Mississippi River Conclusion

So I guess its time for deep thoughts and sage advice. I'm not sure what qualifies me for such things, but people always seem to think you have something important to say after a trip like this.

Would I do it again?
Sort of. I would think about going down the Mississippi again, but I would want to do something different, ie kayak, or springtime, or change something else.

Would I do another river trip?
Yes, at some point. There are plenty of other rivers, but there are also plenty of other trails to hike, or roads to bike, etc, So I don't know if or when I'll get around to another river trip.

What did I learn?

Barges are annoying, wind is annoying, but overall the Mississippi is much more wilderness than I expected, which is nice.

Most people will think you are crazy when doing something like this (ie too dangerous, too abnormal, too whatever reason not to get out and do something), but the people that actually matter will be interested.

There is still kindness in America. While it is much less common than on a trail like the AT, there are still plenty of people willing to help you out, offer rides, places to stay, etc.

Why did I do it?

Good question. It seemed like a nice trip for the time period that I was looking at, and something to keep me outdoors and in the woods. I'm always looking for different things to do, anything out of the ordinary and outdoors.

Photos

Take a look at all my photos here:
I still need to go through and add descriptions to a lot of them, but at least I have them all uploaded now.

Mississippi River Day 115 (Morgan City, 2200 miles)

Last day of paddling, and a very long day against the current. I ended up taking a smaller river back up to the Intra-coastal Waterway, hoping for less current, but it didn't help. I met back up with Greg and Michael for one last night, and that was the end of the trip.

Mississippi River Day 114 (Gulf Coast, 2179.5 miles)

Another foggy morning, but only lasted about an hour. The current has been getting slower as we get closer to the coast, and the river widened out quite a bit today. 16 miles into the day we got to see open water, and decided that was good enough, pulled over and had lunch on a convenient sandbar, took a few pictures, and headed back.

Paddling against the current, even though it has slowed down a bit, is really hard. We were able to make headway by staying towards the shore, where the current isn't as strong, and also where we could pole ourselves along with our paddles on the river bottom.

We only made it 6 miles back up before calling it for the day, but we found a nice seashell beach, composed entirely of seashells, about 2 feet above the water, and set up camp. It was a nice camp, but some of the really big and fast boats that went by sent up a big enough wake to splash some water on us, so we were thankful to have our flies on our tents and hammock.

Mississippi River Day 113 (Atchafalaya #127.5, 2157.5 miles)

Another foggy morning. At this point I'm not sure if its the weather, or if the Atchafalaya is usually foggy in the morning. Today it burned off quicker, thanks to some wind, but unfortunately it was a headwind.

I stopped for lunch just upstream of Morgan City, and was able to watch a Coast Guard ship practicing man overboard drills.

Once the wind died down I made it through Morgan City and out into the Intra-coastal Waterway, where the current slowed a bit. There were also a lot more bigger boats out there, so I was glad I was only on it for a few miles before returning to the river on the downstream side.

While I was waiting for Greg and Michael, who had stopped in to town for water, a tug went by me, then did a u-turn and came back. I tried to get out of the way, until they cut their engine and called me over. The captain, Captain Boo, was concerned that we didn't have any radio or anything, and wanted to know what we were doing. Greg and Michael had caught back up, and were watching this from the side of the river. I was eventually able to convince him that we were safe, and were going to be camped shortly, instead of being on the water after dark. He finally took off, and we found a nice sandbar to camp on for the night.

The sandbar wasn't quite high enough, and some of the bigger wakes were breaking over the edge of it, but the waves didn't quite make it far enough inland to get the tenters wet. Fortunately I was in my hammock anyway, so it didn't really matter.

It had been getting a lot warmer, which has also been bringing out the bugs, and tonight was especially buggy.

Mississippi River Day 112 (Atchafalaya #95, 2125 miles)

Another foggy morning. I decided to push off and float in the current, until Greg and Michael caught back up to me. It was kind of interesting when they did, since they appeared out of the fog rather quietly, and managed to aim right towards me. It turned out that they had made several wrong turns in town, which is what took them so long yesterday. They had also apparently camped only a mile or two upstream from me, so we were pretty close.

I caught back up with them for lunch, and had a few tugs pass us, the only ones we had seen all day. We took off again after they had passed, and I was able to keep them at least in sight, to see where they pulled off to camp. They had found a very small campsite, barely big enough for their tents and my hammock, so we weren't able to have a fire for the night. Just before dark a hunter pulled over and asked what we were doing, and seemed impressed. He also had to warn us about the large alligators in the area, bigger than our canoes.

Mississippi River Day 111 (Atchafalaya #51, 2081 miles)

This morning was really foggy for the first few hours. If I had been on the Mississippi I couldn't have gone anywhere, since I probably would have gotten run over. Instead, I was able to push off, and enjoy the otherworldlyness of the fog.

After the fog lifted the day actually got quite warm. Apparently the cold weather the past week or 2 had been about 15-20 degrees colder than normal for this time of year.

Towards the afternoon I started just floating along with the current, waiting for Greg and Michael, who had stopped in to town to resupply one last time. Over the course of the day I was passed by a single barge, which was a lot smaller than the barges on the Mississippi. There were also several small boats, probably hunters or fishers.

Even with floating along for the last part of the day Greg and Michael still hadn't caught back up, so I ended up camping by myself for the night.

Mississippi River Day 110 (Atchafalaya #13.8, 2043.8 miles)

Woke up this morning and had a small fire to hang around until I pushed out again. I figured I had to leave a bit before Greg and Michael in order to do the same mileage, since they are a bit faster. That way we can end up camping together.

About 20 miles in I hit the turnoff for the Atchafalaya River, which I had been planning on taking for quite a while. It is much safer than the Mississippi, which still had to go through Baton Rouge and New Orleans, which have a lot more barge traffic (Cancer Alley and Suicide Alley don't sound like fun). Instead, the Atchafalaya is more of a river and less of a highway. It is also supposed to be more scenic, rather than a lot of levees and industry. It also doesn't hurt that it is shorter.

According to some people, the next big flood will actually divert the Mississippi into the Atchafalaya, re-routing the entire river south from there. The Army Corp of Engineers is trying to stop that, since it would ruin the economic opportunities of Baton Rouge and New Orleans. It seems to be a losing battle though.

After I got on the turnoff the current died out entirely, and I had to paddle through 5 or 6 miles of dead water. There was also a lock to pass through, but the lock master decided to drive me around in his pickup instead. He said it would be faster than draining the entire lock just for a canoe. I didn't mind. Downstream of the lock the water was a lot clearer, since there was no current to kick up the mud. After the 5 or 6 miles the channel rejoined the current, and I was being pushed along at 3 mph again, which was nice.

Greg and Michael met up with me again, since I had managed to convince them this was a better route than the Mississippi, and we ended up camping out together again.