Squall

All day we heard reports of possible thunderstorms, but then we have been hearing reports of this since we entered Canadian waters. It was bound to happen. It is summer after all on the Great Lakes. Rip-snorting squalls and thunderstorms are a common occurrence. Carrie Rose has ridden out many on her mooring in Montrose Harbor without incidence, but Carrie Rose has never rode out one in the wilderness on her own anchor, until last night that is.

A squall is a tumultuous child born out of conjoined hot and cold fronts. They course across North America conceiving tornados, leaving wind and rain and hail in their wake, and they are the nemesis of every sailor. A squall may announce itself with thunder and lighting but it may not. I know to glance over my shoulder every so often when on the Great Lakes to see if one is sneaking up on me. Last night’s squall was first spotted on Dave’s iPhone radar app. It was a band of green, yellow and magenta approaching West Hotham Harbor (our anchorage) at a 45-degree angle. It crossed stepwise across the tiny screen heading towards a blue dot that he explained was our location.

The intense mass of weather got us back in the dinghy and after a short downwind row, onto Carrie Rose. It truncated our farewell dinner with Dave and Judy on Sir Tugley Blue. Three of us, Dolly (who left earlier that day), Sir Tugley Blue and us had been travelling together since meeting in St. Ignace for the Nordic Tug Great Lake’s Rendezvous. We heard rumors that we were referred to as the Nordic Tug Fleet by fellow North Channel cruisers after a summer of cruising together in Canada’s northern Lake Huron.

Canada is a wonderful country and a sweet people populate it, but that said Canada does have a few quirks worth mentioning. The main one for my purpose here is the Canadian weather forecasting system, or the lack of it. The United States has many faults but its weather forecasting and reporting system is not one of them. NOAA provides comprehensive real time service and if you are willing to do a little research, enough raw data to make your own well informed forecast.

Our weather ritual consists of rising early in the morning and looking out the window, checking the barometer and turning on the VHF radio to listen to channel 3 or 8. Eventually we will listen to both. Channel 3 broadcasts in French and English, and channel 8 in English and MAFOR. Channel 3 is Environment Canada, and channel 8 is Canadian Coast Guard Radio.

Please bear with me as I expand on this. Of course French and English is self explanatory, but what in the world is MAFOR. I wondered the same for years. In US waters you rarely hear the Coast Guard reading strings of numbers, so I never concerned myself with its intricacies.

Canada is a different story. Much of channel 8’s time is taken up with the reciting of these numbers for Lake Superior, Thunder Bay, Georgian Bay, and North and South Lake Huron. The reader prefaces each of the above regions with how many series of 5-digit codes will be read. And what is this 5-digit code you ask, well the first number is the Code Number. This one is easy as it is always 1 and seems to be irrelevant. The second represents the number of hours in the future that the forecast is good for. Number three is the wind direction. Number four is the speed of the wind in knots. Remember this single digit code represents a range of wind speeds. If the number 5 appears in the forth slot the winds will be from 34 to 40 knots. Best not to venture out if you see this number. And finally number five is the weather condition as in number 2 for strong risk of ice.

If we turn on channel 3 and they are in French mode we switch to channel 8. What we are looking for is the North Channel weather. The wind will be discussed, then wave height, next the present weather from a list of available sites. I question the existence of Elliot Bay for in the 60 odd days I have spent here its weather has never been available. Gore Bay also stands out as it is always 10 km/h windier than the rest of the North Channel. And just to keep things interesting some wind speeds are reported in knots and some in kilometers per hour.

Finally, if we listen long enough and do not space out at the last moment we will hear the list of disclaimers that signals (and is often longer than) the forecast for the North Channel, “Winds light, becoming lighter in the afternoon and lightening after midnight.” Throw in a SW, NE or SE at random and you’ve got it. Both channels 3 and 8 fade in and out as the boat swings at anchor. At face value this may not seem significant except according to Murphy’s Law the signal fades precisely at the crucial moment forcing us to repeat the process.

But let’s get back to the squall. West Hotham Harbor is not a harbor in the traditional sense. Hotham Island is an unpopulated island in an under populated region of Canada. There are a few cottages but generally this area is under the control of mosquitos, flies, loons, bear, moose, bald eagles, never seen song birds, sea gulls and the reviled fish eating cormorants. The harbor consists of a divot on its NW shoreline. All that is here is rocks and conifers. It does have a great view of Mt. McBean, the highest peak in the area, and some serious mud (sans weeds) for the anchor to dig into.

