Weather Window

I spoke to the skipper of another sailboat anchored nearby this morning about the weather. It turns out he and his family, a wife and young son, live in Annapolis and are from Austin. They motored down from Annapolis yesterday, and he said the same thing about the waves -- very steep and close together. His boat is bigger, around 40', so they didn't bother him quite as much, plus Annapolis isn't very far away.

All I know right now is that if they forecast 3' or bigger, I'll sit and wait. At this point, it'll be mid-week before the next weather window, so I'm trying to get a few things done while we wait.

I finally hooked up the tuner yesterday, and the performance, though not excellent, is at least acceptable. I was able to check in to the MMSN on 20-meters, the Waterway Net on 40-meters, and WLO on one of the marine frequencies in between. I didn't do anything special, so improving the ground, should help a lot. I may also add tuned radials, but as long as it works, I'm not too concerned.

I moved the am-fm radio over to the starboard side with all the other radios this morning. That allowed me to hook it back up to the antenna. So, now I can listen to NPR and Car Talk, plus jazz and classical music. It's been a while, so this morning was a real treat -- sorta like Christmas.

I also plan to do some more rearranging before our next trip so Zoe can find a better place to hide in rough conditions. That'll mainly consist of stowing as much as I can instead of keeping it in boxes stacked on the v-berth. Zoe likes to go as far forward as possible, so she ends up climbing over all that stuff, and I'm worried she might get hurt.