Rough Night In The Slip

[Trim50]

Wow, last night made me think seriously about the sanity of living aboard. When I got home from work, the winds were blowing about 40 knots across the harbor lifting salt spray. The boat was heeling about 10 degrees and all the halyards in the marina were going nuts.

After getting accustom to the heel and the pounding of the rain on the deck, we finally got to sleep. At 2:00 AM, we were abruptly awakened by the sound of what seemed like a truck load of golf balls being dropped on the teak deck. For nearly 5 minutes, we couldn’t even hear each other talk. When I looked out side, I couldn’t even see the boat in the next slip due to the volume of hail falling. It was like we were suddenly in the middle of an ice blender. The winds felts like they were upwards of 50 knots and the water in the marina was splashing 3 feet into the air as the golf ball size hail hit. It all only lasted 5 minutes, but it was the most extreme weather I’ve ever experienced.

This morning I heard on the news that a water spout was reported in our vicinity at about the same time…

[Lighthouse]

Time to head off to where the weather suits your clothes?

[CharlieCobra]

Sounds like normal weather for up here during the Winter.

[Trim50]

Originally Posted by Lighthouse

Time to head off to where the weather suits your clothes?

I'm think'n St. Barts.

[JeanneP]

When we made landfall in Australia the first time, we headed up to Mooloolaba after checking in at Brisbane. We luckily arrived in Mooloolaba one day after they had experienced a violent hailstorm such as you described. We visited some of the boats and the damage was terrible - dented fiberglass decks with the gelcoat badly crazed, a few cracked windows and hatches. Cars on land that had really bad damage. Trees with branches broken off. Wow!

We were in and out of Australia several times over the next four years and never saw, or heard of, such a terrible storm again.

We've been hit by two waterspouts in our travels, and I was just as worried through the second one as I was with the first! They are dreadful and destructive. Twenty years after the first, I still have a scar from the injury caused in that first waterspout.

Hope damage was minor where you were.

[Nausikaa]

Within a few days of me moving inte my house in Namibia (going back a few years now) we had a tremendous hail storm. namibia is quite a dry place but when it does come down it can come down hard! Now, that did not go unnoticed on a "tin roof". It sounded like a train was passing overhead! Fortunately, the angle of heel remained unchanged.

Now I am back in colder climes but would gladly go return to the tin roof and all its problems.

Aye // Stephen

[imagine2frolic]

Several nights ago we had tornado warnings, and the wind was getting right along. As I drove down the dock all the mast were heeling right on over about 10 - 15 degrees. Imagine was rocking, and rolling but there was no heeling. One more advatage to multihulls........

[Nausikaa]

Well, you know what they say...... "If you don't want to get seasick, stand under a tree"

// Stephen

[Trim50]

When I left the boat this morning it was still dark, so I didn't really get to see it there was much damage. The hail (not hale) was very wet and melted really fast. In fact the air temperature was quite warm which was kinda odd.

The weather guys are calling it a cut-off low causing the strange happenings.

[Trim50]

Well, nearly five straight days and nights of hard rain...two more to go. We are now getting tropical rain from the South coming through and these clouds drop bucket loads of rain. This is very strange for SoCal.

Good news though, we found and fixed our hatch leak. Turns out that it wasn't coming from the hatch at all, but rather the staysal chain plate. Lori is now enjoying the rain on the boat since the bed is dry.

We bought a pressure cooker today and will give it a try tonight. We also bought a cool griddle plate for the Force-10. Slowly getting accustom to the live aboard life.

Does anyone want to buy my 50" Plasma HDTV?...it is sitting in storage and needs a home.

[imagine2frolic]

Trim,

You have been reduced from 50" to 37"....oh how the suffering goes on

[Trim50]

It is terrible I tell ya! Actually the TV's are more for Lori believe it or not. She has to have her football in HD. What really hurts about the 50", is that we paid about $1800 for it just over a year ago, and now I'm having a hard time getting bites on it at $900. I pretty much knew it would happen, but I didn't expect it to lose value quite that fast.

[Nausikaa]

Originally Posted by Trim50

We bought a pressure cooker today and will give it a try tonight.

Just about the best investment one can make!

They are so versatile, once you get used to them. I would not be without one ashore or afloat.

You'll find it far more useful than the 50" HD plasma although football probably is best viewed on the latter.

Aye // Stephen

[JeanneP]

Pressure cooker. I canned lots of meat, and in the tropics it's a great way to cook "comfort" foods (stews, roasts, thick soups) without heating the boat up too much.

When possible, the night before leaving on a passage I would cook up a nice roast beef with gravy, vegetables, the whole nine yards. We could have a good hot meal while on passage when the weather was bad. Colonel Sanders pressure cooks his fried chicken, and I've often thought that would be a sensible way to fry chicken on the boat. I don't fry foods while on passage, but even at anchor hot oil can be dangerous so I do any frying in deep pots with oil no more than 1/4 to 1/3 the way up the wall of the pan.

[Trim50]

Pressure cooking with oil...sounds kinda dangerous.

[JeanneP]

Originally Posted by Trim50

Pressure cooking with oil...sounds kinda dangerous.

Peter says that's how in bad weather they cooked pork chops on the ice breaker he was on.

I just Googled "pressure frying" and it says absolutely DO NOT use a pressure cooker to fry food. Oh, well, there goes that idea. Pressure fryers are very different, apparently. The picture of the pressure fryer looks like my old pressure cooker, sold with SV Watermelon.

really, guys, the Internet is wonderful. That little search saved me from who knows what disaster?

We need a cross-eyed smiley. That's what I do best, I think.

[Trim50]

OK, I have come to the conclusion that a pressure cooker IS a required piece of cruising hardware! As newbie’s to pressure cooking we started out simple...mashed potatoes. Lori was able to cook mashed potatoes in under 15 minutes start to finish! Actual cooking time was less than 10 minutes.

Can't believe neither of us have ever used a pressure cooker till now. It is like discovering the microwave oven at the age of 42 But better.