A Tale of Two Chemists: Weather watching

Weather watching

Friday - Saturday 20-21 October 2023

I continue to make slow and steady progress on the boat jobs. I decided the varnishing is complete with 3 coats and took off the masking tape this morning. I’ve made some progress on polishing the stainless steel and cleaning windows. I’m also trying to get more proficient in using the Predict Wind weather routing tools and so I watched a couple of videos that they provided, specifically aimed at managing weather information and routing on long passages. They recommend spending as much time as possible trying to get a handle on the weather patterns before making a big passage, so I’ve started running models on a daily basis. It’s been good practice, but it’s also a little off-putting as the weather in the Caribbean, Bahamas and east coast USA has been so poor and continues to look awful as far out as early November. We would be okay leaving this morning, as long as you don’t mind 12 foot seas resulting from hurricane Tammy, as she makes her way north next week. I need to remind myself that long range forecasts, good or bad, should be taken with a pinch of salt.

Yesterday evening we had a strong front come through that brought scattered thunderstorms and winds gusting to 30 knots. In fact there was a local warning for storms off the coast generating 55 knot winds and waterspouts. Anyway the passing clouds created a spectacular sunset over the marina last night. Earlier in the afternoon I did launch the dinghy and went for a ride, but chickened out of crossing the open water of the estuary, to Beaufort. It probably would have been fine getting there, but directly into the building wind and chop on the way back.

The highlight today was watching the England - South African rugby World Cup semifinal over on the sailing vessel Pyxus. I met Jen and Barry when they first arrived yesterday and they said they planned to watch the game on the TV in the club house and I should join them. As it transpired, the game wasn’t available on that TV, so we went and watched on their boat, joined by their friends Sharlene and Gill from sailing vessel First Love. They all seem like lovely people and it was great fun. They all have strong connections to South Africa, and although England dominated for most of the game, South Africa won in the end. They certainly seemed more vested in the outcome than I was.

Mike