Can you canoe?

Remember last August when my dreams of canoeing the Kentucky River were dashed?  Well, while J and I were in Kingsport, TN, a few weeks ago I heard about river rafting near there.  I tried to make plans, but the scheduled tours just didn't coincide with our schedule.  That idea, though, reminded me of the Kentucky River tour, and I called last week to see if they were offering it this summer.  They were!  When Allison called back to confirm our reservation, she confirmed that the lock would be open (YAY!), and then mentioned that it would be closing this week for months of construction.  Wait...we actually landed on the right side of luck this time??

So here we are, canoeing (J's first time ever), locking down, paddling past Buffalo Trace Distillery (which, of course, smelled as delicious from the river as it does the road!), swimming (me, at least...right before I stepped on an errant shell and sliced my toe open...about that luck thing...), and locking back up the river!  We joined a group of folks from Louisville, and had two tour guides. I highly recommend this tour (at least, after the lock re-opens) and you can expect to see J and me heading back to the River and over to Elkhorn Creek again soon!

Preparing to enter the lock from upstream

Buffalo Trace

Immediately after paddling into the lock from downstream; the lower door is still open behind us.

A picture of me taking a picture of the rest of our group while hanging out in the lock.  The upper door (gate?) is built on top of the damn, so water pours in under the gate while we wait.  I suspect that's part of the construction work planned.  The dark line on the wall is the water level when the upper gate is open, so we had a while to wait at this point.