About 3:30 this morning I was awakened by a howling thunderstorm. Hard to believe but after 8 months of traveling this was the first time we had a really bad storm while at anchor. Even harder to believe is that I was very calm about it. Just shut a few hatches, dug out my foulies and picked up a few things I'd left in the cockpit. I checked the weather radio and it described a front with 50 mph winds. I'm pretty sure I didn't get that much wind in my little bayou. I was tempted to dig out the wind speed instrument and check but it was raining too hard to go out without a really good reason. The wind didn't shift directions when the storm blew through so I wasn't too worried about the anchor getting free - ok maybe I was just a little :-) It all passed through in about 1/2 hour and I went back to my very wet bed! Not sure if I mentioned that the glass popped out on my $300 window repair. Guess I'll have to fix it myself this time. I couldn't do any worse than the professional :-)
Yesterday it rained on and off most of the day. Just about the time I'd get all the hatches closed it would stop and I'd open them up again. Good thing is a rainy day is a great time to get a lot of work done. Sometime after lunch, I needed to charge the batteries so I fired up the engine and then took the dinghy over to shore to get away from the noise. <Not the side where I'd seen the big cat!> I found lots of shells and put a particularly interesting one in my pocket to take back to identify with my shell guide. A few minutes later I saw another just like it in the water with a little hermit crab inside. Now that gave me cause for pause - I reached in my pocket and sure enough I had a hermit crab in there :-)
By early evening the rain had subsided and left a beautiful sky tinged with pinks and purples. The water was almost calm, but there was just enough of a breeze to keep the pesky bugs away. I was on the lookout for my wild cats - but no luck. I did see one deer. I spent a lot of time trying my hand at fishing. I had a couple of nibbles and then decided to change lures. I dug out my tackle box (same one I've had since Phillip was 6) and decided my stuff needs a little updating! I managed to find a couple of lures that looked liked little fish with shiny spinners on them. I rigged one up and after a few minutes actually had one - but unfortunately he got my lure. I guess my friend Mike was right when he said I needed heavier line. Oh, well it was fun to at least have a little struggle even if I didn't win this time. I fished until a beautiful almost full moon came out and made the water sparkle. I turned in early as for whatever reason I seem to be waking up at 4:30 these days....
Right now the weather forecast looks good for heading to Port St. Joe on the outside tomorrow. It's supposed to be stormy today/tonight and then tomorrow winds from the Southwest 5-10 with 1 to 2 foot seas. That would be great little way to get started. But I guess I'll just see what it's really like when I get up in the morning - and then either head outside or down the ICW - but one way or the other I'll be in St. Joe tomorrow.
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January 2019
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