Here are some scenes along the Mississippi...many sand bars, many many big limestone quarries. AND there is Roberto de Kirchmi on the bow of the boat ! You probably guessed that there a loooong periods of nothing except watch for dead heads and steer. The river has a pretty good current so we averaged 13mph on the Mississippi---sometimes hitting 15 and 16mph ! But there can be lots of debris, and of course there's many tows (BIG, long ones) and then the current to deal with.

This is an anchorage we stayed at one night and that night there were only 2 of us (out of the six) who had been at Hoppie's together. Of course, Fern told us and everyone else about this place.

Here is the bridge at Cairo, IL where the Mississippi and Ohio rivers meet.
We made a left turn here up the Ohio, so now we're going against the current....same rpm only 9-10 mph. We were on this river only about 40 miles, past Paducah, KY until the Cumberland. Not much different about it except that it seemed to be staging area for tows going down the Mississippi.