Well, that was different...

Yesterday, we awoke to a light rain.  As usual, I checked weather - no mention of rain for the day, nothing about it in the hourlies.  I checked an hour later: rain until 10:00.  We heard thunder rumbling; that's unusual around here.  By 9:00, the weather forecast changed to: rain until noon, then sunny; they lowed the predicted high from in the 70s to in the 60s.  At noon, the rain had quit, solid overcast.

The boat I usually drive is "the adult boat."  The other boat has a table inside with kid books, coloring supplies, and educational toys.  We had a family charter our boat: 5 adults and 7 kids (6 of them under 6 years old)... yep, that's different.

It was sunny when we departed a bit late, at 1:38 pm (Hey, the adults in that family were outnumbered!  It takes extra time to herd kids around.)  I got a report of where the whales are located... and a report of solid fog in that area.

We didn't run into the fog until around Cattle Pass.  The water was pretty calm, and it was wispy fog at first.  Looking to the south, I saw lightning... fog and lightning?  Fun.  I called Joan in the office and had her run a radar loop with predictions - looked like the convective activity would stay south of us.  Within 1/2 mile of turning upisland on the west side, visibility was down to a couple hundred yards.  I already had radar on, so we slowed.  With the engine quieter at the lower speed, you could hear the rumble of thunder.  The fog thickened... with visibility at an estimated 200 feet, it was going to be hard to see whales at 200 yards.  I had a couple small targets that weren't moving; I assumed there were fishing.  On the radio, the report was improved visibilty (a half mile) where the whales were (a few miles north of our position).  We continued through the fog... I was concentrating on the radar, the chartplotter, and keeping a watch ahead - the naturalist said they thought they saw a dorsel fin.  I shut down the boat, and you could hear a whale breathing, but couldn't see it.  I could see the blip on radar.

We started up and moved north.  On the one mile range, I could "see" a couple boats moving slowly; I asked distance and direction of the whales from them.  As the visibility improved some, we saw our first dorsel.  Then another.  A big male and a couple females.  Nearly surreal to see them in the fog.  They were moving north, so we paralleled their course.  Great viewing, and the visibility improved to a couple miles; we could now see the other whale watch boats that were on scene.  The kids on the boat were giddy with the whale sightings.  I kept looking back to the south... yep, a solid wall of fog, lightning in the not so distant distance.

I let the naturalist know that we'd be "taking the long way back."  Choice: further distance with good visibility vs shorter distance, fog and convective activity.  18 knots vs 6 knots.  Either way, we were going to be a little late getting back, and we'd have a quick turn for the evening trip.  The water was nearly flat, sunshine, no wind... nice.  The naturalist asked me if we could swing by Spieden Island on the way back... "We'll see.  We're already running late."  She told me that one of the guys and his son had fished near there yesterday on a charter and they wanted the rest of the family to see the sika deer and mouflon sheep.  I called the office and let them know that we'd be late getting back, but would make up the time at the dock.

The family loved it - the kids got to see the animals, some seals, and a couple bald eagles.  It was an excited and happy bunch when we got them back to the dock.

I swapped boats at the dock, got updated reports of where the whales were: same area, the fog had pretty well dissipated.  Joan pulled up radar: nothing close by.  I had a couple bites of chicken that Joan had waiting for me and headed back to the boat.  We left on time and got to the whales just in time to see a whale breach twice!  Whales to the north moving south, whales to the south moving north.  The naturalist explained to the guests about two pods coming together.  The only boats there were two small Canadian ribs and us.  A great show, but looking behind us, I could see a rain cell moving fast on us.  A few minutes later and the first crack of thunder!  I counted the seconds between seeing the lightning and hearing the rumble... getting closer.  A few drops of rain on the windshield, then... the rain came pounding down!  We handed out rain slickers - most of the guests wanted to stay outside where they could see better, with whales on three sides of us.  It really was a good show, but it looked like we'd be taking the long way around again, this time to stay out of the lightning.

When we turned into Spieden Channel, I could see another cell moving west.  The rain had lightned up a bunch as we moved north, and now it was picking up again.  Moving south in San Juan Channel, the cell seemed to be chasing us.  We made it back to the dock, and it was barely sprinkling.  While picking up around the boat (it takes a long time to hang up 30 wet slickers and spread out wet blankets), there was a blast of lightning WAY close, followed almost immediately by the thunder... the music I could hear in the background went quiet and town went dark.  I went into the dark office (we leave lights on all night) with the sound of beeping battery back-ups, checked out, and locked the door behind me.  9:00 on a Friday night... having no power for the restaurants, bars, and shops is going to be an inconvenience.

There was a glowing horizon to the west, and a light sprinkle as I walked the dock to our boat.  I handed by gear to the Blonde and asked, "Do we have power?"

"I think so.  I've been reading; haven't had the TV or heat on."  I looked at the power panel... nope, no power on the docks, either.  No matter, I was ready for a bite to eat and bed.  Joan said, "I'll nuke that chicken and put it on a tortilla for you."

"Um, no power.  Cold chicken will be just fine." ;-)  With battery power on the boat, we were fine with the fridge, the lights are 12 volt, and I was ready for some rest.  I went to bed with rain and thunder for a lullaby.  In the middle of the night, I was feeling a bit chilly... after 3:00 am, and we still didn't have power.  I went back to bed and pulled the covers around me.  Around 4:00, I heard Joan get up... "It's 53º in here."  She flipped the AC power breaker on, it beeped, and she turned on the electric heat.

Glorious sunshine this morning.  No mention of rain, fog, or lightning in today's forecast... I don't trust 'em.

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On edit: talk on the dock this morning... "Wow!  That was something last night!  Better than the 4th of July!"... "I heard power was out on the mainland."... "Sure glad I wasn't out in that.  What?  You were? Ohhh..."..."We don't usually get warm fog and lightning..."... "I haven't seen anything like that in years."... "Yeah, once every three or four years at the most."