Sunday May 18, 2008 ICW The Rigolets. East of New Orleans,  LA.  Lat 30° 08.27’ N, Long 89° 38.51’ W

We left Seabrook, TX a week ago today and we have only made it to just East of New Orleans. The week has been relaxing, tiring, enjoyable, frustrating. But we do now have our repaired sails which we picked up yesterday from Seabrook Marine in Seabrook, Louisiana.

Below should be a picture we took yesterday while negotiating the Mississippi River in New Orleans. However I tried sending this twice and I don’t think it went through so we are trying again without the photo. You will have to wait until we get to the East coast of Florida and get regular internet access! We had taken the ICW to Harvey lock (8 ft. rise)  where we entered the river and cruised down past the French Quarter at 10 knots (that’s with 3+ knots of current helping us) to Industrial Lock (12 ft. drop), where we left the river to head for Seabrook Marine.

Today we got fuel, water and groceries (it was about a mile and a half walk to the grocery store) and headed out to the Rigolets which are at the western edge of the Mississippi Sound. We are anchored here surrounded by salt water marsh and the surreal remains of a badly rusted oil platform and a street lamp sticking out of the marsh. We plan to  head out into the Gulf again tomorrow morning. With a forecast of favorable winds we will hope to make a lot more progress in the next seven days.

Tonight Janet cooked cream cheese and chicken enchiladas with fried plantain and cabbage salad. It’s quiet and, if you ignore the platform and the street lamp, almost idyllic. I may even have said it was idyllic if it was not for the no-see-ums that we had not anticipated. We both rushed our food to spray on mosquito repellent but after that they started getting at our scalps. Tomorrow night sailing under the stars with a nearly full moon and favorable winds should be perfect!

Jeremy and Janet