We Three: Fred , the "Ferry" Boat, and Me
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Much of what happened in the pages of We Three: Fred, the “Ferry” Boat, and Me, could have happened last November or almost any November. But these events happened in November of 1993, which is significant because of the horrific, record-setting floods that inundated the Nation’s heartlands in the spring of that year. |
However, little thought was given those imminent dangers as the sailboat, Harper’s Ferry II, and its’ two-man crew ventured out of Washburn Marina in western Wisconsin into the mammoth Lake Superior.
They were literally and figuratively launching a journey that, to the best of anyone’s knowledge, had never been taken before. It was the first leg of a trip that would take them some 2,400 miles from the Great Lakes down to the Gulf of Mexico via the Inland Waterways - the Chicago, the Illinois, and the Mississippi rivers. Hundreds and possibly thousands of people using the waterways on boats of all kinds – from millionaires’ mega cruisers to rowboats and dinghies – have made all or parts of the trip. Some people have canoed and a few have water-skied the length of the Mississippi River and others, like Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, floated down most of it on a raft.
But no one, as far as was known, ever piloted a forty-seven-foot, deep-draft Gulfstar motor-sailer, with a pair of ancient mariners as crew (a couple of retired natural gas men whose combined ages totaled more than a century-and-a-quarter) all the way from Washburn, Wisconsin to Freeport, Texas, via those waterways. No wonder so many people stared at this unlikely sight from the river banks as “We Three” went floating by.
To purchase a signed copy of We Three for $13 (plus $5.00 taxes/shipping) via e-mail, go here: harperhere@LIVE.com or go to -
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=We+Three%3A+Fred%2C+the+Ferry+Boat%2C+and+Me for a standard or a Kindle version of the book.
They were literally and figuratively launching a journey that, to the best of anyone’s knowledge, had never been taken before. It was the first leg of a trip that would take them some 2,400 miles from the Great Lakes down to the Gulf of Mexico via the Inland Waterways - the Chicago, the Illinois, and the Mississippi rivers. Hundreds and possibly thousands of people using the waterways on boats of all kinds – from millionaires’ mega cruisers to rowboats and dinghies – have made all or parts of the trip. Some people have canoed and a few have water-skied the length of the Mississippi River and others, like Tom Sawyer and Huck Finn, floated down most of it on a raft.
But no one, as far as was known, ever piloted a forty-seven-foot, deep-draft Gulfstar motor-sailer, with a pair of ancient mariners as crew (a couple of retired natural gas men whose combined ages totaled more than a century-and-a-quarter) all the way from Washburn, Wisconsin to Freeport, Texas, via those waterways. No wonder so many people stared at this unlikely sight from the river banks as “We Three” went floating by.
To purchase a signed copy of We Three for $13 (plus $5.00 taxes/shipping) via e-mail, go here: harperhere@LIVE.com or go to -
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=We+Three%3A+Fred%2C+the+Ferry+Boat%2C+and+Me for a standard or a Kindle version of the book.