Columbus, MS to Gainesville, AL (Tombigbee Oxbow Anchorage)

December 13, 2022: We start our winding, debris-filled trip down the Tombigbee River, stopping at what might not have been the best anchorage, given the weather.

(continued from At Columbus Marina)

It was almost 7 AM when we left Columbus Marina on yet another overcast day with patchy fog. By 7:10 AM, we’d locked through at Stennis and continued down the river.

The Tombigbee River

For most of our journey south from Pickwick Lake, we’d been in a series of canals that met up with various waterways with dams that created lakes. While some of these canals may have been dug out parts of the Tombigbee River, it wasn’t until Aberdeen, north of Columbus, that charts started labeling the canal as the Tombigbee River. At the same time, however, there were winding sections referred to as oxbows that followed the river’s original course, criss-crossing the manmade canal. Sometimes they’d be the Tombigbee River and other times they’d be other rivers that eventually joined up and became part of the Tombigbee. Generally speaking, the engineers that created the Tenn-Tom Waterway wanted a shorter river passage than what you’d have if you followed every bend in the river. So they dug straight lines between a lot of the bends when they made their canals.

Where the river left the canal and where it rejoined it was often navigable water, deep and wide enough for various boats to enter. Obviously the shallower your boat’s draft, the more likely you were to be able to motor in. Sometimes the upstream entrance of the oxbow would be silted up but the downstream exit would be clearer. Aqua Maps and my Garmin chartplotters indicated many anchorages just inside these oxbows or even deeper.

Our next marina stop was Kingfisher Marina in Demopolis, MS. But it was too long a cruise for one day, even if I pushed the boat faster. So I was aiming for an anchorage called the Tombigbee Oxbow, which was just below the Howell Heflin Lock. Kenny and Rhonda in Nine Lives had stayed there and recommended it — and they stayed at a lot of good anchorages. The thing I liked about it was that it had a boat ramp near the anchorage, which would be a perfect place to dinghy over with my pups.

At least that was the idea. Things don’t always work out the way you plan them.

The Cruise

My notes for the day are simply a collection of lock times and speed changes. For some reason, I drove the boat faster that day than any other day so far. Perhaps it was the weather — the forecast called for heavy rain and flooding. I guess I was in a hurry to get to our destination for the night before the weather got bad.

The Tenn-Tom Waterway twisted and turned mostly southbound, with short straight sections between oxbows. Eventually, we reached Aliceville Lake and the Tom Bevill Dam that created it. It was around here that I saw two of the boats we’d met in Columbus — New Bearings and the boat that traveled with it but wasn’t identified by name on Nebo — anchored on the east side of the lake. I didn’t see the actual boats, but I saw them on Nebo. They’d stay there several days, waiting out the weather ahead of us.

We passed through Tom Bevill Lock at 9:45 AM — remember, we’d gotten an early start — and continued downstream, traveling at 10 to 12 knots most of the way. I played with the chartplotter’s auto guidance feature, looking for other weird idiosyncrasies — like its plotting of our courses at the edge of a channel instead of closer to the middle. It still tried to kill us at most bridges.

 
Two more examples of stupid routing by my Garmin chartplotter’s auto guidance feature. It had us hugging the edge of a channel instead of going closer to the middle of it (left) and it kept trying to drive us into bridge supports with crazy Ivans (right). Clearly, this feature was not ready for prime time.

The rest of the morning and early afternoon passed in a blur of more of the same. I have photos of a parked tugboat and a barge getting filled. My dogs slept on the seat beside me, as they did every time we were under way. Alyse did stuff on her phone or read.

I have no idea why I took a photo of this tugboat. I must have seen more than 100 of them by this point in the trip.

A barge full of scrap metal is loaded (or unloaded?) alongside the river.

We locked through at Howell Heflin Lock at 1 PM. The lockmaster told us to have a good trip down the river but to watch out for debris. I told him we were done for the day and would be anchoring around the corner at the oxbow anchorage. Telling him might have been a good thing.

