Paducah, KY to Green Turtle Bay/Grand Rivers, KY
Geru, Valsignet, and the Honey Queen pulled out of Paducah a little after 7 am. The winds were still whipping pretty strongly, making the water rough on the outset, but it didn’t last too long. From here, we had to decide whether to take the Tennessee River to Kentucky Lake or the Cumberland River to Barkley Lake. The two lakes are connected, so either way still gets us to the same ultimate destination: Green Turtle Bay Marina in Grand Rivers, Kentucky. The shorter route, Kentucky Lake, usually means more barge traffic and thus, a greater chance of a long wait at the lock, sometimes for hours and hours. The longer route, the Cumberland, is the opposite, longer but far less traffic. The experience of our many predecessors, has proven the longer route is usually quicker, the Cumberland was the decision. The real downer to this, we learned, was the swiftness of the current. Going “uphill” all day, we were lucky to make 5 knots. The riverbank is pretty, but the ride is painfully slow. And the real kicker is we traveled 47 NM, and 9 hours on the Cumberland and ended up 28 miles, by car, from where we started. If you are wanting to make good time traveling, I suggest using a car.
The Cumberland is pretty 
Cells, as they are called, are used for temporary securing of barges. This one didn’t fare too well to the flood or a barge. 
We had 30 seconds of sunshine today, but I missed the photo op. 
Loading aggregate onto a barge from the quarry.
The barge traffic was light and when we arrived at the Barkley Lock a barge was locking through. Our wait was about 45 minutes. I tried to anchor, but the bottom was pretty rocky, so the anchor was skipping and not holding well. I let the boat drift, while idling. We were in and out of the huge lock in a matter of minutes to Barkley Lake level. GTB can be seen from the exit of the lock. I made the mistake of trying to cut across to the private channel of Green Turtle Bay instead of following the main channel another 500 yards. The depth finder went from 20- 10-8-4 feet in about 10 seconds. I found myself parked in the mud. I called the other boats who were following me to save them the same trouble. It’s funny how the front man is the leader, whether he is qualified or not. It took a few tries, but I was able to back off the mud and find the real channel, getting into the bay without further incident.
We had dinner in the Green Turtle Bay Yacht Club with our boat buddies and everybody called it an early night.
We’ve decided to make GTB a 2-night stay. An oil change and provisioning is mandatory. We’ll check out what’s cool about this place, too, while we are here.