of our things within some kind of reminder range. I dont want to get into it, angry thinking. But now up to code anyway.



And Sebula, the island city, small and hot. Heat coming out of the ground, heat taking us down and waiting in front of BombFire pizza for our energy to return us to the raft, whe Tom drives up and tells us he left us goodies at the boat. Tomfire from Bombfire and all the ingredients delicious for a lunch, bread, tomatoes, mozzerella cranberry chutney, oh my. And then as we leave paddling on toward the bridge stopped for a bit of catfish donation, good old boys, brief exchange.

And the fish, the river fish inside with batter and fried, with fish water all over the deck all over the boat, the fishy water in the river on the swimming skin on the bluegreen algae, on the spewm on the surface, in our planters on our feet, on the deck. Covered with these fish.



And now Lindsey has some kind of cold. Andrew is back on his farm. Hannah is back with Bernadette and waiting for the rain to let up, for our battery to make its way the many blocks back to the boat, to fill our tank up with some municipal water and get on our merry way.

suddenly pictures:

so many adventures, sojourn with clara, she holds the camera, ha,

landing 615, little stop, girls gone wild:

and matt and matt who taught us how to use our radio:

and then waupeton and its kindly folk:

and their dogs who couldn't stay long:

and the tow from a kayaker:

the fog that almost ate us:

the paddlewheel that almost made it to the bottom of the river again:

the lock we eventually made it through:

and here's how we came into dubuque:

and the people were there, they were good:

and we parked by hawk's lillybelle:

and so it was and there we said goodbye to clara, tiny airport and hugs.

it was a beautiful thing to have her,

and lovely thanks for the photos, good eye:

Dubuque

It seems, caffeiene and sugar
up and down, feeling amped, feeling like going
moving fast, quickly and miles
moving slowly but making miles
stopping and reading the light and the fog and
no longer the swarms of dragonflies but
patches of white
pelicans lined up off in the distance
they move quickly, paddling even
and their song
like a phone alarm

and the air in the buildings now so queer and noisy
and the air in a car now so fast and raucous


the speed the open all ever expanding
the slowness and stopping and watching and dancing

sleeping with my glasses on every night to see the stars

and we got to dubuque
and clara left us
but with some sort of renewed vigor and love for the all the things
remembering again after four five days how magical it is

everyday

and a woman took our pictures as we pulled up
here is how we look now
in dubuque
outside the amazing rivermuseum (which we have made ourselves part of while we're here)
http://www.rebeccacatephoto.com/-/rebeccacatephoto/gallery.asp?cat=94412&pID=1&row=15

lotos

although really, these pictures do no justice.
(the lotus grow up sprung out of the water, unlike the lillies, stand up, perfect round, smell like i couldn't tell you, some kind of bygone dilation and fancy, and unworldly inside, belong here though i never imagined, with the other marshians, dreaminglike, could float amongst and between and to oblivion and do, sleep amongst them, waken smiling perfect soothed)