Voyages of Annie, The Great American Whistle Hunt - October 26, 2007

Good evening from Biloxi, Mississippi

Finally got the generator problem corrected. Finished up about 6 last night. Seems like it was the “let’s start replacing parts till it works” approach but it is running OK. Ran it all day today and didn’t miss a beat.

Left New Orleans at 1 AM this morning. Put everything away on the boat , lashed all of the cabinets shut and put everything on the floor that might fall. Had a relatively uneventful trip…practically no wind at all. The monotony was periodically broken by bottle-nose dolphins playing in the wake of Annie and pelicans diving for dinner. Got into Biloxi mid afternoon and dropped the anchor. About half of the marinas and hotels are up and going and half are still in pile of rubble post Katrina. There’s construction all along the waterfront. There’s a barrier island just offshore called “Deer Island” that provides good protection from SE winds. Right now there is no wind and the sky’s clear. Beautiful sunset. Winds are supposed to pick up again tomorrow and the forcast for the next week is the same, 8-10 knots every day.

Been thinking about hauling up the anchor and making the passage to Dauphin Island tonight while the wind is calm. Don’t like doing unknown waters at night though so will wait till the AM and see what things look like. Besides I am tired from the passage here.

The Biloxi waterfront is mostly hotels and casinos I went ashore and I asked where the nearest chandlery was to get some charts of Mobile Bay and its about 10 miles away. I’m not into riding my bicycle that far so I will just hang out here.

Carol will be coming first part of the week. We are waiting on some parts to arrive for the boat and then she will drive over here or to wherever Annie is at. Maybe up on the Tombigbee River or Black Warrior River by then. There’s not much to do here without transportation so as soon as the weather permits I will head out. Was going to go topside and grill a steak for dinner but then the temptation hit me. Maybe I should try to come up with a new recipe for Jimmy Dean’s frozen breakfast biscuits.Yummy yummy!!!

Wishing I could do some whistle hunting. With all of the destruction from Katrina I suspect there are a lot of old buildings in shambles that might yield some interesting artifacts. Unfortunately, until we get on the rivers, the water is too shallow to get close enough to shore to see anything. If I stay around here I will get in the dinghy and go poking around the waterfront tomorrow.

Ron Beberniss aboard Annie in Biloxi, Mississippi.