And the Fun Stops.... .. Now.

No real meaningful wind yet, but we've finally got those 20' swells we kept hearing about on the radio! All at oncelike, too. Here we were, minding our business, finishing up evening watch, and then Otis had to go tell a story about a dream he'd had that had involved extricating an albatross from a block & tackle. And *just* as he was starting to describe cutting its wings off with his rig knife, we got hit HARD on the aft starboard quarter. Hard enough to slam the watch on the weather side into the binnacle, and hard enough to fling Rob and myself over the lifeboat and onto the lee rail (baaAAaaalance!). Then we got another one. And another.

So! Great watch, good luck guys, we'll see you below. Good times.

I headed down to the hold, climbing down the fore & aft safety-line the whole way, made sure that the hatch was secure and that the (tarp) cover was nice and tucked over it. I bounded down and into my rack before turning completely green.

I didn't realize how much worse that weather could feel when you were below and couldn't see it.

Then again, I could see it fine when waves began CRASHING DOWN INTO THE HOLD! There's a cutout to the starboard side of the hatch, which leaves exposed about a 1'6" gap, starting 1-2' above the deck. The waves that were breaking over onto the deck were easily clearing this, soaking those of us below.

The first few waves caught me square in the face, since my rack is on the port side, near the galley. I'd been oriented that way to keep my head away from the galley, what with all the crashing noises that go on in there (which was now crescendoing into an Animal-Drum-Solo of pots and pans). Time to change my strategy. I reoriented my drenched head and pillow to point aft, up against the bulkhead and galley.

Meanwhile, while us lubber folk were panicking, Annie and Beth were busily jamming a fitted chunk of plywood into the hatch cutout. Waves were crashing all around them as they worked, but after much heroic effort, it slid home.

And then the next wave broke over *that.*

Not much to do after that, except pray to the Gods of Electric Bilge-Pumps, and get what little sleep we could.

Which got trickier, once the COFFEE-MAKER slipped her moorings, bounced off the bulkhead, and exploded into a million pieces. All of which unloaded their cargo of lukewarm coffee and grounds into my faceand down into my sleeping-bag!

For the next drenched, violent 8 hours, I convinced myself that we were done. With every swell, I was sure that we were broaching, and that was it. After all, in the Forester and O'Brian novels, the Frenchies have had it when water starts blasting down into the hold, right?

After making peace with the world, I finally collapsed into sleep.

12 minutes before Maya politely came down to wake me for morning watch.