What a wonderful night; the weather had changed and in our cabin directly under the bow, you could hear the delightfully restful rhythm of the falling rain all night. We decided this would be a
good morning to sleep in, so it was 10:30 am before we began to pull anchor. What a surprise to discover pulling the anchor that we had caught a cable of twisted steel, maybe an old tugboat mooring of some sort. Tom worked a while using a rope to tip the anchor to finally free us. He said he used a bowline knot on both ends of the rope and that if he wasn’t so modest, he would be really proud of himself. I guess we were lucky we didn’t snag an old cannon discarded by the French explorer, Montcalm.
The waterway we passed through today was very different, and more like the low
lying land around New Bern. We began to see water plants and some marsh grass. There were area where the river was very wide and very shallow where trees were growing in the water. There were lots of birds along the way, graceful blue
herons, white egrets, Canadian geese and little back ducks.
We descended the Aberdeen Lock this morning. They had their spillways open and the rushing current pushed the boat sideways as we exited the lock, but the water was pretty churning like the rapids.
We were hungry by the time we pulled into the Columbus Harbor Marina; must have been 2:00 by then. We stopped at the fuel dock to top off our tanks since the price of diesel had dropped to $2.99. The harbor is full of many long sleek boats, and we moved to a T-head in front of another looper flying the AGLCA blue and gold burqee.
Since the courtesy van was already being used, the dock master loaned us his personal truck
to go into town. That generous gesture made us feel right at home. We spent a couple of hours viewing the old southern plantation house, called Waverly, that was built in 1852 by George Young. It was the house for a 11,000 acre plantation where cotton was worked, picked and ginned by over a 1000 workers, slaves and tenant,
share croppers. Our delightful tour guide was the daughter of a couple who had purchased the house about 50 years ago and spent their lives “fixing it up”. She and her father still lived there sleeping in two of the magnificent bedrooms that she showed us. The interior
forum was four stories tall with beautiful stairways and balconies that reminded me of Johnson Hall at Meredith College. The house was filled with beautiful antiques of the era and our guide had many wonderful stories on the restoration including personally cleaning mud dobber nests out of the crown molding with a toothbrush. She also told us that the Magnolia tree in the front yard was documented to be the largest Magnolia in the
state, estimated to be 300 years old. The house was also filled with crystal chandeliers lighted by gas which Young made himself with a plant for burning pine knots under the house, which we thought was pretty amazing.
We saw the first home of the famous playwright, Tennessee Williams, where he was born in
1911. Williams won the Pulitzer Prize for his work “Streetcar named Desire” and “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof” both set in the South. The house was a small, two-story, gabled roof structure and well maintained as the city’s visitor center.
Columbus was also the site of the Mississippi State College for Women opened in 1884. They claimed it to be the first Women’s College in
America that was state supported; Meredith College in Raleigh was established just a short 7 years later (1891). I smiled to see the little guard house in the middle of their entrance drive with a small sign that said “All Visitors Must Sign In”. I wonder if they make the men leave their drivers licenses after 11:00 PM like at Meredith?
Columbus is also the home of the Columbus Air Force base and about a third of the US Air Force pilots are trained here. We didn’t go to the base, but we did hear fighter planes overhead.
Tonight we had dinner at Woody’s Restaurant right here on the water front. We really know we are in the South now! We had delicious shrimp and grits with a white bacon flavor gravy for dinner. It was wonderful...
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