New Orleans

April 20, 2009
Linda gets the hero of the day award today. She kept us from scratching a freshly painted 52' Hatteras! Here’s what happened.
This morning we woke to 40 mph winds in the harbor. We were surrounded by apartments so I’m not sure what the wind speeds actually were but they were 40 mph at my boat. The forecast was for early morning showers then clearing in the afternoon.
I printed all the charts for the ICW between Galveston and New Orleans so we would have charts to refer to. NOAA has the charts on the internet. I can only print to 8 ½ x 11 so we have to print several pages for just one chart, actually I just print the parts I need, but it works and provides us with the charts we need. I’ve tried unsuccessfully to buy them. After I printed the charts, we decided the weather was clear enough to go so we headed out across Lake Ponchatrain. We were repeatedly assured it was okay to cross Lake Ponchatrain. I was a little worried because others had said it may not be safe after hurricane Katrina. In fact, we had a nice day. We were going into the wind so I motored the 17 miles to New Orleans.
As we came across the lake I watched the satellite weather radio showing thunderstorms popping up around us but none ever actually on us. We finally got a little sprinkle.
When we began approaching the channel I looked at the Chartplotter information and learned that I was supposed to contact the channel bridge three hours ahead of time. So, I began trying to reach them by radio. That was unsuccessful. Finally, we dug up a phone number, which I called, and the bridge called me back. Actually, it was the wrong bridge but the guy was really nice and radioed the correct bridge to raise so I could enter. It raised and we came in.
We stopped at Seabrook Harbor, the marina I tried to call the day before. It was a marina in the channel and it sold diesel so we refueled. There I learned that the next place to stop or anchor is Houma which is 55 miles away. The ole one step forward, two steps back syndrome hit us again. We had only made about 17 miles and we had to stop. So, we bought fuel, rented a transient slip, and prepared to stay the night.
I have only tried to back this boat into a dock one time. That was in Key Largo. What a disaster. I couldn’t even begin to get the boat to back properly. Since then I’ve had to back a little here and there but I’ve been determined to pull into any slip, not back in. "I’ll practice backing when I get back to Texas," I thought.
In Slidell, I had the perfect slip to practice backing into. Thought about it. Then thought, "no, I will learn to back into a slip when I get to Texas."
Seabrook’s transient slip had to be backed into. Bummer. "Okay," I thought, "I will want to back into the wind for more control." So past the slip I motored and turned around to come back downwind so I could back upwind. First try, bad. Second try better but not good. Third try I came in like a charm, except, I cut the power too soon. The wind caught the bow. The bow swung toward this freshly painted 52' Hatteras. Yelling and screaming came in from everywhere with everyone telling me what to do. But, Linda , the hero, was on the bow and she ran to the starboard side, grabbed the Hatteras and held our boat off, trying to push it away. It wouldn’t budge. The jib hung up on the anchor of the Hatteras. But, Linda held fast. She wasn’t going to let our boat or the other get damaged. Things calmed long enough for me to back a little more and we got into the slip with the help of no less than four other people running from boat to boat to keep us off. Okay, I may practice before we get to Texas, just in case I have to do this again.
We tied up and cleaned up and, using the ole if life gives you lemons make lemonade philosophy, we headed to the French Quarter to a festival and to eat. It was packed. Clearly New Orleans is making its party town comeback.
When we got home I fretted. Tomorrow we leave the dock and head through downtown New Orleans with about five bridges to raise or otherwise move so we can pass through. We have to go through two locks and five miles up the Mississippi. I have an extreme amount of angst over what we are about to do. Extreme angst. It isn’t fun. I go to sleep thinking about being in a lock and having a barge bang into the boat, breaking it down its centerline. I was really worried, I fell asleep.
Bump! I had just fallen asleep when I heard our boat bump. I climb out of bed, put on my glasses, and looked out. Nothing seemed wrong until I realized that the starboard stern line had released and we are bumping into the other yacht next to us. I couldn’t believe it! The bump was very soft so there were no scratches, damage or any other problem. We came loose from a line. A line I had tied. I finally retied, added a spring line, and went back to bed. By the way, a spring line is a rope that, in this instance, ran from a piling at the midsection of the boat to a cleat on the starboard stern. It prevented the boat from moving further backwards.
I hope tomorrow isn’t as crazy as today.
Post again tomorrow
Royal Crescent.