03:20 – I awoke to a loud crash from the galley area and, just as I was getting fully awake, I heard stuff falling in my head and realized that I was sliding across the bed. I got up quickly (as one might imagine) and checked outside to see if somehow my anchor might have dragged; an unlikely event considering I’d dove on it the day before and it was completely buried in sand and had sufficient 4:1 scope of chain. Everthing above deck looked OK until I noticed that a very big northerly swell had set in and there was a wave about to break beside the boat!
I was still in about 20 feet of water inside the reef so I realized that for waves to curl over inside the anchorage there must be a very big swell out there. WindGuru showed me that this new north swell up to 3m in height and 10s interval would last at least 24 hours, but I wasn’t going to try to leave the anchorage in the dark and the only danger I was in was the danger of losing sleep. While most of the time the wind aligned the boat to the incoming swell and nothing much would happen, every 10-15 minutes the combination of boat angle and a set of 2-3 exceptionally big waves would roll the boat so excessively that even my “Starfish” position on the bed would barely keep me in place. As can be expected, I didn’t sleep very well or much at all and at 7am after sunrise and the first squalls of the day, I proceeded to prepare the boat for leaving the anchorage and departed, heading for the sheltered area on Jost van Dyke off Diamond Cay and I took a mooring ball while a squall passed by and am now comfortably on the mooring and debating whether to make another coffee or just to get on deck and take a couple of hours worth of nap.
I took a walk to the bubbly pool again, as it looked like the waves were really breaking on the north shore. I’ll keep those memories to myself and not post any pictures today (in reality, I neglected to remove the battery from the charger).
I switched from the mooring ball to the anchor in the late afternoon, with plans of using the saved $30 at Foxy’s Taboo ashore; I feel more comfortable with my anchor and sufficient chain than with a mooring that I don’t know at all and which might part unexpectedly in the middle of the night, leaving me up on a reef. After making myself presentable I dinghied in and had a fine lamb kebab for dinner and some conversation with a couple from the USA who were celebrating their silver anniversary on Jost.
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