Leaving out of Galveston was easy. I pulled into the fuel dock at Galveston Yacht Basin for fuel, water, ice and to let the princess off and take on another crew member. GYB is the place that almost every cruiser stops at before leaving the Houston area. (Unless you are stubborn like our very good friends on Bettie Del Mar) Well I got the fuel flowing and to my dismay, 70 gallons and $290 later I was feeling a little violated, especially knowing this was going to be the first of several fuel stops. (FYI, this is the first time I had filled the tank up, and the previous owner and I were debating on how much the tank held, he says 50 gallons, I checked the bilges, he is obviously wrong, my wallet says so.)
I had everything I needed to begin this journey. I had meticulously planned the trip and had the chart plotter programmed with anchorages and emergency anchorages so that I would not have to travel the ICW at night. (With our current complement of electronics we could easily travel at night but no reason to push our luck.)
Some of the first stretches of this run are pretty desolate and just outright boring. Extremely boring. (The pictures prove it!).
I was trying to make Taylor Outfall, a mere 60 miles. No such Lucy luck. I was told by a friend who had just done the trip about a good little anchorage and as I came up on it I decided to pull in for the night.
See very desolate, even the cows look bored!
First sunset of the trip.
Let the gator spotting begin! This one was small, he was only a 5 footer.
Our second day, I made a short run of it. I stayed at Shell Island. No clue why they call it that, because there was not a shell in sight.
It was pretty uneventful.
Finally out of Texas! Yes it is that big.
Our first big hurdle, the Ellender lift Bridge. You must call in 4 hours in advance to have it lifted. Here is the kicker. It is at 50', my masthead is 46' out of the water, however with my fancy new WiFi antenna will I have the clearance I need to get under without having it lifted. Guess we will find out.
Yes I had the clearance but just barely.
Well the princess was getting all antsy in her pantsy to see me. (I think she was really just nervous about the boat and wanted to see it.). I was looking at all of the possible anchorages that I could make and they were all well away from civilization. The way it was looking was that she was going to miss the boat. (hehe). That was when the Royal tantrum began. There was scepter waiving and royal decrees being tossed about, it was nuts. What's a wary sailor supposed to do. Well like anyone would do in that situation I found an alternate port of call. It was way out of my way (20 miles, maybe 30). So Lake Charles, here we come.
I start searching all of my books and charts looking for a stopover. That is when I found this amazing little marina. Bowtie Marina. It is in Contraband Bayou, right around the corner from L'Auberge du Lac Casino. What princess doesn't like the sparklies of a casino. So I call her up and tell her where we will be.
Go here, cheapest fuel on the gulf coast. If I would have known this I would have fueled here and not GYB.
Bowtie also houses the lake Charles sector of the coast guard.
It was an eventful 3 days. But there is lots more to come.
- The Hubby
- Posted from aboard S/V Jus CrewZen
Raymond! Good to see you've had a great trip. We miss you guys and wish we could do a little sailing together.
ReplyDeleteYou should come to Mexico if you want cheap diesel, btw.