Top photo- sunrise in the swamp
One under it- in the locks
The start of this segment began at 0530 yesterday. We knew had a great distance, for a sail boat, to do on Sunday, the passage from Houma, Louisiana to New Orleans. The destination required about 75 miles, but more importantly, the transit of the locks and the Mississippi river enabled by those locks. That is not usually done in one day. Most cruisers stop short of the Mississippi, sometimes in Lafitte, Louisiana so that the “assault” on the locks and bridges is accomplished in one fairly easy day. Not us.

The weather pattern was shifting toward a long, cold few days if we did not get to New Orleans on Sunday. It was doable but we had to leave in the developing fog around Houma before sunlight. Dark, fog and the GIWW makes for no fun. We navigated using The Capn chartplotter, radar and cat like, albeit old sleepy cat, reflexes. By sunrise, we were approaching Bayou Blue Pontoon Bridge. This bridge is, like many in the area, a barge that is moved into place using cables from each side of the GIWW. One must wait until the cables are down on the bottom before attempting a passage. We approached the bridge with several tows astern and a few approaching from ahead. The bridge tender told us that due to a light barge in the way, the bridge would not be operating, at least until someone came to move it. Mind you, the GIWW, with all the commerce it handles was blocked by some bonehead that parked a ten by twenty barge against the bridge. So it was that 9 tows and Why Knot were stopped whilst someone came and moved the barge. Fortunately, a local came out and did that. While we were stopped, tow captains up and down the line were letting each other know that Bayou Blue bridge was “broke”. Forever more, the crew of Why Knot will refer to that bridge as “broke bridge”.

As we waited for Broke Bridge, for the first time in a while, I had a chance to let the sun warm my toes. Bear took a nap and things were not all that bad. The coffee tasted particularly good as we burned time from our daily plan. By 0830 we were underway again. All those tows were behind us as we motored through some very pretty areas approaching Lafitte. The most intriguing part was “Stump Alley” where the GIWW looks sort of manicured with the cypress knees and palms lining the edges of a very straight cut. We started there to see more civilization in the form of unbelievably loud tourists’ air boats and houses. It is that part of the area that hosts swamp tours. Cold people wearing industrial bright yellow hearing protection tear by in various directions, ducking out of bayous and across the GIWW with supposedly a smile on their 45 degree faces. Could that be fun?

When approaching Lafitte, one cannot help but contemplate the history of this place. It was in these swamps that the famous pirate lived and hid much of his booty. Locals are still looking for the goods and will be forever. Swamps and bayous lace this area and I am sure in the summer it is beautiful. As of our passage, it was eye candy but only to the extent that we had to pass quickly. Wiser captains stop there to make the New Orleans assault easier.

We motored on in the early afternoon thinking that our passage through Harvey Locks would happen quickly and we would be in the Lake (Lake Ponchartrain) in time for a toast of rotten grapes before the sunset. Just south of Harvey Lock is an intersection where one chooses Harvey or Algiers Lock. The former being upstream of the Industrial Lock across the Mississippi . Algiers Lock is downstream of Industrial thus requiring a transit upstream. It is about 6 miles from that intersection to Harvey. We chose that route and motored up to the Lopalco Bridge just short of Harvey. I called bridge and was told that it was “broke” but 52 foot masts have passed the 50 feet clearance before. Yeah, right they have. At the suggestion of the bridge tender, we approached the bridge dead slow and was told we were too tall and would hit. We had to retrack to the Algiers channel and I called them to see what the wait would be. They said 3 to 4 hours once we got there. Great! It was 1300 and we should have gone back to Lafitte for the night but we did not. We arrived at Algiers staging area and did circles at the request of the lockmaster who said he would try to lock us through soon. An hour or so later we did just that. It was a 13 feet lift to the Mississippi that was running big time. Out of the Algiers and into the big Miss was without incident although there were many ships. We motored by dozens of ships unloading concrete, coal, rocks and goods of all kinds. Whereas Corpus, and Galveston are more petroleum, this place handles much more. The current was over 3 knots opposing our crossing and the 5 miles to Industrial Lock, our key to the lake, took well over an hour. We had been underway 14 hours by then and were very tired and as the near future would prove, dull of wit. At least I was dull of wit, the best description I can use to describe stupid.

