October 20 – 22

We left Whisky Business for a short walk to dinner with the crews of 5 other Looper boats. This is a view of the Highway 67 bridge to St. Louis.

Sam and Rev from Here’s to Us had a rental car so we headed to St. Louis for “The Hill” neighborhood. Decidedly Italian American.

Made a stop at DiGregorio’s (why do Italian names have so many syllables?) grocery. We thought we would lose weight on this trip.

No way.

Did not go to the Arch but got a good look from the hiway.

Highway 67 bridge back to Alton.

When I got up yesterday I decided to change the engines water pump impellers. The impellers are a critical component of the engines cooling system. When they spin in the water pump housing they draw raw water in and that water passes through a heat exchanger (kinda like a cars radiator). The heat exchanger contains antifreeze and the antifreeze is what actually cools the engine. The last time I changed the impellers was just before we left Punta Gorda, Florida in April for the Keys. You may recall we replaced the waterpump on the starboard engine while on the Erie Canal in July. That water pump had had it’s impeller replaced around 100 hours before I installed it on our engine. Should have been fine.

NOT!

The impeller on the left side of the photo is the one I took out of the port engine. It was installed in April and it is in very good condition. The impeller (or what’s left of it) on the right side of the photo should have been in as good a shape or better than the one on the left. Here comes the hard part.

Ya gotta find every single piece that broke loose. There is a device just upstream from the water pump that cools the gear oil. Found all of the pieces there. Had that impeller lost any more of it’s vanes, I could have overheated that engine. $30K fix averted.

Pre-game for a night at Fast Eddies with 4 other crews.

One of the must stops on the Loop. Fast Eddie’s in Alton, Il. The menu is on the front of the building. Half pound burger for $2.49. All drinks $4.50. Such a deal. Had a blast!

One of those vending machines where you pick up your prize. Coozies!

Yup.

Food pick up.

Sunset.