PART 3: Anne Sherve-Ose and the Intrepid Voyageuses of Central America | News, Sports, Jobs

Twenty-nine locks and dams form a “staircase of water” for boats of all sizes navigating the Mississippi. The first, Lock and Dam No. 1, is in Minneapolis, and they are numbered consecutively as you travel south along the river. The photo shows the safest way for a canoe to pass through a lock: huddled against one of the huge walls, with the paddlers holding on to ropes thrown down from above to hold the boat in place as the lock fills or empties. Photo by Debbie Lenox-White

Episode Three — From St. Paul to (Almost) St. Louis

In 2008, the voyageurs left St. Paul for “somewhere in Iowa” to continue south along the river — yes — but also because “That’s where Anne lived.”

But before we paddle out of the cities, we must stop and highly recommend to you, the reader, the Mississippi River Gorge. Situated between Minneapolis and St. Paul, it is one of the most beautiful spots on the river, and so close, there is no excuse not to see it.

And you can see it without a canoe. Just pay the admission fee to enter the Science Museum of Minnesota, 120 Kellogg Boulevard West, in downtown St. Paul. There, in the lobby, is the Mississippi River Visitor Center. Most Americans don’t know that the U.S. has national seashores and national rivers, just like national parks. The Mississippi River, which runs through the Twin Cities, is officially called the “The Mississippi National River and Recreation Area,” which means it’s a sibling to Grand Canyon, Yosemite and Glacier National Parks. You’ll even see rangers on duty wearing the famous Smokey-the-Bear hats.

The ever-vigilant ladies had little time to gaze at the landscape, for danger lurked, a danger they would carry with them all the way to St. Louis: locks and dams.

Before 1930, the Upper Mississippi, the river from Lake Itasca to Cairo, Illinois, was free-flowing. Almost every spring it flooded as expected, wreaking havoc on nearby towns and farms, digging new channels, and reducing the depth of the water to less than a foot in many places. Even the smallest boats could not navigate it.

Also in 1930, Congress directed the Army Corps of Engineers to design and build a 9-foot-deep navigation channel (minimum clearance for loaded barges) along the entire length of the upper reaches of the river. The plan called for 29 locks and dams, funded by the Works Public Administration. A “swimming pool” was created between each of the dams to keep the ships afloat, and locks allowed them to bypass the dams. The Corps, which to this day maintains the water level in each basin, does so by opening lock gates when necessary. These same locks and dams, now nearly 90 years old, allow Iowa’s corn and soybeans to be exported worldwide at competitive prices.

Even locks and dams can’t guarantee that crops will be able to travel the river to New Orleans every year. In 2023, a drought year, there wasn’t enough water in the upper reaches of the river and barge traffic was severely restricted. Barges couldn’t be fully loaded and fewer barges could sail because the size of the shipping channel was severely reduced. Rates for shipping corn and beans increased by more than 75%. With all the rain so far in 2024, barges are warning that they may not be able to operate normally this harvest season because of too much water in the river. Too little, too much: this is the real story of a river that has been the subject of endless manipulation.

In making the river usable for barges, little thought has been given to its use for recreation. Are you surprised, reader, that a canoe with three middle-aged ladies on board has as much legal right to use a lock on the Mississippi as a fully laden river barge measuring 195 by 35 feet?

As the brave canoeists approached their first lock at St. Paul, Anne Sherve-Ose recalled: “We had read the little sailor’s guide to lock safety and felt we were prepared for the challenge.”

What could go wrong?

Neither the manual nor the unsuspecting sailors anticipated the power of poor communication. We won’t recount every detail of the incident here, but the canoes were in the wrong place at the wrong time and could have been quickly sucked to the bottom of the giant lock, millions of gallons of water rushing out. They would have been helpless in the giant, swirling whirlpool. A life-saving, split-second decision was made to paddle back out of the lock.

The lesson? Danger always lurks for canoes on the Big River.

The next few trips through the locks were more routine and almost boring compared to their first experience.

Sherve-Ose wrote, “After the first few locks, approaching and passing them became less fun, as it is a time-consuming process. Furthermore, the water in the locks is particularly bad; dirty and smelly, with a lot of floating waste.”

In addition to locks and dams, Mississippi paddlers must also be aware of wing dams. They are no more than long piles of rocks that extend into the river and help control flooding, erosion, and currents. At high tide, wing dams are submerged and mostly invisible; at low tide, the dams protrude several feet above the surface. Either way, they can be deadly to small boats.

“… They (wing dams) play havoc with paddlers, especially those who were as unaware of their existence as we were. All we knew was that the surface of the river would occasionally boil and swirl, creating cyclonic movements that resembled giant bathtub drains. I can’t think of how many times we nearly went under in the early days. By the end of the trip I was paranoid about wing dams, so much so that my ‘mates’ would tease me about them…” Sherve-Ose observed.

