Late afternoon on the 6th Street Bridge

Formally, it's the Robert C. Byrd Bridge. It's been that way since it was dedicated and opened to traffic about four weeks before the 1994 election, when West Virginia's senior senator was running for re-election. But locals call it the 6th Street Bridge, which was the name of the old 1920s-era steel truss bridge that the new one replaced.

Adam and I went up on the bridge this evening to get some Ohio River photos. This is part of what we saw ...

The river pointed straight toward the sun as it sank toward the earth. There were no clouds, so the bridge left a good shadow on the river's surface.

That's me on the left and Adam on the right. His momma says he looks a lot like me. Can you see the resemblance here?

We were up on the bridge to see the mv. James R. Morehead go past pushing five coal barges. The sun was right behind the boat, lighting it up brilliantly.

While we were up there, this man and a teenager jogged past us heading from West Virginia to Ohio. A few minutes later, as seen there, they made the return trip.

Winter is almost over

Yesterday I went to the boat ramp at the mouth of the Guyandotte River here in Huntington. There was a boat coming down the Ohio River, and I wanted to see it. It was this one:

While I was  there, I noticed there was still about three inches of mud on the parking lot and the boat ramp, left by at least two bouts of high water in the past few weeks. Eventually, someone will come along and haul the mud off. Also, the ground that had been  underwater remains soft and muddy. Sooner or later, it will dry out.

Earlier today, I went to downtown Huntington to finish a chore that was necessary to apply for a job I'm interested in. I made a side trip to Harris Riverfront Park, and there I saw a guy with a shovel and a wheelbarrow scooping mud off some walkways down by the river.

The very lowest part of the park is still under a few inches of water.

When the river falls back to normal pool and the mud is off the concrete and asphalt, I will declare the winter of 2009-10 to be officially over and done with.