Pensacola FL Sailing Blog - sailingnightwatch

What a difference a week makes. Pensacola generally goes through a rainy period from mid June till Mid July. Then it gets serious about getting hot. Our rainy period may be over. This weekend was almost cloudless both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday there were some thunderheads south in the Gulf, but they traveled East. For us it was cloudless with a 10 to 15 knot sea breeze. It does not get any better then that. Temps were low 90’s with it cooling off to low to mid 70’s at night.

Sunday morning I launched the dingy and went for a dip in the Gulf. This has to be considered the “Year of the Jellyfish” Since Memorial Day, there have been many jellyfish. The numbers seem to be getting less, but you only need to be stung once to quell you desire to go swimming. Walking along the Gulf, I only saw a couple and therefore took a quick dip. In Grand Lagoon, there were many more but they seem to be drifting in packs. That allowed one to walk along the deck and check for jellyfish and if none were around have a good chance to get in a quick swim. The water temp is where even someone like me who does not like cold water can wade right in with out slowing down to get use to the temp.

The sail home was wonderful with 10 to 12 knot winds. Another beautiful day in paradise. We have noticed that there are noticeably fewer powerboats around. In fact, this weekend there were fewer of all types of boats. Could it be the economy, the jellyfish or 95 degree weather?

Does it get easier? No! The tanks are again in the way, but this is the lesser of the 2 evils. There are two plates and it is preferred to install them end to end. They are suppose to be no more then 7 feet from the antenna tuner. That is not going to happen. I can manage about 8 to 9 feet to the first bolt on the first plate. I think that is pretty good. Then there is this theory of using copper straps for a grounding wire. They sell a 3 inch wide roll for this purpose. That means cutting 3½ to 4 inch slots in bulkheads to install the grounding strap.

Then you can get on the forums and read about everybody else’s theory. Ground it to the engine. No, do not ground it to the engine, because you are just grounding back to your battery bank. A no, no! Ground through the through hulls. Oh No! Grounding different type metals. Messes up the anti corrosion system. What to do, what to do.

I bought the plates. They will be installed in October when the boat gets hauled for a bottom job. Does this answer the counterpoise question? No. I may string a couple wires for a couple frequencies to see if the system works before then. After all, one of the theories is to do both.

Yea I love the Blue’s and want to see the show. Now the wife, that is a different story. She gets more excited about the Blue’s then anyone, especially her age. She listened to the weather forecast and gave us a non-negotiable schedule. Go out maybe a half hour before the show and watch the show and run home. The forecast was for storms about 20 minutes after the show. We did it according to plan. That was good I think.

The Blue’s were fantastic. One of the best shows we have seen and we have not missed a show in many years.

We got back to the slip and the boat put to bed when all hell broke loose again. Looking at the radar, it look just like Saturday. The lightning was more intense. There was a house hit about 100 yards from us that got the fire department out. There was a strike close enough to the boat to fry my HDTV and my VHF. I thought we had been hit. You run around looking at all the through hulls and mast step looking for holes in the boat. No holes, and everything was still on top of the mast. It must have hit one of the trees near the slip, even though I can not see any sign of a hit. The circuit breakers were tripped, in fact 1 was knocked loose from the box.

Scary times.