They left St. Paul in 2008 and paddled to Brownsville, Minnesota. Along the way, they passed through Minnesota river towns that had much to offer travelers in canoes and otherwise. Red Wing, named after a Dakota Indian chief, is home to Red Wing Pottery, Red Wing Shoes and the beautifully restored 1904 Sheldon Theatre. It’s about as charming as river towns get.

Then, like a string of pearls, come Lake City, Wabasha and Winona, Minnesota, and beautiful La Crosse, Wisconsin. All offer visitors memorable summer days on or near the river, and some of the most beautiful fall foliage on the continent. Readers of a certain age will remember a beer “brewed in the land of azure waters,” or another originating from “God’s country,” aka La Crosse. And that slender Indian maiden who once beckoned you to buy her butter at the dairy in Fareway? All these and many more good things come from this stretch of the great river.

Deb Lennox-White drew on her knowledge of Native American tradition and began each year by sprinkling tobacco on the water and saying an Ojibwe prayer for a safe journey. As things developed, the three brave ladies would need all the protection they could get in the flood year of 2011, when they traveled from Dallas City, Illinois, to St. Charles, Missouri, near St. Louis.

Flooding is common on the Mississippi, but 2011 saw many records broken. Above-average snowfall in the winter of 2010-2011 and above-average rainfall in the spring caused the river to run high when voyageurs launched their canoes in June.

At Fort Madison, there was so little room under the Santa Fe Railway bridge, Sherve-Ose recalled, “We were almost decapitated when the powerful current swept us under.”

Further away, in tiny Hamburg, Illinois, she recalls: “We paddled straight down the main street of town, aptly named Water Street.”

How dangerous is high water?

Sherve-Ose cited a few statistics: “When you realize that a gallon of water weighs eight pounds, a cubic yard weighs a ton, and the river can be a mile wide, you begin to understand how dangerous it can be.”

About 95% of their time on the river they were out of reach of emergency help. Often cell phone reception was poor or non-existent and it was difficult to pinpoint their exact position for a potential search and rescue mission. Capsizing in the river was never going to end well. The fear of it never left their minds.

As they approached St. Louis and the end of the 2011 paddling season, they thought about the sights of St. Louis, including the famous Gateway Arch. Their last night on the river, somewhere near Alton, Illinois, a good camping spot proved impossible to find. Tired and feeling the need to get off the river, they pulled over at what must have been a gravel pit. After a typical river meal of macaroni and cheese, the paddlers gratefully went to bed for a well-earned rest.

Sherve-Ose picked up the story there: “Around 5am we woke up to thunder and lightning. Soon we heard tornado sirens wailing from the nearest town. Then the wind started to blow. The rain was pouring down and we were all spread out in our tents, hoping they wouldn’t blow away with us in them. Deb K.’s tent actually blew over. It had been a short night, so I wasn’t happy to be woken up by two voices saying, “Anne, Anne, our canoe is gone!”

It was all too true. As always, the night before they pulled the canoe ashore and tied it to a small tree. Sherve-Ose theorized “A strong gust of wind hit the canoe at just the right angle, causing it to capsize, snapping the rope and blowing it into the river.” Life jackets, backpacks, tents, wet clothes and paddles were still there, but their trusty red canoe – their lifeline and only means of transportation – was now well on its way to New Orleans.

They were rescued by a fisherman who loaded the women and all their belongings into his boat and carried them downstream to the next road, where, having no other means of transport, they could walk to seek further help.

It turned out to be a road that led to the Yacht Club of St. Louis, where the canoeists were at the mercy of a decidedly posh membership.

Sherve-Ose provided the hilarious scene: “…We three dirty, stinking, filthy ladies were in the Yacht Club, with all the big bosses in St. Louis. We were not talked about, but I am sure we became the subject of many others.”

Thus the 2011 canoe season came to an inglorious end.

On the way that summer of massive flooding, Deb Stephens-Knutson expressed her concerns about the conditions they would encounter on the river south of St. Louis. She was certain it would be unbearably hot no matter what time of year, and hungry insects and reptiles would be lurking everywhere, waiting for the next canoe around the corner. Yes, St. Louis was clearly the place where their odyssey would end. And as if the climatic conditions weren’t bad enough, a storm had swept away their canoe, a sign that the gods were no longer with them.

Despite these fears, the group’s leader, Sherve-Ose, recalled: “When we got to the yacht club, … I don’t remember it even being discussed at that point. The discussion was about where and how we were going to get a new canoe.”

Next time: From St. Louis to Greenville, Mississippi