no boating under the influence

Vicksburg, Mississippi, tries very hard to keep the river from the city's streets. The levee wall is high and bleak on the river side; painted with murals on the city side. The river is high.

the river

To see the Mississippi River, I had to cross this, the River Bridge, to Arkansas to see it. So here it is on a rainy day.

mississippi river

This is as close as I got to the Mississippi River at Meeman-Shelby Forest State Park. The road goes to a boat launch on the river, but there's been flooding—this is the last of it—and so the boat launch is closed and HIGH WATER signs are supposed to keep us from going any further. So, being the law-abiding citizen that I am, I didn't.

mississippi river

The border of Wisconsin and Minnesota, where I-90 comes through, is the Mississippi River. Lock and Dam #7 (as well as all the other locks and dams on the river) were built to increase the depth of the river water to at least nine feet at those places where the river was normally shallower than that. Barges carrying grain and other stuff regularly come through here. It is still a commercial river, unlike the New York State Barge Canal/Erie Canal which is now just for recreation. And never were the locks in New York State able to accommodate the extremely long and wide rafts of barges that these locks can.