Catching up - Hurricane Matthew

AJAYA'S CRUISE
Phil & Nikki Hoskins
Tue 6 Dec 2016 16:54
“We’ll post some pics when we have a moment”. Well that was back in October when we wrote that in the last blog. We’ve been seriously short of “moments’ since. Or at least the right moments when we’ve felt like sitting down and grinding away at the keyboard after having cleaned up at the end of another day of dealing with issues and repairs. So we’ll try something now and see how far we get.
 
Matthew accounted for two boats ‘blown over’ in Westlands yard, Titusville. It could have been far worse had the Cat 3 hurricane not eased away from the coast in the final hours. One of the locals informed us that the hurricanes don’t come ashore here as there is an Indian burial ground out on Merritt Island to the east of us and the spirits keep the storms away. That’s really kind of them to say the least and if there was a ‘spirit donation box’ sited anywhere in town then we’d certainly be dropping some coins into the collection. But then one couldn’t help wondering given that the entire east coast of the USA was populated by native American peoples, First Nation or whatever they are called politically these day (certainly not Red Indians that’s for sure) that there must have been burial grounds the length and breadth of the country. That doesn’t seem to stop other storms from crashing into various locations along the east coast so the myth is not to be relied on we feel. Maybe we have a some seriously strong spirits in this area and not just the various brands that emanate from the ABC Liqueur Store!
 
Well, regardless, here are some pics.....
 
m_20161009_114635   m_20161009_115817
Well, our cockpit was a mess of foliage from the park behind us and one of our neighbours mizzen mast was not as upright as it should be.
 
m_20161009_123504 m_20161009_114936
This small trailer sailer was blown off it’s wooden perch.....  However, walking the yard and we found much worse damage at the far end.......
 
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This Moody caught a blast of wind just after the storm had cleared and over it went.....
 
m_20161009_120119  Shredded sail
.......with it’s mast taking out the rigs of the two boats alongside.                                          So maybe this cat wasn’t so unlucky after all.
 
All that remained for us to do on our own boat was clear all the storm debris, and.......
 
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20161024_111327  Frogs
 
.............evict a family of frogs from our dinghy using a bucket with a long stick for encouragement. This process resulted in a pulled back muscle for ‘Skip’ when one of the rescued frogs leapt out of the bucket in panic ahead of time. It clung to his bare leg causing him to jump high into the air (thus the muscle strain) before disappearing into the undergrowth.  The next one wasn’t so lucky.  With so much work to do and an injured ‘Skip’ the ‘Admiral’ took over. This one learnt to fly very quickly.
 
End.