We All Know About the Great Loop... What about Lower Missouri?

[Jhawkflyer]

So I'm thinking about running the Great Loop from St. Louis into Mobile, AL. That will require me to truck my Catalina C36 from Kansas City to St Louis. That got me to thinking about Ol' Muddy. Any reason I couldn't/shouldn't start down the Lower Missouri into St Louis, the Loop from there? The Missouri is fully charted/marked and commercial traffic use it all the time. Minimum depths are 10 ft or so.

Crazy? Anyone done it?

Cheers.
Flyer

[missourisailor]

Hey "J" hawk.

I know of several persons that have built large crusiers in the KC area and launched them on the MO for the trip south. For them it was less of a hassle to deal with the launching issues than with DoT for overweight and oversize highway travel.

Most of the river ramps around here are not long or deep enough to launch your Catalina 34 off a trailer. More than likely you are going to have to use a mobile crane off of one of the river wharfs for launch. All of which cost money.
Most often it is cheaper to haul out here, transport south than relaunch in the gulf than to try to launch on the MO here in KC.

But if you want to look into it, Google "Missouri river boat ramps kc" to find the public ramps.
The builders that I know who launched their boats, used private commercial wharfs in Parkville and Randolph. And both used cranes.

Good luck and let us know if you do it and your experience.