Saturday, February 16, 2008

The Storm

We left Genoa in the evening and made our way down the west coast of Italy.At approximately 7:30 P.M. the next evening Mal and I noticed scatteredlights to starboard. We went up to the pilot deck to investigate and wererewarded by the sight of Mount Vesuvius erupting into the night sky. Twohours later we were negotiating the straits of Messina between Italy and Sicily. The lights of the towns on either side were so bright that they litup the night sky. The passage is narrow and full of boat traffic so we hada pilot aboard to help us navigate.
Later that night I was rudely awakened out of a deep sleep by theshuddering and pitching of the boat. We were in a storm. Very soon theboat was rolling from side to side. We are 600 feet long, two footballfields, so we were able to ride the waves but occasionally we pitch poledinto a large trough caused by an extra large wave. The impact of the boatsinking into the water caused the whole boat to shudder. There was verylittle sleep the rest of the night.
The next day the storm abated. It was fun to watch it from the shelter ofour room. I tried to imagine what it might be like in a 40 foot sail boat.Let me just say that Mal and I have no plans to sail around the world.
By night fall the storm ramped up again. It looked like another restlessnight. We had some respite for a couple of hours as our course took ussouth of Crete and into the shelter of the island. By the next morning thestorm had finally run its course and we were able to enjoy the beautifulMediterranean weather we had anticipated. The entry in the ships log wasforce 10 winds on the Beaufort scale for both nights (winds 55 to 63 milesper hour) Force 12 is a hurricane.

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