At Sea in Winter

Zebulon, NC

 

It is really cold and windy here today. Brrrrrrrr. Libby and I have no cold tolerance left. The cold wind seems to cut like a knife.

Just for fun, I looked up the marine weather. Out by Frying Pan Shoals, in addition to cold, the winds are 30-40 knots and the seas 18-20 feet. It will stay like that for 4 days. Man oh man does that should horrible. I imagine being out there in our open cockpit. No thank you.

It makes me appreciate more that the sailors of fore were a different breed of men than I or most of m contemporaries. Think of all those men who rounded Cape Horn. Of course part of their secret was that they didn't do it when they were 68 years old. Still, their fortitude was amazing.

If you would like to read a realistic account of what it was really like for those men in 1840, try one of my all time favorite books. "Two Years Before The Mast" by Richard Henry Dana. His account and his English sound modern , so the reading is easy. You can get a free copy here.