Travels of the Confetti

1/26-27/11 The last time we came through New Orleans, we had a terrible time getting through the two locks that flank the Mississippi River. The locks were overcome with commercial traffic and we were not allowed to pass through until near dark. That put us in a narrow canal with rock banks as the only place to anchor. It was a very uncomfortable night with barges passing within spitting distance. They came by all night long. This time we were determined to beat the system so as we approached New Orleans we anchored in a less desirable spot but ten miles closer to the river. We got up at day break only to have fog too thick to make a run solo. Finally a tug with tow came by (named "John 3:16") and we fell in behind him and crept along until the fog lifted. We made it to the first lock and found no traffic at all. We breezed through and proceeded to the second only to find out it was closed for maintenance daylight hours until further notice. There is no where to anchor on the east side and especially on a moonless pitch dark night. There was no option but to find a tug that wouldn't be traveling too fast and follow him closely enough to avoid collisions with bridges, pilings etc. It happens that there was a tug locking through with us and he agreed to let us follow while we cleared New Orleans. We followed him until 9:00 pm and finally spotted an anchorage called Rabbit Island that would do. We pulled off and anchored successfully. It was so dark we would have followed him off the edge of the world.