Another light night, thank heavens. I think that I would have gone nuts if we had another bad one. AS I posted yesterday, Knute has agreed to let us move over to that I feel is a more protected dock. AT least we will have another larger boat outside of us with pilings between them and Nelleke in case they break away, plus we'll have our bow into the forecast winds. Starting Tuesday night the weather is calling for another blow. This time it is calling for 20 kts from the south veering about to the southwest all of which is better than the 60 kts from the southeast that we got last week, but, frankly, I don't trust 'em. Our planned move to the other dock will have us bow facing the nastiness and will have a couple of layers of other boats plus the dock itself between the weather and ourselves. Plus I will really get ourselves prepared. I have learned my lesson about the double braided dock lines - they look nice and are great in calm weather but there is absolutely no give to them at all. If the boat is moving against the lines they deliver the shock of the weight of the boat directly against the desk cleats. In our case we had tried to mitigate that with the rubber line snubbers but the old design of those would eventually break under the strain and shock leaving us with longer, no stretch dock lines. I am gradually replacing all of ours with 5/8ths or ¾ nylon three strand lines plus the newer design of dock line snubbers that have been re-engineered to take the shock. I'll try to take a photo of the two types so you'll see what I mean.

The wind generator arrived today - Hurrah! I have begun to assemble it and should have it up on the mast by end of day tomorrow, just in time to see how it does in the 30 kt winds. The mechanic here at Whittaker Creek began the work on fixing up the dingy lift points and I am most impressed with what he has done so far. It looks a lot better than the one that I threw together.

We have also been introduced to new friends Kathy and Earl from the sailing vessel Seeker who have joined us at the dock here in Whittaker Creek tonight. They were planning on being here earlier but had some engine overheating problems and ended up being escorted in by TowBoatUS. By the way, for anyone even thinking about coming down this way even if you feel that you will be spending most of your time offshore, membership in Boat US and the ensuing additional monies for the TowBoatUS insurance is worth every dime. One tow that is free because of the insurance and would have cost $$thousands otherwise more than pays for itself. Plus you can call them to speak to the fellow that is responsible for a particular stretch of the ICW to find our what the current intel is for depth and shoaling. Altogether, including Boat US membership plus the premium TowBoatUS insurance as I recall it came to less than $300 for the year.
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