The other day I mentioned that the Okeechobee Waterway has its own navigational challenges...Today we encountered them! The first was the depth of the water in Lake Okeechobee: It is low and has been steadily dropping for weeks. The Army Corp of Engineers has the controlling depth posted at 5.7 feet today but, as it turned out, we never saw less than 6 feet.

The more interesting challenge waited for us on the East side of the lake: A railroad lift bridge with a clearance of only 49 feet even when its open! Now, before we left Marathon, Leslie and I very carefully measured our mast height and verified that it is 52 feet from the water to the top of the mast. Add on a foot for the lights and sensors mounted up there, and another foot for safety, and we have a 54 foot bridge clearance. All the other bridges on the Okeechobee Waterway have 55 feet clearances and we went under them without incident. But 49 feet is a LOT less than 54!

So what to do with the extra five feet? Well, as we planned this crossing, we verified that the low water was actually increasing the bridge clearances: That meant the bridge clearance was actually just under 52 feet. We still wouldn't clear it, but the difference wasn't as much. With a little bit of trigonometry, we calculated that leaning the boat over about 15 degrees should enable it to fit under the bridge. Now we heel over 15-20 degrees all the time while sailing so the prospect of leaning over 15 degrees wasn't too daunting.

Now, before you conclude that we are completely certifiable, I should mention that there is a long history of tipping sailboats under this particular bridge. In fact, its called the Okeechobee Limbo and there is even a commercial service that will do it for you. Of course, why would we pay somebody else to have all the fun? Before we headed off this morning, we carefully drained and filled selected tanks to make the boat heavier on the port side. When we got to the bridge, we anchored just before it, had lunch, and prepared...

We moved all the jerry cans of fuel and water over to the port side, then rigged our whisker pole at full extension off to the port side with the main halyard run through a snatch block at the end of the pole. Then I went out in our dingy and ran straps under the dingy and attached them to the main halyard. As Anne and Evelyn winched in the halyard, the weight in the dingy started to heel the boat over. But it wasn't enough...even with my full weight on the end of a 20-foot gin pole. But not to worry! I can make the dingy a LOT heavier: Anticipating this need, I had our big manual pump in the dingy and I pumped the dingy full of water....This, and some brute winching by Evelyn, got us just over ten degrees of heel, which I thought would be enough....15 would have been better, but 10 should do...

With the boat and dingy in this unlikely arrangement, Anne hauled the anchor and Evelyn slowly piloted us under the bridge. How close was it? Well, our VHF radia antenna only sticks up above the mast a couple of feet and it scraped along the underside of the bridge! But nothing else made contact and cheers were heard as we emerged on the EAST side of the bridge...Ah, I hear you wondering, but who took the pictures? Leslie! When I got in the dingy we also launched the kayak and Leslie paddled under the bridge first so she could record our adventure.

Once on the other side, we reversed the whole process, pumping the water out of the dingy, retrieving the kayak, securing the lines and stowing the pole all while continuing down the canal at idle speed. We even managed to get it all done before we met the tug and barge coming the other way!

An interesting day on the water...