The hurricane is over

The hurricane has past, we’re safe, and their was no damage to the boat.

The winds picked up significantly around 10PM. I was reading steady winds in the 40+ knot (46mph) range gusting well into the 50+knot (58mph) range.

The winds were strong enough that it was difficult to walk outside. Walking the docks to adjust lines and help others was real chore. Glasses instantly were covered in rain. Take them off and you couldn’t keep your eyes open because of the driving rain. The locals all had goggles. And, it was cold. I’m not sure what the wind chill was, but it was in the low 50s, upper 40s over night.

Around 12:30 we lost electricity, which meant we lost heat in the boat, and the temperature outside was in the 40s. That reduced the number of inspection trips I made.

At 2AM the winds started to settle enough for me to get some sleep.

The biggest issue we had was storm surge. At low tide, we sit low and have a nice concrete wall blocking the wind. 12:30AM was low tide, yet we were at the highest water level I’d seen our entire week we have been here. Actually, it was significantly higher. We were at the maximum level for the floating docks. And, we had no wind protection from the wall, we’d planned on. Had it been high tide instead of low tide, the docks might have gone under water.

If I had to do it all over again, I would have turned the boat around so the bow would have been into the wind. The cockpit would have stayed dry and the dingy would have taken less wind. Lessons learned I guess.

Power is still out. I’ve fired up my generator and turned the heat on. We’re not sure when the power will be back on, hopefully it will be sometime today.