Dodged the Big Storm - Friends of Seguin Island Light Station

Monday
July 18, 2016

We woke up to the sound of the foghorn sounding off and a very thick fog blanketing the island. We had steel cut oats with fresh fruit, nuts, seeds, and granola for breakfast along with coffee of course.

Working on the latch for the interior lighthouse doors.

At a few minutes before nine, a couple that spent the night on their sailboat in the cove came up the hill to the see the museum and lighthouse. We chatted with them and found out that they arrived after the campers and the other sailboat we saw pull in as the fog was rolling in. They said they were relieved to find a mooring (our fifth of five) available and that it was a tricky maneuver in the fog with four other boats to get tied up. Except for our guest quarters, we were

pretty full last night with five boats in the cove and six in the campsite. I took the visitors up in the lighthouse and the view was actually a little better than I expected. We couldn’t see too far but the fog had burned off enough that we could at least see the water.

After breakfast, I fixed the latch on the interior light house doorway using the old trick of filling the hole with glue covered toothpicks and driving the screw into the toothpicks (thanks for the suggestion Jason). It worked perfectly and the latch won’t keep coming loose. Patty was chatting with our early visitors in the museum while I was doing that and then she did a little dusting and cleaning – the brick dust never stops.

The fog continued to dissipate but it was getting pretty hot and sticky. Around ten, the six that camped down the hill came up to see the museum and lighthouse. They said they had a good night and the only thing they missed out on because of the fog and dampness was playing cards together. In fact, they asked about availability in a couple of weeks because part of their group might come back. After seeing the lighthouse, they went off on a hike but said they planned to leave by early afternoon before forecasted storms hit.

We had some turkey and swiss cheese in the freezer thanks to our recent guests Whitney and Tom who gave it to us when they left. With that and some lettuce, tomato, and onion, we made sandwiches for lunch before Ethan’s group arrived. After we ate and cleaned up, it was just about 11:30 and a few minutes later, the first visitors from the ferry came up the hill.

One extended family of ten staying together at Small Point was from Massachusetts and New Jersey. They brought a picnic lunch with them and ate at the table outside our kitchen after touring the lighthouse. Most of them had been to Seguin before but a few had not and they all enjoyed hearing the history of the island (a refresher for some). One of them said that the flies in Small Point are vicious right now which I feel lucky

because we don’t have too many….yet. We also had a family of seven from the Houston area in the group that are heading home on Wednesday to temperatures of 100 or higher. We felt lucky again! They also brought a picnic lunch and spread out on the lawn to eat. Very unusually, we also had a couple that visited the museum and went to hike but decided not to go up in the lighthouse.

After Ethan’s group started to head down the hill or off on hikes, we overheard some lobstermen on the radio saying they were heading in because of front coming our way with severe weather. The wind had definitely picked up since this morning and while it was pretty clear now, we could see thick clouds to the west. We went down the hill to check the camp area and cove and saw that only one sailboat was moored and the campers were gone. We headed back up the hill with water and thought we might do some mowing before the storms arrived.

By the time we got up the hill, it was even windier, too windy to work outside with our 10-minute average speed (according to the weather station) up to 20mph. And the clouds were getting closer faster than we expected. Not long afterwards, we started to hear thunder and it started raining lightly. No mowing. About an hour later, around 5:30 or so, the sun started to come out and we thought the storm had mostly passed without getting bad though we still heard distant thunder and the wind was now averaging 22mph. The weather station actually read “Kite Flying Weather.”

With an occasional rumble of thunder, two visitors from Quebec that were moored in the cove came up the hill. We were really surprised to see them, in fact, Patty had just said “now is the time some crazy couple will visit” and they were surprised we were here. When she told them she had just said that, they showed her the storm on radar – It was a big one and it just skirted to the south of us and was heading away. They visited the museum and gift-shop but we said we didn’t feel comfortable taking them up in the tower because of the potential for lightning, particularly in light of the fact that our ground cable is broken. They planned to spend the night in the cove and said they were fine with either coming up later tonight if it cleared up or tomorrow if not. Before returning to their boat, they hiked the North Trail and then headed down around 6:30.