At Sandwich
Osprey
John Bowering
Sun 4 Nov 2007 11:12
Spent the day hunkered down in Sandwich and being thoroughly pounded by
Hurricane Noel. Shore power disappeared at an early stage both for Osprey
and the rest of the town. Early morning before the winds became too strong
we walked up to the local store and collected some extra milk and sandwich
making supplies. Even then was difficult to walk and luckily a local
fisherman gave us a lift back in the back of his ute. Even that was an
experience as the wind combined with the car speed made hanging on very
difficult. Osprey got pretty well beaten up even in the sheltered basin of
the harbour and until daylight we will not be able to assess what really
did occur. At some wind angles the boat was pressed hard against the key
and fenders were not of much use for protection in that wind strength. We
recorded wind gusts of 64 knots on our instruments. We are planning to
check the boat at daylight, re rig the genoa furling gear which needs a
few more turns on the drum and re secure the solar panels which were
lifted to their full aft axis position. Spoke with Bob Cook who is
suggesting we head out in the morning and meet out with Jent, the Dutch
boat sheltering in Newport and also heading for Bermuda. It seems
whatever time we leave we will get caught by at least one 30 knot front
whilst either in or close to the gulf stream which we will simply have to
deal with. Such is the Atlantic in Novemebr! We have a tidal window in the
Cape Cod Canal between 0500 and 0800 which we will try and catch otherwise
we will either have to fight the flow of wait until 1700 and the quicker
we are at sea the better. Jonathan has taken on the cooking whilst John
does the clearing up and it is obvious we will not starve ? chicken stew
last night and cribbage whilst the gale howled around us. The wind
strength meant we had to lash the companionway door closed as the suction
from the wind kept banging them open.