Misery and woe
currently in: Marsh Harbour, Abaco, Bahamas
(http://www.findu.com/cgi-bin/winlink.cgi?KG4EYP)

The wind started howling last night around dusk, and true to form, somewhere around 3 am it got truly nasty.  Here someone reported 40-45 knots steady gusting to 50s, with a high wind of 55 (we saw a high of 32 on our broken anemometer) and on a nearby island someone reported 60 knots!

The wind didn't shift as far north as we expected, and as this harbor is not very protected from the west, it got bumpy.  Bumpy enough to raise waves that made our 8 inches or so of low-tide clearance zero.  Naturally, low tide was around 3 am.  Needless to say, sleeping while your boat's keel gently thumps against the bottom isn't very easy.  (Fortunately the bottom here is soft mud, so it wasn't damaging.)

Today it is still windy and bouncy.  Nothing to do today other than chores and reading.  Even if our outboard worked well, I'd be reluctant to dinghy anywhere because the ride would be so rough - and no way will I risk having to row in this. The wireless internet is so marginal as to be worthless, so we can't connect to the net.   We can't go elsewhere, because we've got to bring the outboard in at 8:30 am tomorrow. We're tired and cranky. Did someone say this is paradise?  I want a refund.

(I'm sure my mood will improve later this week.  But right now we're remembering why we always went to the Exumas, farther south where the weather isn't so severe, rather than the Abacos.)


- posted by S/V Windom @ 4/16/2007 [link]