Mobile River Loop

Forecast for the day was choppy conditions in Mobile Bay. Sometimes wrong forecasts are good.

As always, dredging Mobile River to keep it deep enough for ships is a never ending process.

Mobile Skyline.

Mobile Convention Center.

Nor Goliath, an offshore servicing rig for the oil industry capable of lifting about 2000 Tons. That would be about 4 million pounds.

BW Pioneer is a FPSO ship. FPSO stands for: Floating Production, Storage, Offloading vessel. This ship, capable of processing 80,000 barrels of oil per day, had been working off Lousiana at a depth of about 2600 meters (1.6 miles) making it the deepest water operation of any FPSO in the world. 

http://www.tparkerhost.com/not-average-vessel-bw-pioneer-fpso/

Memorial Day Weekend and the USS Alabama go well together. The historic battleship had a lot of visitors this weekend.

Interstate I-10.

Dauphin Island

Good News and Bad News.

The good news is the almost $7 million dollar Dauphin Island east end beach restoration project that brought in 325,000 cubic yards of sand is complete. The new beach is proving to be popular.

http://www.al.com/news/mobile/index.ssf/2016/03/no_alcohol_ban_for_dauphin_isl.html

The bad news is the free east end parking is limited and my favorite east end sheltered kayak launch has moved so far away from the now crowded parking area that it is not worth using anymore. Most of the formerly sandy shoreline is now a kayak un-launchable rock shoreline.

The new long rock shoreline is visible on the right. To launch at the sandy beach visible on the left side of the photo will require carrying the kayak across a painfully long stretch of new sand.

The north side of Little Dauphin Island Bay is enticing.

All the sand that was moved to Sand Island Lighthouse has been swept away.

The Mobile Bay ship channel is next to the lighthouse so you may get to some big ships up close while kayaking near the lighthouse. A porpoise or dolphin jumps out of the water while playing in the ship's bow wake.

Not much of a wake from this big ship hauling railroad cars.

The Fort Morgan ferry passes nearby as I head back across Mobile Bay on this Double Crosser kayak trip.

Pelicans flying nearby with an oil rig visible in the background.

Unique looking beach house.

Nifty looking plant sculpture.

South Fork Deer River

South Fork Deer River is one of only a few waterways in Mobile County you never hear me bitching about for being polluted with trash. Why not?

First, it is outside the City of Mobile jurisdictional limits. Secondly, it has no major State road crossings. Thirdly, it is in a rural area lacking any major storm water drainage system. Because of those reasons one can paddle the relatively short South Fork Deer River and see almost no shoreline trash. If there is no trash pollution to document there can be no complaints.

Much of South Fork Deer River's shoreline is salt marsh grasses.

There are some strange things to see on the horizon.

Quiet backwaters of upper South Fork Deer River.

One of the two bridges you will pass under.

This is one way to make a private boat launch canal off limits to public boat and kayak traffic.

Crazy Coot paddling in the river.

One of the ships you might see while crossing the trash polluted Theodore Industrial Canal  to get to the entrance of South Fork Deer River.

Gilliard (Pelican) Island

Conditions were perfect for a couple mile crossing of open Mobile Bay waters over to Gilliard Island.

Gilliard's Island looks small but the man-made dredge spoils island is about 6 miles in perimeter.

I call it Pelican Island for an obvious reason.

If you ever want to see thousands of pelicans, paddle around Gilliard Island on a calm day.

If you're lucky a big ship will pass closely in the ship channel while you are on the east side of the island. I missed a close encounter with this ship by about half an hour.

Pelicans Galore.

Standing room only for pelicans along the rocks which surround the entire Island.

It is a surreal paddling experience to be around so many pelicans.

Always a fascinating ship to see is the Deep Blue.

Another big ship in the Theodore Industrial Canal near where I launched in North Fork Deer River.

08/25/2013 - Theodore Industrial Canal

1) A heron takeoff is not always a beautiful sight.

2) A little alligator left in Dog River.

3) Old gray beard.

4) Industrial drainage site into Theodore Industrial Canal.

5) The end of Summer is near. Hahahaha.

6) The wind went still as the sailboats started going out to Mobile Bay.

08/02/2012 - Mobile River Blues

Header Image is a photo of a ship with an interesting name.

On the way to Mobile River some Manatees surprised me in Spanish River.

One of the Manatees went under the kayak. Awesome.

Besides Manatees, people swim and fish in Mobile River.

Isn't this a cute little rodent? Looks like a politician to me - a RAT. A 14 Trillion Dollar debt and a population of only 315 million Americans means your share of politician sanctioned debt is about $50,000. Pay up. Hahaha.

An increasing trend in river bank pollution is Oil Booms which are installed to protect the environment. Abandoned boom ends up being the pollution. The canvas is quick to deteriorate exposing the Styrofoam.

Mobile River tends to attract large pieces of garbage. Or, wait, could this be Mobile's new cruise ship?

Companies along Mobile River often try to stabilize the bank of their property using garbage. See the sunglasses?

Someone grading their property pushed soil into the river - no biggie - the Corps of Engineers keep Mobile River dredged. What is in those pipes?

Five different petroleum slicks seen today. I feel so bad for Manatees surfacing to breathe through second hand fuel. 

Two of the small sheens I think are related to the oil and grease on the railroad bridges at Chickasaw Creek and Three Mile Creek. None of the petroleum sheens were big enough to investigate further and report.

Question: What do you get when cross a gung-ho Forever Wild supporter with a gun and an important sign? Answer: Hey, it was orange so the high school dropout redneck shot at it. Vote NO for acquiring any more Forever Wild Land unless it is set aside as a wildlife refuge where hunting will be prohibited, Forever.

Question: What will GulfQuest Museum visitors see when looking across Mobile River? Answer: Look at this photo - lovely view for visitors eh?

Question: What is the difference between Mobile leaders and Mobile waterways? Answer: All Mobile leaders do is Hope for more Cash and all Mobile waterways do is Cope with more Trash.

There will be unintended consequences to poor leadership because once you let the people do whatever they want, you can't reverse it without anarchy. Once respect for the law is gone, there is no law.