We staged, and stay staged for over an hour, for the Industrial canal lock. By the time we were through the lock, it was hour 15 yet we did a fine job of handling the locking process. We motored out of the lock and I failed to notice a low bridge just .2 miles beyond. I can now attest to the fact that one cannot move a bridge with a 10 ton vessel. We hit that sucker at 7 knots. In fact we had 2.99 encounters with it. First, the forestay that holds the headsail, gave way and went in to the water still attached to the bow. Next came the rain of stuff from the masthead, like wind instrument, windex , lights and radio antennas. That was hit one on the first beam. But wait, there are two and having successfully passed the first, we encountered the second. That one took the port spreader off by a complicated ballet of pushing pulling on various standing rigging. Next came the boom landing on the bimini frame which, unnoticed until the cold grey light of dawn, ripped the bimini and bent some of the framework. All of that took place over a 10 second period. So there, I admit I did it. What Katrina failed to do, I almost did by my lonesome. The only reason the mast did not come down was the spinnaker halyard attached to the bow pulpit (for those who don’t sail, it is the shiny railing on the bow that anchors the lifelines). When the forestay failed, the spinnaker halyard took the blow and absorbed the mast movement. In so doing, the bow pulpit got severely tweeked. It died doing that job, but the mast stands.

After the “Big Hit” we attempted to reach Seabrook Shipyard for the night. Two more bridges stood in the way. I used my handheld VHF (the masthead antenna was gone) to contact the L&N railroad bridge while Bear and I “stood down” our racked nerves. It went up on request and we motored through. The second bridge did not answer. The railroad tender asked if we could go under that bridge since it was closed for the evening. Damn! Thought our leaning mast must be shorter, I wasn’t risking taking it down and asked the railroad tender to “hold her open” for us to go the other way. We were shot by then and elected to duck into a cut in the inner canal and anchor. Just as we were anchor down, the front passed. Bear went below and I just sat in the cockpit in the rain and had a large adult beverage. Secondarily, I was on anchor watch.

This morning I surveyed the damage. It was as I expected and not pretty. In order to get to the shipyard, we still had those two bridges. It took 3 hours to raise anyone. I thought we had sailed into the Twilight Zone since the radios and cell phone met pure silence. I couldn’t reach the Coast Guard for a radio check. There in the cold mist, we sat and wondered what happened. As it turned out, methinks due to Mardi Gras, the communications finally came up and we called the railroad bridge who had a train parked on the bridge. We also called the part time second bridge several times before they answered. The tender said that she would open for us but had to call “the electricians” and would let us know when they arrived and when she would open. That said, I remembered that when we were bringing Why Knot back from this place after Katrina, it was that bridge that prevented us from taking the easy way out of the lake. Sure enough we passed the bridges after doing circles waiting for the bridge tender coffee and bignets to settle and the task at hand to be realized.

We motored to Seabrook Marine and tied up this morning only to find they were closed. It did not matter since my mindset was to do battle with anyone, but anyone that tried to keep us from tying up there. The first priority was to get shore power to the boat so Bear could have some normality. We can make our own power but a shore power cord, properly deployed, is what she needed.

We decided to take down time, read naps all day. I contacted the insurance company and the process begins to repair our “battle damage”. The marina opens on Wednesday after the culmination of Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday. We have lost our desire to partake in the festivities. We will just start the process of fixing the boat and we will continue once completed. Although we fought the bridge and the bridge won, we will continue. I can’t resist to call that bridge (WAIT FOR IT) the bridge over troubled waters or (WAIT FOR IT) A BRIDGE TOO FAR or (WAIT FOR IT) bridging the gap between west of Harvey Locks and East of Harvey Locks. From this point east the GIWW counts up numbers East of Harvey Locks. We have now made it 6.8 EHL.