When entering such a space there are many variables to consider. To name a few: wind, depth, weather, already anchored boats, escape routes, swing if the wind changes direction and well, some I have missed. Anchoring is also about the gear and if you want to get a taciturn group of old salts going bring up the topic of anchors. I am lucky in this regard. Carrie Rose was festooned with six anchors when we bought her. I have spent the last nine years taking them off one by one. It seems the first owner had an anchor fetish and I thank him for that. He left us with an oversized Bruce attached to thick chain that has served us well . . . knock on wood!

One of our cruising companions has been setting anchors for fifty years. Not the lecturing type he teaches by example. I watch him as best I can considering I also have to anchor. He has a sense of the size of his boat—we have identical boats—and the best place to tuck into at the proper depth. He picks a spot, lowers the anchor to the bottom, sends twenty to thirty feet of chain over the side after it, then sits and waits. This waiting is the tough part. Anchor, though a noun, is usually thought of as a verb. I mean what do you do with an anchor—drop the damn thing. To watch him stop and wait, if only for a minute, defies the time and space equilibrium.

One day, after a few glasses of wine had lubricated our tongues, we asked, “Why the wait?” The suspended moment is to let the anchor, and the chain, “settle”. As it were, find its own place in the weeds and mud before trying to set it by backing the boat. Once the wind and the current have tethered the boat then gently back up and set the anchor. It is like a caress as opposed to a karate chop.

We came into Hotham and did this. There were boats in front and behind, and boats to the side of us. There were large and small boats; sail and powerboats; old salts and novices waiting for the alluded to storm. A nervous energy prevailed. In such circumstances it is the anticipation that gnaws at you. I did what I could and then set about my daily life on Carrie Rose.

So now back on board we prepared the boat as if we were going to leave on a cruise. The computer was in its proper place with the GPS connected. I retrieved my red flashlights (so as not to destroy my night vision) and my shockingly expensive Surefire A2 LED Aviator flashlight in case I needed illumination as bright as the sun. I turned the battery switch to BOTH and took the covers off my instruments.

Suddenly night was upon us. The distant rumble of thunder and its accompanying white flash lite up the sky. It gradually intensified as I sat in the dark and watched. I was mesmerized and forgot to turn on my radios. I missed the warnings on Channel 16, but who needed warnings. Nature was doing a good job of that. Again the odd part in this is the waiting. Squalls come at you from a different direction, so one moment you are facing north and the next west. It happens in a second. Sometimes there is a lull in the wind and then POW!

Carrie Rose took her time in swinging into the 45-knot gust. I watched the coordinates on the GPS for any dramatic change, none appeared. I looked out through the torrent of rain and realized that the sailboats to my right were gone, blown down the channel. Suddenly the harbor was ablaze in lights: red and green running lights, white anchor lights, search lights, spreader lights, red cabin lights, all sparkling on my rain drenched windows.

Our friends in the boat directly in front of us were frantically trying to signal us. I was wondering why the kept flashing all these different colored lights in my face. It seems I had inadvertently turned off my anchor light and was sitting in the middle of the chaos blacked out. And I had forgot to turn on my radios, so was also blacked out in another sense. They were wondering if we were sleeping through it. Not a bad idea but no cigar.

The wind and rain kept coming. Behind me it looked like a ballet of lights as each boat sought to avoid the rocks, re-anchor and gain stability. We sat hushed, watching our perimeter for interlopers, the little triangle on the computer that represented our location and the numbers on my backup GPS. Nothing moved. We stayed put and got a glimpse of what was happening when lightening lite up the entire harbor for a millisecond. Not very long but long enough to cement the surrounding boats locations into our brains.

One boat came pass us several times because its anchor refused to grab. Our friends helped light the forlorn boats way. They called out advice, which they graciously took and eventually, after letting out one hundred and fifty feet of rode the anchor stuck. I felt a slight ease in the wind. The rollers that were coursing down the harbor were not so distinct. There was still lightening and thunder but I could no longer feel it rattle my chest.

As I settled back into my chair the rain started in earnest. A spot on the salon roof that has never leaked in the decade we have own Carrie Rose dripped water onto the settee. The rain signaled the squalls end. It was finally spent after an hour. Not that long, but long enough I reckon to get my merit badge in North Channel nighttime squalls.