Day 303, Year 6: Earthquakes and Hurricanes
Date: Tuesday, August 23, 2011
Weather: Most Sunny, Temperature Cooling Down
Location: Eel Pond, Woods Hole, Massachusetts

Our day started by checking email and weather online. It’s just routine to do this, but this morning Mark looked confused. He asked if I knew why 50+ knot winds were predicted for here on Sunday and I said I didn’t but that it sounded like a hurricane must be headed our way. And sure enough, Hurricane Irene is out there causing all kinds of worries. We’ll have to keep a close watch to see if she is really going to head up our way, but I must say that things don’t look so good for the North/South Carolina coast. I sure hope something happens to derail Irene. And then later in the day I heard from Heather that there was an earthquake in Virginia that was felt all the way into Canada. I was busy trying to get two little ones to go down for a nap at the time of the quake and I didn’t feel anything, but others here did. So Mother Nature is asserting herself here at the end of August as she has done many times in the past few years. I’ll never forget one Labor Day weekend when we took friends sailing from New Hampshire to Maine. We returned on a Sunday and when we got to the Isles of Shoals off Portsmouth, New Hampshire, we wondered why there was not one boat in the islands. It was usually packed on summer Sundays. When we got back to the marina, we quickly found out that everyone but us knew a hurricane was headed our way. In less than two hours, we had all the sails down and had the boat ready “just in case.” Thankfully the hurricane passed us by, but you do have to be prepared. Tomorrow we will check to see what other people with boats in Eel Pond do to prepare. I’m not liking the idea of being in a small area with so many other boats, but Eel Pond should be fairly protected. Let’s hope so.

The shed kit that Heather and Jed ordered on Saturday and were told would be 3-4 weeks before delivery is actually being delivered tomorrow. So we’ll head in early to be there when it arrives. We’re not sure how it will be packaged, but with the weather report as it is, we sure hope the materials are somehow protected from the weather. Tomorrow evening my niece Lynn and a friend come to spend the night on Windbird. They are headed to the outer Cape for a few days and won’t be able to spend more than the one night, but it will be good to catch up on happenings since we saw each other in Myrtle Beach in June.