For those with a passion for the Mississippi River and its ecosystems, a new podcast by Dean Klinkenberg, the Mississippi Valley Traveler, might be right up your alley or estuary. Dean, who lives in an old St. Louis neighborhood near the river, has penned novels, nonfiction, and travel books on the river. Also, he has been a traveling lecturer aboard riverboats, and he has paddled both the Upper and Lower Mississippi. He often shares photos and links to river songs on his website.

I met Dean in the summer of 2013 when he came upriver to Hannibal to catch a show by Dr. G & the Mudcats in the sweltering heat at the Mark Twain Boyhood Home & Museum’s Music Under the Stars. It was the beginning of a friendship born of our mutual love for the Mississippi and its magic, marvels, and mysteries. For a dozen years or more, Dean has operated a popular website, and now he has added a podcast. Soon his podcasts will include interviews with a wide array of guests. Below is a link to the first episode in which he explains how wanderlust led him to give up an academic career and to take to the river for paddling adventures, a sense of fulfillment, and an exciting recreational lifestyle as a canoeist and writer. The fictional river characters in his contemporary mystery novels are delightful, and I’m looking forward to following the entertaining stories in his educational podcasts. I hope you are, too.