10.2 to 9.8 RBD WARNING: Iron Pilings in River

Paddlers beware! Dangerous iron pilings or other iron works are found along the main channel top end of Grand Pass Island. This should be no threat to downstream paddlers. But if you are paddling back upstream to Venice you might find yourself hugging the shoreline towards the top end of Grand Pass Island and in danger of severe consequences. Be very careful about not inadvertently running over one of these pilings with sharp rusty edges. They would easily cut a hole through most vessels.

9.6 - 8 LBD Lower Venice Anchorage

Active anchorage with lots of activity for vessels conducting business in the Venice area. You are safe to paddle through this anchorage if no tugboats are visible, and there is no apparent plans for movement of freighters.

6.9 RBD Un-Named Pass

6.7 - 1.5 Pilottown Anchorage

6.6 RBD Un-Named Pass

6.5 LBD Leon’s Pass

4.9 LBD Mary Bower’s Pass

Mary Bower’s Pass leads to Mary Bower’s Pond, Clearwater Bayou, and the open waters of Breton Sound.

4.8 RBD New Pass

A new Pass opened in 2011 West Bank RBD mile 5 with a beautiful sandy bar and nearby cypress trees (south side of the entrance). Strong flow at all water levels, but of course stronger at high water. Ride the current as it swirls into this opening and pick your route for landing (or continuing into West Bay).

4.8 RBD New Pass Cypress Beach

On the south side of New Pass paddlers will find a good location for low and medium water camping. Follow swirling waters through New Pass and paddle hard around eddy to make landing. Possible camping on beautiful sandy beach with several cypress trees behind. Possible camping when the river is below 2VG. Questionable above 3VG.

3.6 RBD Un-Named Pass

3.5 LBD Old Quarantine Station

3.5 - 2.9 LBD Cubit’s Gap

Many enticing routes are possible for paddlers through Cubit’s Gap, with beautiful cane-lined passes and other waterways ending in pristine ocean beaches. But many routes also dead end in muddy ponds, and you could easily get lost by the myriad choices within 49,000 acres of marsh! Cubit’s Gap creates a yawning opening for muddy water to flow into a giant pooling area where the muddy water reforms and splits around 3 islands into 4 openings: Main Pass, Octave Pass, Brant Bayou, and Raphael Pass, all within Delta National Wildlife Refuge. All of these proceed to the Gulf, with splinter passes and bayous all of their own leading off, some of which are listed below. Paddlers could follow any of these to the Gulf, with beautiful long passages through wild places, and very little traffic.

Cubit’s Gap/Main Pass Camp

A wooded high ground is found in Cubit’s Gap at the mouth of Main Pass 3.7LBD with a protected anchorage (in low flow) and good natural ground landings for canoes, kayaks and paddleboards. This site can be identified from the distance by a high lookout tower that was once used at the Old Quarantine Station. More detail in River Log.

Cubit’s Gap: Main Pass

(12 miles to open water of the Gulf with good choices for beaches and island camps. Wilder and less traffic than most other passes, partially due to its shallow waters)

• Octave Pass North
• Delta Pass
• Cottam Pass

In some way parallel to nearby Baptiste Collette Bayou, Main Pass runs in a northerly direction for about a dozen miles. It is the biggest of the passes emerging from Cubit’s Gap, and yet doesn’t carry much more water because of sedimentation and accretion in its sluggish channel.

12 miles down Main Pass will lead paddlers through Delta National Wildlife Refuge to an opening at the open waters with some great choices for beaches and wildlife viewing. If you are a birder or seek the solitude of wild places this might your best choice. Main Pass is silting in. In the next 10 years it might be closed up, especially towards its end where most water seems to divert eastward through Delta and Cottam Pass. The old Main Pass curves northward and shallows as it widens and then splits ways around a marshy island (Main Pass Island) with beaches on ocean side. As result the last three miles are almost inaccessible to anyone but shallow draft vessels -- such as the kinds we paddle -- canoes, kayaks and paddleboards!

