We are thankful that we have been lucky dodging hurricanes. So far, we've escaped the ravages of Hurricanes Idalia in 2023 and Debby and Heléne that struck the Big Bend coast during the 2024 season. All three hurricanes made landfall not far from our community inside the St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge. Also during this year's season, Hurricane Milton hit south of Tampa/St Petersburg at Siesta Key, not far from where we have our sailboat on the hard.
Earlier this year we hauled Bay Breeze at Snead Island Boatworks near Bradenton for storage in a crowded yard full of boats. She's been on jack-stands since the summer while we were in Maine. This venerable boatyard was damaged not only by a off-shore pass-by from Helene in late September but by a close-by landfall from Milton only 2 weeks later. Only a few boats were toppled by the storms. The storm surge from Milton was not as bad as predicted, so Bay Breeze did not float off her stands and survived without any damage from other boats or storm debris.
This year we worried about losing houses and boats while watching the forecasts. We were very fortunate that each storm moved about 20 miles to the east before making landfall. That left our community on the weaker side of the storms, but many of the communities to our east took the brunt of the power of wind and water. The threat of hurricane damage to our neck of the woods remains a credible possibility every year.
Now we are hoping to launch in December and resume cruising down in SW Florida. Weather permitting, we might even be able to sail her back to our home dock.
Just released - a book for kids
We have just published another book. This one is for children to read, or be read to.
In 2018, a powerful and devastating hurricane, Michael, delivered a rare bird, an American flamingo, to our area. The bird, dubbed "Pinky" hung around St. Marks National Wildlife Refuge for five years to the delight of casual and dedicated birdwatchers until about a year ago. His fate is unknown, but speculation is that he moved on, joining six flamingos that arrived with Hurricane Idalia in 2023.
The Pinky story, and our travels to places in the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, and Cuba, led us to write a children's book.
After a career avoiding anthropomorphism in our work, we find ourselves attributing human characteristics to wildlife in this story. Oh well, we tried to infuse some biology into the fiction.
This hardcover book is available at some independent bookstores and Amazon.
Thanks for reading.
Marvin and Lee
11.21.2024
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