Storms at Sea

Our overnight dash from the Berries to the US had us once again changing plans en route. We left thinking to catch the Gulf Stream and make Cape Canaveral in a day and a half or Fernandina Beach in two days. Not to be. A front that had lingered over Florida for several weeks finally made its move. In the middle of the night, two intensive lightening storms left the Florida coast and aimed directly for us in a pincher type movement. Sails were lowered and foul weather gear put on deck, we already had life jackets and lifelines employed.

We watched the storms rumble toward us in a virtual state with greens, reds, and yellows zig zagged with lightening strikes on our weather monitor and we watched visually as stars disappeared behind clouds leaving black holes in the sky. Brilliant flashes of deadly lightning forked  into the water. We had been watching several Bahama bound cruise liners about 8 miles away. One by one, the disappeared into the chaotic clutter of the storm on radar. You are never as alone on the ocean as when you are sailing blind into  ship filled waters in a storm.  We changed course to the SW, going against the Gulf Stream in order to cross behind the weakening southern storm and avoid the more aggressive storm racing at us from the northwest. The edge of the southern storm caught us with winds shrieking suddenly to 28, rattling the empty mast and blowing sudden spray across the cockpit as waves leaped to life.

The good news was that our maneuvering kept us from being engulfed by storms or cruise liners. The bad news was that several hours of going the wrong direction meant we only made it to Fort Pierce, Florida.