Octave Pass North

4.5 miles down from Cubit’s Gap, Narrow Octave Pass North meanders seductively northeastward from Main Pass. After four miles of meandering Octave Pass North ends at the Gulf at the end of a peninsula of marshy cane swamps, with no beaches. In calm weather you could paddle over to the beaches at the end of Main Pass (approx one mile away). Or you could turn around here and paddle Octave Pass North back up to Main Pass, and back to Cubit’s Gap.

Cubit’s Gap: Octave Pass

• Cottam Pass
• Savage Island
• Brant Island
• Contrariete Pass
• Spanish Island
• Dead Woman Pass
• Dead Woman island
• Twenty Seven Pass
• Bienvenue Pass

Octave Pass makes a spectacular, but also convoluted, 10 mile run run to reach the open waters of the Gulf of Mexico. (This route is best viewed on Google Earth). Narrower than Main Pass, Octave also has better flow. It wanders eastward around Savage Island/Brant Island. Brant Bayou parallels it on the other side of the islands, and then joins forces at the eastern tip of Brant Island (which is really nothing more than a swampy marshland, and is probably disappearing). The two flow as one Octave Pass around Spanish Island and then split into Dead Woman Pass and Contraire Pass. Follow Contraire Pass (to the left) as it meanders northeasterly several miles, and then splits around Contraire Island. Follow Contraire Pass (right Fork) or Bienvenue Pass (left fork) at this split to reach Timber Island, which rises very slightly above a very shallow bay opening up into Breton Sound. The beach on Timber Island would be a fantastic last camp for your Mississippi River Expedition. And your return paddle would be as interesting and wild as it was coming in.

Cubit’s Gap: Brant Bayou

Brant Bayou is a dead end for reaching the Gulf, but leads adventurous paddlers to remote hideaways like the below ponds:

• Albert’s Pond
• French Duck Pond
• Pintail Pond
• Dave Inside Pond
• Coule Pond
• and many others...

Cubit’s Gap: Raphael Pass

Raphael Pass meanders gently through the marshes behind Pilottown, and is also a dead end to paddlers wanting to reach the gulf.

• Martins Pass
• Round Pond

Delta National Wildlife Refuge

Delta National Wildlife Refuge was established in 1935. Its 49,000 acres were formed by the deposition of sediment carried by the Mississippi River. This area combines the warmth of the Gulf and the wealth of the river. Its lush vegetation is the food source for a multitude of fish, waterfowl and animals. Delta is the winter home for hundreds of thousands of snow geese, coots and ducks. Natural History: Delta NWR is part of the currently active delta of the Mississippi River. Formation of what is now the refuge began in mid 1800’s at Cubit’s Gap. Refuge was established as a bird sanctuary. An abundance of ducks, geese, raptors, wading birds, shorebirds, and several bird rookeries are on the Refuge. Refuge is composed of marsh habitat. (from USFW)

2.4 LBD Shell Pipeline Co., Pilottown Wharf

This terminal is used to unload crude oil from barges and tankers before being sent up to refineries. Hurricane Katrina caused approximately 1,400,000 gallons of crude oil to spill from tanks at the facility into the surrounding environment. There were six tanks but only three remain.

2.9 RBD Un-Named Pass

1.9 LBD Associated Branch Pilots and Crescent River Port Pilot Association, Pilottown Piers

1.9 LBD Pilottown

If you intend to stop at Pilottown, look for a narrow opening in the caney marshes one hundred yards upstream of the Pilottown docks. There is a narrow channel leading directly into the swamps that bisects a walkway connected to the town. You will find a safe landing here about 200 feet in, well protected from the waves of passing freighters. Pilottown could be a great place to stop and have lunch and refill water before the gulf -- if you can find anybody. This once busy port found East Bank along your way to the Gulf was hit hard by Katrina, and is losing services and population. Pilottown is a semi-private collection of dormitories for river pilots laying over between shifts. The compound has the feel of a quiet Key West village. Verdant leafy palm trees are scattered throughout. Large swamp rabbits graze in the Bermuda grass while egrets, anhingas and roseate spoobill stalk the surrounding wetlands. (Mark River)

