Tuesday, May 20, 2014

The Mississippi River houseboat adventure



When I was in college, I decided to fulfill my childhood dream of floating down the Mississippi River like Huckleberry Finn. I had the sense of adventure, I had the friends willing to accompany me, I even had a modest savings to pay for the necessities along the way. The only thing I was missing was a raft to carry us.

So, I built one.


Luckily for me, my grandpa is not only the most ingenious person I know, he is also extremely generous with his time. He and I spent every weekend for an entire summer engineering a fully functional houseboat out of a 1976 Prowler Travel Trailer and an old pontoon barge.




It was a humongous effort and a feat of human imagination. Using limited resources and commercial grade tools, we retrofitted the travel trailer into a houseboat cabin, arduously hoisted it up onto the pontoon barge with a makeshift pulley system, connected all plumbing and electricity, and even turned the chassis we had cut off the bottom of the Prowler into a street-safe houseboat trailer so we could tow our magnificent creation to Irvine Lake to test it out, and after that to Coon Rapids, MN to begin our voyage.

To our delight, it floated like a dream, and we decided it was river-worthy and ready for my adventure. Unfortunately, my crew was not as committed as I was. I think perhaps they had doubted -- during our brainstorming session when the idea of the great journey was born -- that I would actually follow through in building the improbable boat. I tried desperately to convince others to join my crew. I wrote passionate, painstakingly crafted letters and sent them to dear friends hoping I could sell them on the idea through my writing talents. Alas, I wrote in vain. The boat slowly deteriorated on account of the elements, and with it, my dream of navigating the Mighty Mississippi.

In hindsight, that the trip fell through was probably for the best. I was possibly a bit naive, and quite likely had underestimated the vast length, width, and sheer power of the greatest and most important waterway in all of North America. The trip may possibly have ended in a tragedy greater than the heartbreak I felt in watching my beloved boat fall apart in dry dock. And eventually I realized that the experience of building a houseboat with my grandpa for an entire summer and the enormous sense of accomplishment when our boat worked as we intended it was my reward. It had been well worth the effort.




1 comment:

  1. I loved hearing the story last night and think it a great memory in many ways. Thanks for sharing Michaelberry Finn

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