Intercoastal Waterway

After the test we started up the motor again and headed down the Intercoastal waterway (ICW). Since I knew nothing about the ICW prior to this trip, I'm going to bore you with a description. The ICW is a long, marked waterway that runs along the east coast of the US from Maine to Texas.

The direction is important because the buoy markers are marked as if you were headed back to Texas. When you enter a harbor, the rule is "red right returning". This means all red buoys, which are numbered and triangular on top are kept to the right. This ensures that you don't go into water that is too shallow and run aground. The green buoys, which are rectangular, are kept to the left.

On the ICW, they are marked independently from the harbor or channel markers. Each existing buoy is marked with either a yellow square or a triangle. Just like the normal buoys, the triangles are kept to the right and the square are kept to the left as if you are headed to Texas.

Sometimes you will have a red buoy with a yellow square or a green buoy with a yellow triangle. In these cases, if you want to enter the harbor, you follow the color of the buoy and if you want to follow the ICW you follow the yellow markers. This is sort of like highways which are marked [I-25] and [US85]. Sometimes the highways will separate and you have to watch the correct sign to stay on your chosen path.

By the way, I sometimes have to create pictures in my mind to remember things. For the buoys I've created two images. The green buoys are called cans, are rectangular, and are marked with an odd number. To remember this, I think of a 7UP can. It's a can, it's green, it's marked with an odd number. For the red markers, which are called nuns, marked with an even number and are triangular, I think of a nun dressed in red, wearing the pope's hat with a number 6 on her frock. I know it is a silly way to remember it, but I haven't been able to forget it either.