Anchoring at the Tombigbee Oxbow

I steered us out of the lock, down the river a short distance, and into the downstream end of the oxbow. There was a pretty good current coming down this part of the river — certainly more current than I had expected. I continued upstream at a slow pace, looking for the boat ramp where I’d be able to easily land the dinghy with my pups. It was there on the right bank, without a dock. A few cars were parked in the lot beyond it. I figured we’d drop anchor just past it and lay out enough rode to keep us holding in the current with the boat just upstream from the ramp.

I moved the boat into position and Alyse got up on the bow to drop the anchor. The water was about 12 feet deep there, so I needed to play out at least 75 feet of rode for a 5:1 scope. (You need to consider the distance between the top of the water and the windlass as part of the depth, so I was rounding to 15 feet . 15 x 5 = 75) I didn’t try to hold the boat in place as the chain and rope played out; I relied on the current pushing the boat back to set the anchor. This had worked for me in every anchorage so far and it seemed to work here. Unfortunately, Alyse didn’t take note of the markings on the rode, so I had no idea how much rode had played out beyond the first 50 feet of chain once we got to rope. So when it seemed as if the boat was holding in place, I went out on the bow and let out more rode until I could see the next marker, which was blue (75 feet). Then I let out some more for good measure — maybe another 10 feet.

The current was pretty strong — too strong, I decided, to launch the dinghy and row to shore. My pups would have to use their “pee place,” a green fake grass mat on a tray. As usual, they weren’t happy about this and refused. But they didn’t have a choice. I left it out on the aft deck where they’d have easy access to it.

Meanwhile, I set an anchor alarm and realized pretty quickly that the anchor wasn’t holding very well. I let out another 25 feet of rode and reset the alarm. That did the trick.

Here’s our Nebo log for December 13, 2022. As you can see by the red line, I was in a bit of a hurry all day. Download a PDF log file with more info. Track Do It Now on Nebo.

At the Anchorage

We had lunch. It was still very early in the day and I think Alyse was unhappy that we’d stopped. But I knew we’d never make it to Demopolis and I also didn’t know much about any of the other anchorages downstream. There were very few on Aqua Map, probably because there were very few other oxbows. There were no marinas before Demopolis. Also, it made no sense to anchor much closer to Demopolis that night if we had to stop in Demopolis anyway. Besides, weather was coming and the last thing I wanted to do was struggle with the anchor in bad weather. That was my line of thinking, anyway, and I’m still not convinced it was wrong.

So we settled down for the afternoon. Although I can’t remember what I did, I probably split my time between reading, wondering if I should let out more rode, and worrying about the weather. Alyse probably read. She’d brought a book with her and had finished it. I’d found another book for her at one of the marinas and I think she was working through that.

Sometime before sunset another boat came up the oxbow. It passed us and continued upstream. It tried three times to set an anchor and finally succeeded. Now I had a new worry; what if this guy’s anchor came loose and he drifted back into us?

The sun set and it got dark. I let out another 25 feet of rode — we now had 125 feet out and were nearly abeam the boat ramp. I also set up and deployed my new stern anchor, which I hoped would minimize our swinging. The job required me to put the anchor together and attach the chain and rope line. The line got incredibly tangled and Alyse’s help just made it worse. I spent a good 20 minutes untangling it and laying it out in a basket-like bin to prevent future tangling. Then I dropped it over the side, felt it hit the ground, played out more line, and secured the line to one of the boat’s aft cleats. While it may have prevented some of the swinging, I’m not convinced it really helped much. Still it was good to have the anchor set up and ready for a time we really might need to use it. The task of “dialing in” my boat was still a work in progress.

We might have had another meal. I think I got one of my girls to use the pee place. Then we retreated into our sleeping spaces for the night.

I would not sleep well. Rough weather was on its way.

The storm I had been worried about all day was on its way east.