Gale force winds! Where?

No photos tonight. I took them but too late to load. Will show you this new location tomorrow weather permitting.

For those who have written to inquire as to our safety when they heard about the Tropical Storm off the east coast, you can relax. We are safe and sound way up the Potomac at Colonial Beach.

The Tropical Storm that began off the coast of Charleston had moved as far as Cape Fear by this morning. As we left Olverson’s and headed down the river toward it’s junction with the Potomac, the winds were really gusting and waves were picking up more than predicted. The USCG was putting out a small craft warning for the Chesapeake and telling mariners to be prepared for gale force winds within the next 24 hours. It almost made us consider turning back but we elected to at least take a peek out into the Potomac itself.

The waves had been forecast to be one foot and winds of 8 mph. We were already seeing two footers and winds over 15 mph, but it seemed that once we got out of the confluence of the two rivers things settled slightly and we moved into mostly beam seas of 1-1 1/2 feet that rocked and rolled a bit but were manageable. And the further we traveled up the Potomac the better it seemed to get. Overall the trip was uneventful to Colonial Beach where we will spend three nights.

This is a sheltered marina with good facilities and a nice town nearby with things to do for our layover. Our friends Bill and Pam on Seabiscuit, who we have not seen since Islamorada in the Keys, are trapped in Onancock on the east side of the Chesapeake. They had gusts of 27 mph today and the big winds won’t get there until tomorrow. And in Onancock they truly do roll up the sidewalks at 5pm so we are not so bad here.

We gave Cbay a good rinse to get the salt spray off and I used a new cleaner called On and Off to get the mustache off the bow that we had picked up in the tannin infused waters of the Dismal Swamp. It works great.

We will use the time here to prep the boat for our upcoming guests. The twins’ Uncle Walter read where I said that we were going to rearrange things on the boat. He said forget about rearranging, hide everything you can and bolt the rest down! Surely between four adults we can manage two five year old boys in a 40 foot space.