Hilton Head Island: THE WIND IN MORNING; a pleasant surprise; 4%: owls

 

A friend's reference to Magellan reminded me of an excellent novel about his voyage, THE WIND AT MORNING, which I read probably more than fifty years ago.  That happens when you are almost 81.  It is no longer in print and there is no Kindle edition, but I was able to buy a used hard cover via Amazon for less than $8.  I just checked and there are presently ten copies, both hard cover and paper back available at Amazon for less than $10.  If you suspect that I am going to advise you to buy one, you are quite right.  This is one of the best sea novels I have read. 

The author is an Englishman, Donald G. Payne, who wrote under several pseudonyms, including James Vance Marshall.  His most famous novel, WALKABOUT, was turned into one of my favorite movies.

THE WIND AT MORNING follows Magellan's voyage from the point of view of a cabin boy on one of the five ships that began what would become the first circumnavigation ever.  In 1519 five ships and 277 men left Spain in an attempt to reach the Spice Islands by sailing not east as had been customary, but west.  Three years later one ship and 19 men returned.  Magellan was not among them.  Men died for many reasons, violence, execution for mutiny, storms, and mostly scurvy.  The author states that only the narrator cabin boy is invented and all the rest is factually true.

I have sailed to many of the places mentioned in the book and it was a pleasure to revisit them in my mind as I reread THE WIND AT MORNING.

If you have an interest in the sea and the edge of human experience, as considering that you are reading this journal I have reason to believe you do, you will enjoy THE WIND AT MORNING.

Early afternoon.  Rain is forecast and so I biked to GANNET at 8 am this morning, wanting to get my work done before it started.  However a solid overcast sky is beginning to clear and the sun is coming out.

I biked expecting to have to apply a second coat of paint to the areas I did yesterday.  I was pleasantly surprised to find that I did not need to.  The first coat covered smoothly and completely.  I used Pettit Easypoxy, the same paint I used to paint GANNET's topsides a decade ago.  I applied it with a small 6" roller.

So I laced the pipe berth cover back in place.  Restowed all the stuff I had to move to clear work space, cleaned up some spills with turpentine, swept, and the Great Cabin is again organized.

I still have some details to take care of, in addition to painting the rest of the interior.  I did not reinstall the lee cloth on the port pipe berth because that requires tying several tiny knots and I didn't feel like doing that this morning.  And a piece of wood used to secure one of the storage bags came adrift from the inside of the hull and I need to reglue it.  I'll get around to those things  soon, but I just had the pleasure of marking off 'port pipe berth' from my GANNET to do list.

We all know 'to err is human, to forgive divine', but what is most human is to blame others rather than take responsibility for ourselves.

Two recent examples.

I read an article a few days ago about the limited numbers of those who have received the fourth COVID booster shot.  It stated that only 4% of those eligible have gotten the shot.  I am among them.  So is Carol.  And so I know are several of you.  Readers of this journal are a superior group.  However, the article went on to blame the government for not promoting the shots more.

I do not agree.

I think you have to take responsibly for yourself.  The information is out there.  You should not need the government to run an ad campaign to convince you to do what is obviously in your own best interests.

The other example is the absurd 'controversy' about the forecasts of the track of hurricane Ian.

Larry sent me a link to an article in the  WASHINGTON POST about the complexities in such forecasts.  I do not pass it on to you because it requires a subscription to the POST to read.  Some of the articles in the POST are available to me through Apple News +.  This among them. You can doubtlessly google and find others.

In essence the article said that in recent years hurricane forecasts about intensity have become more accurate, but forecasting track has not improved equally.  There are just too many variables.  Meteorology is not an exact science.  Maybe in ten or twenty years it will be.  

So while I generally have little sympathy for government leaders, in this case I do.  For them and meteorologists, it is a no win situation.  Advise evacuation and it is not needed and there will be outrage.  Advise evacuation too late and there will be outrage.  Outrage has of course become in our time the standard human response to almost everything.

I am not aware that anyone, except those in jails or prisons, is forced to live in hurricane zones.  If you do, you take that responsibility upon yourself.  You have a waterfront  house looking out at the Gulf of Mexico or the Atlantic Ocean, you have chosen to expose yourself to risk.

This is true of me as well.

I am sitting by our bedroom window looking out at Skull Creek and beauty.  I know that a hurricane will in time hit Hilton Head Island as hurricanes have in the past, most recently Matthew the year before we bought this condo.

As regular readers know if I am here alone I have no intention of evacuating for any storm even a category five and that at the beginning of hurricane season I am provisioned and equipped to live for at least two months without outside help or services.  That presumes that I am not killed or injured during the storm.  I have accepted those possibilities for years at sea.  I do on land.

We are on the landward side of this island.  The ocean front is about five miles away.  However Port Royal Sound is only two miles away and storm surge is likely to go up Port Royal Sound.  How much of it would then make the left turn and flood Skull Creek I do not know.  Being on the third floor it will certainly not reach our unit.  It could flood the first floor.  If it does not collapse the building, I believe I will be all right.

I get a monthly newsletter from the Cornell University Lab of Ornithology.  In the most recent is a link to a four minute video of the highlights of a pair of Great Horned Owls raising a single owlet.  I enjoyed it.  You might too.  I had no idea these owls could prey on so many different species and on so large.

watch