Life On The River. The Mississippi River Valley With Dean Klinkenberg Books And Travel

“The face of the water, in time, became a wonderful book … it was not a book to be read once and thrown aside, for it had a new story to tell every day.” Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi

The Mississippi River runs through ten states and has brought life to countless generations, from the first Native Americans, through to the settlers, and into the modern, industrial age. There are great cities along the river, as well as remote wilderness, and a huge variation in landscape, ecology, and culture along the way.

In this interview, Dean Klinkenberg shares his passion for the Mississippi River Valley and gives his tips on where to go, what to see, and why the river continues to be a source of endless fascination and inspiration.



Dean Klinkenberg writes mysteries and travel-guide books about life along the Mississippi River in the USA.



* Geography along the path of the Mississippi River

* The changeable nature of rivers

* Different spiritual meanings of the river

* Cities and towns of interest along the Mississippi south to New Orleans

* Areas of historical interest

* Options for activities like hiking, canoeing, and kayaking on the river

* Local specialties for food and drink

* Recommended books about Mississippi



You can find Dean Klinkenberg at MississippiValleyTraveler.com



Transcript of the interview

Joanna: Dean Klinkenberg writes mysteries and travel-guide books about life along the Mississippi river in the USA. Welcome, Dean.

Dean: Thanks, it’s a real treat to be here and to talk to you about my favorite body of water.

Joanna: I’m very excited. Obviously, to any new listeners, I’m British so I’m going to ask some basic questions. So let’s start with the geography.

Where is the Mississippi and what are some of the landscapes it cuts through?

Dean: The Mississippi runs right through the heart of the United States, cutting a north to south path, from Minnesota down to the Gulf of Mexico. So it touches 10 of the U.S. states in about 2,300 miles. States like Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois, Iowa, my home state of Missouri, and then ending just about 100 miles south of New Orleans, at the Gulf of Mexico.

It cuts through some really diverse parts of the U.S. and some diverse landscapes. And it’s an amazingly different river, as you travel from north to south.

Up in the northern reaches of the Mississippi, it’s really a small stream, and there are a lot of places in the 400 miles or so above the Twin Cities, of Minneapolis and St. Paul, where the river has been damned a little bit or there’s some obstacles, or even a couple of places you have to dodge a beaver dam if you’re canoeing or paddling down the river.

And then, it gradually gets bigger. By the time it gets to Minneapolis, it reaches the largest set of waterfalls. They’ve been greatly altered today but, at one time, they were a pretty impressive set of waterfalls. And then, the river passes through a narrow gorge for a few miles before opening up into a valley that’s about 5-miles-wide that was carved by melting glaciers a few thousand years ago.

It’s framed by these absolutely gorgeous 500-foot-tall limestone bluffs that run for hundreds of miles south of the Twin Cities, all the way down to St. Louis. Although the further south you go, they lose some elevation.

And then, 100 miles or so south of St. Louis, the bluffs end and the river enters the wide Mississippi delta, as people know it, or what scientists call the Mississippi Embayment. Just a very very wide floodplain that’s up to 100-miles-wide that at one time was covered ...