Milestone -- saltwater

We woke up Friday with a sense of excitement about reaching Mobile bay. Climbing the steps into the cockpit revealed a spectacular morning with slight steam on the water lit by the sunrise. We were underway by 7:05, with the engine purring like a sewing machine.


We were 52 miles from "Mile Zero" of the Tennessee Tombigbee. At 8:30 we could feel the familiar turbulence in the water created by a towboat ahead. The disturbed water from these behemoths travels for miles. Sure enough, as we came around a bend we saw a downbound tow pushing six barges of coal. Fortunately, we had a rare wide, straight section of the river coming up to pass him. There was another tow in front of him, so we passed them both. This was getting to be "old hat."

The river was starting to look different. There was hanging moss in the trees. There were gulls and terns mixed in with our now familiar herons, egrets and kingfishers. At mile mark 23 we celebrated at our fist sighting of a pelican. Salt water can't be far away.

The only navigational hazard between us and the bay was a swing bridge at mile 13.2. There has been a lot of buzz about this bridge since we left Chattanooga. It is scheduled to be replaced on Oct. 30, and the river will be closed to navigation for several days. We passed the replacement bridge a few miles upstream of the new one. It was a gleaming new structure covered with dozens of workers in hard hats.

When the old bridge came into view, I had a little difficulty raising the bridge tender on the radio because I wasn't call the bridge by the right name. My chart showed it as the CSX Railroad Bridge at mile 13.2. A towboat captain came to my rescue and told me to call it the "Fourteen Mile Bridge." When I did this the tender immediately responded. He said it would take a few minutes to clear the workers from the area so that he could swing the rusty old thing out of my way. Well, it was more than a few minutes. More like a half hour, but I could see workers scurrying about moving things that were in the way of the process. I felt a little guilty that they were doing all of this for me. I got over that when I saw a big towboat round the bend coming up stream. It opened just in time for him to take the east side opening and I took the west.


At this point the marine radio traffic was starting to get very heavy. We were with in range of Mobile Harbor and it sounded like a busy place!

When we came up on an island (appropriately named 12-mile island) our chart showed that we should go around it to the left. My chart plotter shoed it much shallower that way, but I decided to follow the government chart. Almost immediately the depth started shrinking and I actually pulled the engine back to idle when the depth sounder read 6.4 feet. The engine shuddered, and for a second I thought we had run aground. When I put the engine back in gear, it smoothed out and the depth started slowly increasing to 7 feet. A couple of miles later when we got to the end of the island, I could see that the towboats were going around the other side. So much for trusting the government charts.

An hour and a half later we passed under a very pretty (and very high) bridge and entered Mobile Harbor. It was dredge to 40 feet, so depth navigation was not an issue, but traffic was. There were hundreds of barges and tugs tied to the shores. There were all manner of dry-docks, loading cranes and mechanisms. We say a very strange looking craft being built in a huge building on our left side. It was shiny welded aluminum with twin hulls and a long, pointy bow. We learned later that it is an experimental Navy ship, called the Enterprise, capable of 60-knot speeds with a low radar signature. Every boater in Mobile seemed to know about this project and was damn proud of it.

At 2:00 we crossed over Mile Zero and celebrated with a shot of rum. Almost on cue, a dolphin broke the surface as he escorted us into the bay. Agaliha was pumping salt water through her systems for the first time and seemed to like it just fine.

We had travelled 700 miles from Chattanooga with perfect weather and not a single mechanical hitch. We pointed the boat down the Mobile shipping channel toward the cut-off toward Dog River Marina, our home for the night. We got to the marina about 4:00 and then took a courtesy car to Food World for a grocery run.


We ate dinner at the Mobile Yacht Club, where they served us a delicious grouper, stuffed with crabmeat. The seafood goal had been achieved.


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