The Lanier Mansion opens at 9am and we are THERE! The four of us get our own special tour and get to see “things that we don’t normally show” because Doug asks so many questions and is interested in the construction. Its a nice mansion that is ½ block off the river. We leave about 10am and a tour group of 20 is heading this way. Yes, we’re outta here and on to the next museum.
Next door is the Railroad Museum and Madison History Museum. We see them both in an hour but learn about how to make soap from lye (made from ashes) and lard. We aren’t sure where this will come in handy but the knowledge has been filed away anyway. We also learn that the train tracks used to run right down the middle of the street and in front of the Lanier Mansion. No evidence of them now except that the train station that houses the train museum is right here.
The center of town is only about 3 blocks away. We locate another lovely fountain in this very clean city and take pictures. Most of the storefronts we see are occupied and open for business because the boat is in town. The town is busy though with more than just the “boat people”.
We popped into a little shop. The owners made wood things and yarn things. I found this great scrolled piece of wood in the shape of the state of OHIO with a roller coaster on it. Doug bought one shaped like Washington and a letter “D”.
We continued to stroll along the main street of town and went into a “general store”. After we purchased something Doug struck up a conversation with the owner and we learned all about the taxes he pays, why he moved here, and that he has to work harder now that he’s “retired”. He was a character but these are the kinds of people you find everywhere if you just learn to stop and talk to some of them. And most of them love to talk.
We were looking for this old fashioned Soda Shop (Mundt’s Candies). I asked someone sitting at an outdoor café and they pointed the way. Inside were fellow “boat people” David and Linda Dewey having an ice cream. As the piano player, Tony Schwarz, from the boat was leaving, the proprietors were just putting on his CD of calliope music. We started taking pictures of the old fashioned stuff inside here when the boat’s Gift Shop hostess, Pat, pops in for an ice cream shake. With this many people coming here we figured we might as well spoil lunch and order something cold to eat. Karen and I split an ice cream sundae as did Doug and Betty.
We hurriedly ate them because we were supposed to be on the boat in about 15 minutes. We got to the boat landing and seeing that we still had 5 minutes took some more pictures from shore.
When the boat leaves a port as important as Madison it is customary to toot the whistle, blow the horn, ring the bell, and play the calliope. The captain has control over whether steam goes to the calliope based on the situation the boat is in. If he needs steam to maneuver then he won’t allow the calliope to get steam. Well, this was one of those cases where Tony started to clear out the pipes of the calliope and the captain shut down the steam.
EVERYONE gets disappointed when this happens except the captain. He has to get the boat out into the channel and occasionally needs all the steam he can get to move the boat out there. The people on the boat and on the shore on the other hand are expecting a rousing rendition of “I Left My Home in Indiana” and don’t get it until the boat is well away from shore. Finally, the boat gets into safe waters but we are a ways away from all the people waving good-bye to us on the shore so the calliope playing isn’t as effective for them. WE, however, are having a great time listening to the music echo off the underside of the Madison Bridge as we pass under it.
A few miles out of Madison we see this steam-powered paddlewheel boat heading away from its mooring out into the shipping channel. It is the Barbara H, the oldest sternwheeler towboat still in operation. The owners had seen the DQ in port in Madison and decided to meet us on the river with their boat. Everyone loved it. The DQ blew her customary greeting of 1 long and 2 short deep-bass whistles and the Barbara H returned the greeting with her little pip-squeak whistle that had us all smiling and waving goodbye as she turned back toward home.
The previously mentioned David Dewey, who lives in Oroville, CA, had a slide presentation this afternoon of the differences between the Delta Queen and Delta King (which is a sister ship to the DQ and a hotel on the Sacramento waterfront). It was a wonderful show, very informative, and with all of the DQ experts on board they quickly helped identify how the DK was changed from the DQ.
We locked through the Markland Lock in the late afternoon and once again saw Franz, Carmen, and their daughter along with 3 or 4 other steamboat chasers at the lock observatory.
Karen had pasta this evening. Three of us had pot roast. Karen only had one dessert. I, taking a cue from Karen from the other night, asked if I could have the bread pudding AND a cup of ice cream. Our neighbor, taking his cue from me, asked for the same a little while later. It caused quite a laugh between our two tables.
Around 10pm we pulled up to the fuel dock and began the 3-4 hour refueling of the boat. Sometime in the early morning we finally arrived at Cincinnati.
1 comment:
So sad the trip is almost finished. A good time was had by all and the desserts were wonderful!!
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