Pilottown was constructed and settled after September 1860 in its current location. It replaced the earlier village of La Balize that had been founded more than 160 years earlier downriver. After the hurricane of September 14–15, 1860, blew its buildings down and destroyed the area in a storm surge, La Balize was finally abandoned. The main river passage was moved to the Southwest Pass, because of its deeper water. The Mississippi River pilots built their new settlement upriver above Head of Passes. They named it Pilottown. The first French settlers had built a crude fort and dwellings for La Balize near the mouth of the Mississippi in 1699. The name meant "seamark", and the French built a 62-foot-high wooden pyramidal structure in 1721 to help guide ships on the Mississippi River and at its shifting delta. This was where river pilots came to live. Pilottown is built on piers in swampy ground on the East Bank about 10 miles south of Venice.

Pilottown serves as a temporary home for members of the Crescent River Port Pilots' Association and as a base for oil exploration. Although the captain is always responsible for his ship, all oceangoing ships must take a pilot on board when entering the Mississippi River system. The river has shifting passages and sand bars that make the journey difficult, especially given the tides and the powerful current downriver. The Associated Branch Pilots supplies river pilots for ships traveling between the Gulf of Mexico and Pilottown. The Crescent River Port Pilots' Association supplies river pilots between Pilottown and New Orleans, and the New Orleans-Baton Rouge Steamship Pilots Association supplies pilots for ships that are bound for Baton Rouge.

Pilottown consists of a few buildings, including temporary housing for river pilots and a weather station, and some large oil tanks. Because Pilottown is only a few feet above river level, a raised concrete walkway connects these buildings and runs the length of the island, to provide some footing in flood conditions. Pilottown is accessible only by water or by helicopter. In the 19th and early 20th century many fishermen, pilots and their families lived here, but now most make their residence in larger communities upriver. The pilots stay in temporary quarters in Pilottown only while working. The peak population was probably reached in the 1860s, when La Balize had a population of some 800 people. Pilottown no longer has any permanent residents; the remaining few in 2005 did not return after Hurricane Katrina. The Crescent River Port Pilots still maintain headquarters but pilots do not reside full-time. Pilottown is not listed in the United States census figures.[1] Pilottown's one-room school was closed in the 1970s. Although Pilottown still has its own zip code of 70081, the Pilottown Post Office was closed when the US Postal Service could not find a postmaster willing to live in the village. (Wikipedia)

0 RBD Mile Zero (SW Pass) Camp

An unusual and very expansive field of sand (the size of several football fields) sprawls behind the rip-rap on the West Bank at the Head of Passes, RBD at the mouth of the Southwest Pass (-0- RBD). Good camping is found here at low to medium water levels (between 0 and 2VG), but the entire bar goes under in higher water flows, above 3VG. Solid rip rap lines the bank here, so paddlers will have to physically lift their vessels out of the water over a rough rock-lined bank.

Head of Passes

All river miles upstream are denoted AHP or Above Head of Passes, while all mileage downstream is BHP or Below Head of Passes. Like the death of Jesus as the landmark date in Western History, Mile -0- Head of Passes is the place that determines the mileage locations of all places, lights, docks, points, islands, cities and towns upstream and downstream on the entire 954 mile long Lower Mississippi River AHP -- that plus 20 miles BHP (down the Southwest Pass).

Use the Rivergages.com website for water levels and flows at Head of Passes, and to get an idea of the patterns of recent tides at this location. The gage itself is located adjacent the Mile -0- tower. While viewing water levels, you might want to request a plot of water levels from the past 7 days to get a visual idea of the patterns exhibited by recent tides: http://rivergages.mvr.usace.army.mil/WaterControl/stationinfo2?sid=01545&fid=HPGL1&dt=S

-0- Mile Zero

Mile -0- is the ultimate crossroads. The river spreads out over a mile wide here, and then divides three ways at Mile 0: South Pass, Southwest Pass, and Pass a Loutre. If you’re feeling adventurous (and the water is not too wild) make a landing at the base of the -0- Mile Zero tower and climb up for a fantastic view up and down the three major passes. WARNING: Watch for aggressive hornets and wasp nests! Sign in the Rivergator Paddler’s Register which is paced in a small yellow Pelican Case tied into the floorboards at the first level.

