The Isaias Experience
Tuesday August 4th 2020
It’s now 7.30pm and it’s been blowing hard for the past four hours. Everything seems to be going OK and we are pretty confident that things will work out fine. The winds have mostly been in he 20-30 knot range (force 6-7) but we’ve seen many gusts to the mid-high 30s (force 8) and the strongest gust went to 42 knots. The local weather forecast predicts that the wind will ease off over the next 3 hours, which will be a relief. It’s pretty spooky when it’s blowing this hard and the boat is squirreling around on the mooring.
The morning started with the classic “calm before the storm” with grey skies and absolute calm. It was still hot and also horribly humid. Having completed the dinghy patch repair yesterday evening, I rowed the “Dumb Dog” to shore and picked up our life raft from the car (which we still have in East Greenwich). We then made preparations to the boat, adding additional lines to the mooring, tying up the sails so they can’t come loose and taking down the bimini. The forecast still indicated a strong chance of seeing tropical storm force winds and suggested “Isaias” could arrive in the mid afternoon. Around 3.30pm the wind started to pick up and an hour later some heavy rain arrived. However, that didn’t last long and when I could see clear blue sky emerging I thought the worst was behind us. Not so much! If anything the wind just got stronger. Our dinghy was flipped over three times – the first two times I was able to get it back upright by hauling on the lines tying it to the back of the boat, the third time I didn’t need to bother as I saw the wind pick it up like a kite and flip it back the right way. Thank goodness we took the outboard off and put it securely on the rail of Cotinga!
Anyway, if things settle down we should have a good night and then tomorrow we will finish up our boat preparations with the aim of setting off cruising on Thursday.
Mike
The colour photo catches your breath and is immediately striking; but the black and white is definitely more interesting once you pause on it.
ReplyDeleteMy tuppence worth! (Climber Ben)
Hi Ben, thanks for the comments. I'm missing climbing and catching up with climbing friends. The walls are now open again, albeit with restrictions, are you getting out boldering? Mike
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