Grafton, IL

We were up and at it early heading to Grafton. IL. No locks today just easy cruising. The river is nice and lined with trees.  It reminds us of the Ohio except that it is browner in color.

We saw a place called Mel’s. They have a restaurant and you can ask to spend the night. When we went by we were surprised to see all of the sand bags! They must have had some time earlier this year with the floods.

We also saw a few duck blinds used in the winter and there was a car ferry we had to wait on before we headed into the Grafton Marina.

We reached Grafton. The river is lined with a few restaurants and bars. It appears to cater to tourist. We checked in, the marina has a buy 3 nights get the 4th one free, so we decided to spend a few days here. We had lunch on at the onsite Tiki Bar and then met up with Getaweigh (Bubba and Anne) They had been traveling slow hoping we would catch up with them so we can travel the Mississippi together.

They had met up with Mike and Peggy earlier.  They live on a houseboat in the marina. Mike is a musician and he brought his guitar over and played us some songs.  

The next day, we checked out the one-street town by bar hopping.  They have a number of small bar/restaurants and a winery in Grafton.  We saw a few wedding parties celebrating in the town. The last bar we were at had a larger band there that played a little of everything.  They were good!

Saturday of our stay friends of Bubba’s from St. Louis stopped by to visit.  We had lunch with them and watched the number of bikes and cool card that cruised the main street. Then we took a boat ride to Alton to check out the marina that we will be going there for one night on Monday.

Sunday, we had breakfast at one of the restaurants and then we did some chores including laundry.  Since the laundry was by the Tiki Bar, it did not make sense to walk back and forth to the boat.  So, we sat and had a few drinks while we waited for the laundry to be done.  We met some other loopers, and one was celebrating a birthday.  It was a great time, sharing stories and celebrating!