There's only so much hand-wringing you can do. Here's how we started our day.
Looking forward to next week, we see this synopsis for Charleston (AMZ350) [Emphasis mine.]
STRONG HIGH PRESSURE WILL EXTEND ACROSS THE AREA FROM THE NORTH TODAY...BEFORE WEAKENING AND SHIFTING SOUTH FRIDAY. AN ARCTIC COLD FRONT WILL APPROACH FROM THE NORTHWEST SATURDAY...PASSING THROUGH THE REGION SATURDAY NIGHT WITH GALES LIKELY INTO SUNDAY. STRONGER AND MUCH COLDER HIGH PRESSURE WILL THEN PREVAIL INTO EARLY NEXT WEEK.
This is the synopsis for Cape Fear (AMZ252)
HIGH PRESSURE OVER COASTAL NEW ENGLAND WILL WEAKEN AT SEA TONIGHT AND FRIDAY. AN ARCTIC COLD FRONT APPROACHING FROM THE WEST WILL BRING INCREASING WINDS AND SEAS SATURDAY NIGHT. CANADIAN HIGH PRESSURE WILL CROSS THE OHIO VALLEY SUNDAY AND MOVE INTO NORTH CAROLINA MONDAY.
Ugh.
We need two days of good weather to sail outside to Charleston. Friday to Saturday isn't enough time.
We need three days of not horrifying weather to trudge down the ditch.
The issue with the ditch is that the Cape Fear River, the Waccamaw River and Winyah bay are aligned N-S. Any kind of S wind makes those stretches awful, so the arctic cold fronts are sort of good because they bring wind from the N. But they're also sort of bad because they're right cold.
Monday near Cape Fear, however, looks a little better than anything we've seen for the last two weeks.
Mon: NE winds 10 to 15 kt...becoming E 5 to 10 kt. Seas 2 to 4 ft.
Down near Charleston, Monday doesn't look great, but we won't get there until Tuesday.
Mon: NE winds 10 to 15 kt. Seas 4 to 6 ft. A slight chance of showers.
We'll see how the forecast changes over the next few days. We can hope that the 4-6 foot seas are left-over swell from the gale force winds and they'll settle down on Tuesday.
Enough hand-wringing.
We went to Seapath Marina and did laundry. Unlike some other marinas in the area, they're polite about letting us spend money there without tying up to their docks. The secret sauce is (a) going in the early afternoon mid-week when nothing else is going on, and (b) having met some of the folks at the jam session, we're more like guests of Magic Beans than random transients.