Pictures are Good!

As I was rummaging through my computer I found a few more pictures I had taken this Spring.

The Almost Perfect Storm

As I was digging through old files, I came across an article I had written a number of years back for a  Texas fishing publication. It was entitled "The Almost Perfect Storm", and tells the story of how quickly weather can change and how dangerous it can become.
Here's that article...

“The Almost Perfect Storm”

My son and I were fishing the back lakes of Matagorda Island, about 15 miles out of Port O’Connor, Texas, on an early spring day. We had made the run before daylight in hopes of catching a flooding tide at daybreak. I ran my shallow- water flats boat up into the mouth of one of the larger lakes and we proceeded to wade into the back reaches of the lake. Around 8:00 we decided to try another spot and started back to our boat. The tide had flooded the shallow lake with another foot of water and soon we were into good reds and several large trout causing us to ignore the approaching weather. I was aware that a front was forecast to come in later in the day, but had plans to be in port well before its scheduled arrival time. Very quickly the northern horizon turned from a light gray to an ominous black. The front was rolling toward us at amazing speed.. We hurried for the boat, but before we could lift the anchor and start the engine, we were pounded by 30-40 mph winds. The calm flats were immediately turned into rolling surf. I managed to get the motor cranked and we headed back down the shoreline. I was actually running where 30 minutes before there had been dry ground. The winds increased, waves became three foot rollers, and where there had been six inches of water, there now was three feet. The rain was pounding us like BB shot and visibility was less than 25 yards.

At one point, it seemed as if the winds and rain had ceased. I saw what looked like a sea of green all around us and was trying hard to figure out what had happened. I suddenly realized that I was actually running into the marsh with the storm at our backs. Quickly making an adjustment, we were again being pounded hard. I knew there was a breakwater ahead of us extending out into deeper water and that I had to get around it before going any further down the shoreline. I did not imagine that the breakwater would be completely covered. Only a loud scream from my son warned me that we were almost on top of the breakwater. I quickly turned with the waves and called for all the power my outboard could produce. We missed the breakwater by just a few feet only to realize that another boat had been following us. We barely missed a second collision!

At this point I decided it was just plain stupidity to try to make it to port and turned my boat toward the shoreline. We ran several hundred yards past what was the normal shoreline and tried to anchor. The currents produced by the storm were fierce as the storm surge poured onto the island. We managed to finally anchor and headed toward a group of beach homes, hoping to get out of the cold rain. We were greeted by several good Samaritans, who gave us some dry clothes and hot coffee. The storm continued to rage for several more hours, during which we had to drag our boat back toward the open water several times as the flooding tides started receding. By late afternoon, we were able to make the run back to port. Several boats were lost during this sudden spring storm, but thankfully, no lives were lost.

I was indeed not prepared for such a sudden onslaught of a storm. Since that date in my history I have moved life jackets to a more accessible location, added rain suits, and a couple of those "space blankets"to my boating equipment.