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2012-05-27 tl;dr: Day 3 of Memorial Day weekend has me so incredibly sick of motor boats. I am so sick to death of motor boats. After nearly a month of having the rivers all to myself, this Memorial Day weekend is a bad trip. In the morning the river is saturated with fishing boats. These aren't so bad except they all fish along the bank, so I have to veer out into the river to pass them. Then around noon come the others. From noon until 6 pm the silence of the river is replaced by the obnoxious growl of oversized motors. The smooth surface of the water is destroyed. I bet I went four hours straight without not balancing on boat wakes.I'm still paddling up the Tennessee River, although there still isn't any current. The water level does fluctuate depending on which dam is generating electricity. Apparently the Pickwick Dam above me generates in the afternoon, and the Kentucky Dam generates at night. So the water level raises a foot or so late afternoon, then falls a bit near dusk, then is even lower yet by morning. A stag beetle was floating along in the water. It didn't look happy even after I fished it out. Later I caught a turtle. Say one thing about local folks, say they forget their sunscreen. It has been some time since I've seen so many sunburns. I predict mass insomnia tonight. Very few of these pontoon boats are nocturnal, so with dusk comes a relative silence, except for those frogs! And it turns out those were fireants the other night. My toes itch so bad right now. |
   kingfisher  stag beetle  stag beetle      no beach here |