Greetings from the island everyone. I hope that all of you had a wonderful Christmas with your family and friends, and are having a great new year in 2023. We don’t have any flying cars yet, probably a very good thing. . but maybe in the not so quite distant future.
I swear I’m still having issues adjusting to this time change. My days are so much more on track when it gets dark during the actual pre-night hours, instead of darkness at MID-DAY it seems! I’m basically a get up at morning sunrise person, and head upstairs to go to bed shortly after sunset and darkness. But there have been many times, especially during cold days and nasty weather, that I’ll head upstairs and look at my phone and it’s showing like 6:10 PM! Seriously, Clint?? I don’t think the dang chickens are even roosted that early! So I’ll just lie there in bed and read or watch YouTube videos on interesting things until I fall asleep. Of course I’m then wide awake at 3:30 AM, before the dang rooster even starts crowing. Oh well, the time change back is soon approaching.
A few days before Christmas saw the island, and everyone else, endure what would be a brutal cold spell for our area. I knew from the forecast that it was on the way, so I went in a few days prior and filled up extra propane tanks for all my heating things. . stove, water heater and upstairs bedroom heater at night. I’m so glad I got extra propane and other supplies, including gasoline, because it got very cold out here, with unbelievable high winds, easily 35-45 mph sustained, for 16 hours. I don’t believe the temps were quite as cold as the Feb, 2021 freeze, but the winds were definitely much stronger, dropping the wind chill to near 0°, now that’s dang cold!
That Thursday afternoon, Dec. 22, I finished my preparations, including shutting off my water well and rain tank pumps, and draining all the PVC pipes the best I could. I used old t-shirts to wrap any exposed low-lying pipes that I couldn’t drain. I also filled three 5-gallon buckets with fresh water to use during the 3-4 days I knew I would be without running fresh water, and took a nice hot shower before shutting everything off. By Monday morning, Dec. 26, the temps were remaining above freezing on the island, so I was able to hook the water pumps back up and resume normal living. Thankfully, I did not have any broken pipes to deal with, but there were many places out here that did have broken pipes and damaged water heaters.
As with all winters on the island, especially when cold northers blow hard, like during the Christmas freeze norther, the tide level in the bay drops extremely low, and it certainly did this time. My boat was sitting on solid ground next to my pier for six days, absolutely not going anywhere. This is a common winter occurrence, and one of the many reasons why it is imperative to be prepared and stay stocked up on all provisions during the winter months. Propane, gasoline for generator use, canned food and miscellaneous over the counter medical stuff are all must-haves on hand out here. Island life is tough, but it’s much tougher if you are unprepared.
Well that’s it from the island for now. Everyone take care, stay warm and have a wonderful day.
