Portal Pilot - Anahuac Channel

Evelyn and I decided to have a look at the Anahuac area recently. We went across the cut at marker 62 and anchored Saturday night in Trinity Bay just East of Marker # 1 of the Anahuac Channel. There was a light East wind and we had a comfortable night. The next morning we tried to enter the channel at marker # 2 from the East coming in from about 6' of water.

As we approached the channel, we started hitting bottom, but I plowed ahead to see if it was just some of the spoil which was supposed to be on the West side. After plowing as far as 3/4 of the way across the channel to the West side of the channel, Evelyn in frustration asked what I was doing. I explained that I was trying to find the channel. She insisted that I go to marker # 1 and get in the channel. I showed her that I was in the channel and had plowed across 3/4 of it. She insisted that there was no channel. After realizing that I was in a dialogue with a linguist, I agreed with her.

There is no Anahuac channel. There is a channel marked on the charts. There are channel markers, but there is no channel. Just south of channel marker # 2 there is even a mound of mud showing about 1/4 of the way into the channel from the right side. A local fisherman came by and when asked if the channel was silted in all the way to Anahuac, he replied that it was shallow until you reached the river. Hailing on channel 16 for local information about the Anahuac channel resulted in dead silence. If anyone has any information about how to get into the Anahuac area with 4' or more of draft, let me know.

Contributing Author
Pat O'Neal
Sea Lake Yacts
pat@sealakeyachts.com