Update October 8, 2024:
We’ve added a couple of notches to our storm-belt since this blog post was originally published in 2020. We were visiting Naples and hunkered down during Hurricane Elsa in 2021, but the boat was in the Florida Keys and saw no storm conditions. Hurricane Ian passed by the Florida Keys in 2022, bringing wind and high water, but no damage. We were tucked up in a canal behind a tall building at a marina where boats survived Irma (2017). We lost dock power when the water rose above the sea wall, but that was about it. For our son Eli in Naples, it meant serious flooding which drowned his truck and the house he rents with his cousins. They were all homeless and staying with family for several months until the house could be renovated.
We had a quiet year in 2023, but this year has been a busy hurricane season. We just weathered Hurricane Helene with tropical storm conditions at a marina in the Ten Thousand Islands area of Southwest Florida. We are eight miles inland, surrounded by a buffer-zone of mangroves, tied to a floating dock with tall pilings. Of course, we are at sea level surrounded by swamp, so we worry about losing our cars. Based on the conditions we saw during Helene two weeks ago and the forecasted storm surge for Hurricane Milton arriving tomorrow night, we parked our cars in a parking deck in Naples and had Eli and Aaron drop us off at the boat, leaving us stranded for a few days until the storm passes and the water goes down. The two boys (I should say “men”) are evacuating, moving their stuff from their rental, and going to stay with their grandfather, “Skipper” at his house, which has a whole-house generator and did not flood in Irma or Ian.
As usual, we have multiple contingency plans, including anchoring in nearby mangroves if the path of the storm veers south or if conditions are stronger than currently predicted. As of today, we are outside the cone of uncertainty, forecasted to receive tropical storm force winds and a storm surge of max nine feet, which we can handle here at the dock on the boat. We are well-stocked, securely tied, and self-sufficient. Everyone is feeling a little skittish after seeing the damage from Helene, so people are taking Milton seriously and preparing as best they can. It is a record-breaking storm and could cause a lot of damage and loss of life, especially to the north of us. We’re doing our best, as always, to “hope for the best, plan for the worst,” and praying for everyone in the path of this hurricane.
Original post, November 2020:
We have prepared for and experienced several tropical storms in the twelve years we have owned Take Two, but never have we had to enact our hurricane plan, which involves “spiderwebbing” ourselves up inside a mangrove creek. That is, not until this week, when Tropical Storm Eta passed over the Florida Keys. Eta was the 29th tropical cyclone this year and passed this way after raking over Central America and flooding parts of Panama and Guatemala that we visited (2017-2019). News coming from friends in hard-hit areas is heartrending and puts our encounter with the storm in perspective. We are feeling very thankful that we received the less-intense part of the storm, and also that we were able to find a quiet, secure place to practice our better-safe-than-sorry plan.
We have weathered several named storms on the boat; some of those stories are documented here on the blog. We have been fortunate not to have sustained any storm damage yet, both by luck and preparation, though we have lost plenty of sleep. We prepped for our first tropical storm, Fay, in 2008, mere months after we had purchased the boat.
We were anchored during Tropical Storm Debby in 2012, which lingered over the Tampa Bay area for five days and tested our recently-purchased Manson 80-pound anchor as well as our patience. Later that year, Superstorm Sandy passed by Ft. Pierce while we were tied to a dock there.
We experienced the beginning of Hurricane Matthew in 2016 while we were at a marina in Grenada, a storm for which we considered anchoring in a nearby mangrove bay, though we ultimately decided against it when we heard from locals that the holding was bad. It got a little too crowded for our liking, anyway. We were uncomfortable, but not unsafe during that storm. In fact, dealing with seasonal weather patterns is simply part of living on a boat—every year we make a plan for where we’ll be from June to November, and what we’ll do if a storm threatens.
Our best strategy for storm prep is avoidance. We prefer to be outside the “hurricane box” drawn by insurance companies, in places like the Chesapeake, Grenada, Panama, and Guatemala. When we can’t avoid the hurricane zone, which is sometimes the case since Florida is our home base, we watch the forecasts carefully and try to find a “safe” place to be in August and September especially. With every storm that presents reasonable threat, we make a plan that shifts with each change in direction and intensity. If we can’t avoid a storm, we take measures to protect the boat and her crew during the bad weather. For anything more than a Tropical Storm (winds more than 74 mph), we would put the boat in a place where we can reduce the risk of damage and then evacuate for our safety and comfort.
We were in Panama during the last storm that devastated the Florida Keys, Irma in 2017. The memory is still fresh here, and locals take hurricane warnings very seriously. Those who stayed on their boats or in their houses for that storm tell harrowing stories. The mooring balls in Boot Key Harbor, a place we have now spent three hurricane seasons, are screw-type hurricane-grade moorings, but the biggest threat is the “pinball effect” when a boat in the nearby anchorage drags anchor or breaks loose from a mooring and damages others as it drifts. While we can take proper precautions for our own boat, we can’t be sure of the security of other vessels. This is what prompted us to spend August and September on a seawall up a protected canal, and why we tied up in the mangroves for Eta.
One of the good things about our life afloat is the ability to move, and the self-sufficiency our boat provides. Sometimes we can get out of the way of bad weather, and sometimes we can secure our boat in a safe place despite it. We can’t eliminate risk, but we can mitigate it. Because we make our own power, we don’t have to worry about electrical outages. Because we float, we don’t have to worry about flooding. In fact, the rain provides free water as it runs from our hard top straight into our tanks.
We are feeling grateful a lot these days, for blessings large and small. At a time when there is so much bad news, we don’t take health, happiness, or protection from harm for granted. Seems like for every sigh of relief, there is also a sigh of sympathy: our thoughts and prayers are with those who have suffered so much this year.