...though the machines are barely visible here, mostly a rosy post-sunset sky. I missed the sunset itself by two minutes, but the afterglow is no less amazing.
A cute little jack-up.
One of the bigger and fancier tenders you'll see. That two-tone orange and yellow color scheme, belonging to the Edison Chouest company, is a common sight: they're a bigtime contractor on the Gulf.
One half of the fabrication/staging building where tenders load up.
...the other half.
A big daddy jack-up. These things do the exploratory drilling (like the Deepwater Horizon was doing, only it was on pontoons, as it worked in much deeper water) in 300' or less of water. If the well is successfully completed, then the production company will build a stationary platform there and begin producing. But the work starts with a mobile jack-up.
Not sure what this boat does--it's not a science vessel, since those have open back decks and A-frames. It's sure not a tender, since those are basically pickup trucks. There are lots of pipes and what looks like pumping equipment on the lower deck--possibly it's associated with the cleanup effort.
Double- and triple-parking is common. You just need to cushion the boats and rig up your gangways...
The avenue.
A closeup of the avenue...those big spools in the center of the picture are on the order of ten feet in diameter. 
Thanks for the insiders view!
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