But the promised weather has now materialized and I am really pleased that we have sat here to await it's passing. After a strong blow late last night and enough rainfall to fill our water tanks, we are now experiencing 25-30 knot winds with heavy rain. It has been blowing really hard for nearly 4 hours now and every time it seems that the sky is starting to lighten along comes another bunch of dark clouds!
The entrance to our well protected anchorage has billowing white water breaking on the rocks and it looks like a big swell is running. In the rare quiet patches between the gusts I can hear the surf crashing on the nearby beach. Dead glad we are tucked up here I can tell you!
One other boat came in yesterday afternoon, a neat little sloop, about 30 feet I would say and we were pleased that they anchored well away from us and had an anchor light shining throughout the night. In too many places in the Caribbean more and more boaters seem to conserve their power to make ice cubes and run their microwaves rather than display crucial lights in the hours of darkness. Boy that makes me mad. Safety should be paramount, especially when conditions are not good. Anyway all is ship-shape in this anchorage!
I suffer from terrible moments of peer pressure as I contemplate the weather, to go or not to go that is the question... Sailors are an 'ornery bunch. All of us believing that we hold, at least some, of the definitive answers on forecasting and the meaning of life! It's too easy to be 'gung-ho' where the weather is concerned and being of a cautious nature I can often be accused of great doses of prevarication! And I find that just as hard to live with as anyone else!But one of the things that I am learning is that listening to my gut feel is NEVER a bad thing! So we sit and wait, thankful that we did not decide to put to sea, believing in others statements that the front had petered out or had already passed. It hadn't!
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