Blakeley state docks tours

Additional excursion set Thursday after first sells out

by Jo Ann Flirt

After the first excursion sold out, Historic Blakeley State Park has scheduled an additional boat tour of the Mobile-Tensaw River Delta, which will include visits to the Alabama state docks.

The new tour aboard the Delta Explorer is slated to leave the Blakeley State Park dock on the Tensaw River at 9:30 a.m. Thursday and return at noon that day.

The tour route travels up the Tensaw River, cuts across the wild delta area into Bayou Canot, site of the deadly 1993 Amtrak train derailment and past the spot where the slave ship Clotilde was sunk. The route then moves down the Mobile River along the state docks and Port of Mobile - where a guide from the docks will board the boat and guide the tour - and back to Blakeley.

"We are scheduling this second trip because of the large number of inquiries we have received from people who were too late to buy tickets on the first tour," said Jo Ann Flirt, park director. The park scheduled the tour in March so that snowbirds could participate, Flirt said.

"The special archaeological tour up to the Indian Mounds of Bottle Creek also sold out early and we have inquiries about another excursion up there but the river water is too high now up in the Delta," she said.

Bottle Creek tours aboard the park's Delta Explorer will be rescheduled in the fall by the University of South Alabama Center for Archaeological Studies."

Tickets for the state docks tour cost $30 for adults and $15 for children and are available on a first-come, first-serve basis. Tickets can be ordered by telephone and paid for by credit card by calling 251-626-5581.

Regular "walk-on" tours that last two hours are scheduled for Saturday and March 29. A special St. Patrick's Day tour March 17 will feature an hour-long stop for a Dutch treat lunch at the Blue Gill Restaurant on the Causeway.

These regular tours cost $20 for adults, $10 for children aged 6-12, and free for children younger than 6. Seating on each journey is limited to 50.

For more information, or to order tickets, call 251-626-5581. Blakeley state park also offers charter trips for private and school groups. For rates and booking, call Joyce Walker at 251-626-0798.

Historic Blakeley State Park is on Alabama 225 about 4.5 miles north of its intersection with U.S. 31 in Spanish Fort. The park's boat, the Delta Explorer, is a covered pontoon boat equipped with a restroom. The boat and its captain are licensed by the U.S. Coast Guard.