Waiting for the Wind

Malua
Harry Watson Smith
Wed 31 Oct 2012 17:12
Malua is still at 33:42.78N 07:23.91 at Mohammadea on 31/10/2012
I have been waiting for the wind almost all this summer. In the Mediterranean there was as usual none but that is expected. When we wanted to sail along the Spanish Atlantic coast it only came up in the afternoon. In Portugal it came from the wrong direction. On the way to Madeira it was too strong while on the way back there was no wind at all.
We left Rabat knowing cyclone Sandy had cause some bad weather to come eastwards. The Azores high has gone missing this autumn and now we have an intense low pressure system off the Canaries which is bringing bad weather to the Moroccan coast.
The prediction for the three days after leaving the marina was very strong southerly which caused us to come into Mohammedea and wait. Well, we sat here for two days expecting the wind to come through but it was dead calm. I had prepared a bow line - the ever useful 28mm polypropylene line which has got us out of trouble more than once from Malua's bow across to the opposite dock. I had just pulled it tight before sunset when the rain started , then the wind and finally the full predicted fury of a storm. Everybody was scrambling to rig extra lines and put more fenders while we watched from under the hard dodger as the wind instruments recorded a gust of 41 knots. Malua and Sundancer are secured together some distance from the dock and with all our French Canal fenders out. I went to sleep last night knowing that we were secure and I could do nothing more to made Malua a safer place.
Just one more moment on Malua.