Southwest Pass

(20.2 Miles to the open waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Not recommended for paddlers. South Pass or Pass a Loutre are better choices.)

• Burrwood Bayou
• Pogo Producing Co (Last Refinery on Lower Miss)
• Southwest Pass Bar Pilot’s Standby Station
• Southwest Pass Lighthouse

Southwest Pass captures the most flow at Head of Passes Mile -0-, but is also crowded with freighters and is therefore the most dangerous of all the passes. It has been the navigation route of choice for sea-going vessels since 1853. The SW Pass is not recommended for paddlers unless you are craving some more harrowing adventures before your journey’s end! It does have the advantage of following the main channel to its ultimate conclusion. But be forewarned: all of the freighter and ocean-going traffic you have been sharing the river with now continues to open ocean waters, but with half of the river width to maneuver in! You will be closer to waves and passing freighters. Also traffic also speeds up as it leaves the confinement of docking and wharfing areas. If you had trouble making landings in waves beforehand, it will get worse down the SW Pass. Lastly, the Southwest Pass has numerous wing dams that extend far out into the pass that can pose a danger to paddlers and force them closer in to the big ships. The Southwest Pass features the last refinery on the Lower Miss, the Bar Pilot’s Standby Station, and the Southwest Pass Lighthouse. There is one piece of good news, though, if you do decide to take the SW Pass: you can avoid much of the upstream paddling by jumping off channel into Burrwood Bayou, which parallels the main channel on the East Bank (LBD). Just because you’re in the Delta doesn’t mean you’ve left cables and pipelines behind: you will paddle over unseen South Central Bell Telephone and Telegraph cables, as well as petroleum pipelines laid by Shell Oil, Texaco, Tennessee Gas Transmission, Chevron, Southern Natural Gas, and Texas Pipeline companies.

River Levels Down SW Pass

Use the Rivergages.com website for water levels and flows down the Southwest Pass, and to get an idea of recent tides. This Gage is located 7.5 miles down the SW Pass. On this page you can request of plot of water levels from the past 7 days to get a visual idea of the patterns exhibited by recent tides:

http://rivergages.mvr.usace.army.mil/WaterControl/stationinfo2?sid=01575&fid=&dt=S

-4.5 LBD Burrwood Bayou (Top Entrance)

Alternate route to end of SW Pass, but very little flow. For best water speed stay main channel to the end of the SW Pass. On the way back detour through Burrwood Bayou for easy return paddling. See below for bottom entrance.

-4.8 RBD Pogo Producing Co., W-1 Boat Landing (a.k.a. Scott's Landing)

-6.2 LBD Weber Marine, Sunshine Bridge Dry Bulk Transfer and Moorings

-7.6 LBD Energy Partners, Southwest Pass Wharf

-8.9 LBD Pogo Producing Co., E-3 Boat Landing

Pogo is the very last refinery on the Lower Mississippi River! If you are taking this route, you can now firmly leave all big refineries behind. On the other hand, you will still see many pipelines, derricks, oil platforms, and smaller petroleum operations. PXP Producing Company LLC, together with its subsidiaries, provides exploration, development, acquisition, and production of oil and gas properties in the United States, Vietnam, and New Zealand. The company owns approximately 1,900,000 gross leasehold acres in major oil and gas provinces in the United States; 6,354,000 acres in New Zealand; and 1,480,000 acres in Vietnam. The company was formerly known as Pogo Producing Company LLC and changed its name to PXP Producing Company LLC in October 2012. The company was founded in 1970 and is based in Houston, Texas. As of November 6, 2007, PXP Producing Company LLC operates as a subsidiary of Plains Exploration & Production Company.