Last year’s Wind Ceremony must have worked!  These last two months, we have been blessed with plentiful winds.  As an example, today, despite spring break already starting with lots of folks out of town, SPSC sailors came out of the woodwork to sample winds gusting over 30 mph!

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We are lucky to have two weather stations here at Shell Point.  One station, the Weatherstem on top of the bathhouse, is a bit challenged in terms of exposure.  It’s a bit too close to the boathouse roof that provides some flow acceleration, and just upstream in southerly winds is a beautiful cedar tree that provides blockage and turbulence.  On the other hand, it does have a webcam so you can get an idea of the conditions before driving down.

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 The other station (SHPF1), a real professional setup by the University of South Florida, has an anemometer sited about 6 meters above the ground and provides a more representative measurement of what the wind might be like just offshore.  Unfortunately, it doesn't report in real-time but is usually lagged a couple hours.  Nevertheless its a very helpful gauge for correlating your sail and board size or rig trim settings to a wind speed range… you just have to wait till you are done sailing to know what winds you were out in. 

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The Weatherstem reports in mph and the USF reports in knots.  Since SPSC sailors are also called “20 knot snobs”, we prefer to use the more nautical term (a knot is a nautical mile per hour).  You just multiply knots by 1.15 to get a reading in mph.  Today while I was out sailing between 11:14 and 1 pm, the Weatherstem reported a peak gust of 33 mph while the peak gust at SHPF1 was 26 kts (31 mph).

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It was great fun out there today just barely hanging on for dear life.  Like Perry says, I ran out of skill after an hour or so I didn’t last too long but the time I did have was very special, as well as the après-sail time discussing it with other SPSC enthusiasts (see below).

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Out next big event coming up March 25 is the Wind Ceremony.  You will have a chance to write your wind wish on a paint stir stick and present it to the all and powerful Swami for a blessing before throwing it into the fire as an offering for good winds the rest of the year.  As a bonus, you also get to enjoy some pretty awesome music from fellow SPSC members, who play as the band Swami and the Festoons!  Bring your dancing feet and prepare for a Conga line!

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Here are the links to our weather stations:

Shell Point WeatherStem:  https://wakulla.weatherstem.com/fswnspb

Shell Point USF SHPF1:  https://www.ndbc.noaa.gov/station_page.php?station=shpf1

Looking forward to dancing on the beach with all of you!

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Mark Powell

SPSC Commodore