A blast from the North East.

I was caught up in the final pages of “Digital Fortress” by Dan Brown, when I noticed a strange sky out of the port hole.

I reluctantly lay the book down to pear outside. The strangest clouds I’d ever seen. They looked lick giant breaking seas…, waves…, thousands of feet high and relatively low on the horizon. “That doesn’t look good” I thought to myself, “they really do look like breaking seas in the sky”. I felt like an ant floating on a leaf looking up at some good California surf.

A moment later my inflatable flipped over, and my 4hp Yamaha was upside down in the water. Namaste started to heel as if we were sailing under the main, then we were hit with about a 45/50 knot gust. My weight kept me from flipping over in the dingy as I was taking off the motor, and heaving it on to Namaste’s deck. I haven’t been to wild about my choice of anchorage as when my chain is fully extended I’m about a boat length from the reef. It’s covenant for snorkeling, but not if the wind drags us into the reef. Namaste’s rudder would be the first thing to hit.

I quickly started Namaste’s diesel, and got ready to scoot if need be. The wind lasted about 25 minutes blowing about 25/35, and gusting to about 40/45, there wasn’t even that much rain.

All is well; I don’t think the anchor drug an inch. I was thinking it was a Choko-Sano, but they usually come from land. I really need to learn more about the weather. Jamie is going to give me a crash course on my sextant this week, and I think I’ll ask my buddy Chris to give me the same on weather when he returns from the states.

I know the weather basics, but I want to feel like I have a really good understanding on how all the weather elements react to each other. We have had really low tides due to the hurricane to the north of us, and the locals tell me that after it passes a lot of rain comes which was the case yesterday.

Anyway I’m going back to NSA headquarters in Washington to finish my book.

Peace, Love, and Wind.

– Alex