My column for the Washington County Daily News is online and in print. Here’s a part:
“A man who has lived in many different places is not likely to be deceived by the local errors of his native village.” – C.S. Lewis
Last weekend my wife and I cruised our boat into the welcoming harbor in Port Washington. We had been gone for 379 days cruising America’s Great Loop. We traveled 6,425.9 miles through 17 states and three countries at an average speed of 9.05 miles per hour. We anchored in remote tidal creeks and behind the Statue of Liberty. We listened to the dolphins breathe as we celebrated the dawn of the new year behind Sanibel Island. We dodged the bustling tow boats in the Port of St. Louis on the Mighty Mississippi. We met thousands of people from all walks of life in hundreds of places. Along the way, I learned, or relearned, a few things.
Throughout our travels, we discussed politics with other people exactly zero times. It just does not come up that often in regular life. Instead, we talked about weather, family, traveling, local events, the rising price of everything, work, boats, jokes, and a hundred other things, but not politics. As someone who spends probably too much time involved with politics, it was revealing how few other people were interested. People are busy living and concerned with the things that impact their lives. Politicians would do well to remember that.
People are generally good. They are friendly, earnest, helpful, generous, curious, honest, and caring. In times of trouble, most people are willing to go to extraordinary lengths to help. They are tolerant and welcoming. Outside of the cities, much of the business of America is still done with a handshake. Observing America through our news and social media filters is to miss how much of real America lies beyond the horizon of those lenses. Americans work hard. Very hard. To travel the inland rivers of our nation is to see an older, more industrial side. The rivers are where great, heavy things are moved about and where the mines, quarries, and farms drain into the arteries of our economy. The knowledge economy is important, but it exists because of the muscle and sweat of hard people who do hard things.
Had literally just read the article in the MJS, and here I find out those folks are you folks! lol
Sounds like a grand time! You don’t happen to have a travel-blog elsewhere, do you? Would enjoy reading more details about the day-to-day activities during your journey.
How funny. That’s actually NOT us, but we know them. We met them first passing on the ICW in South Carolina, I think, and then a few other times along the way. Great folks. We did a travel blog (of course) here: https://bowlinesthrown.com/.
VERY funny indeed! I was gonna kid ya about not updating the pic on your newspaper column…lol
Thanks for the link – am truly looking forward to reading it.
Congratulations on your safe return from such a big adventure! Tried to keep up with your blog posts, but sometimes when several were uploaded at once (understandable, considering you weren’t always online), so I couldn’t get through them all. Really enjoyed the pictures – seeing things as they appear from offshore is a unique perspective. Much respect to you and your wife for doing this at a young age, while working, instead of waiting for retirement. God willing, at a later stage you all will be able to do it again, perhaps with other family along. If fate intervenes with other plans for your lives, at least you have already accomplished this.
At our local history Facebook page, an old post was rebooted about the “City of West Bend” boat that was built at a business in West Bend (Mies Filter Products), on the river. It is now in upstate New York with a different name and part of an excursion fleet. Always wondered how it made it there. An old article talks about it being trucked to Port Washington, and then floated through Chicago. I wonder if it took the same route as you did.