The June That
Wasn't: 2009 |
June is one of those months in Maine where the weather can
be almost anything. While summer in Maine can be, and
usually is, a glorious--if short--time, June often ends up
being less than ideal, as the typical summer weather
patterns don't usually form with any coalescence until July.
Over the years, Mainers have endured some lousy weather
in June. This year, however, stands out as one of the
worst in memory. For weeks, a series of upper-level
lows and offshore storms have stalled, immobile, in such
positions as to keep Maine and northern New England in a
perpetual weather funk: fog, drizzle, occasional
periods of heavier, steadier rain, and then more of the
same. The stalled pattern in and of itself isn't
unusual, nor is the fog or rain. But usually, in between
these periods there are at least reasonable stretches of
clear weather.
What made this year so unpleasant is
the fact that there were very few actually nice days during
June; I think I could count them, literally, on one hand.
Day in and day out of persistent fog and grayness simply
precluded any realistic and enjoyable use of the boat.
Somehow, I managed two sails (in addition to the weekend
delivery sail at the end of May) during the month: one
of them was fortuitously squeezed into a rare 24-hour window
of beautiful weather that was sandwiched between long
periods of heavy rain, and the other was on the first
weekend of the month before things had started to truly
deteriorate. Of course, the few truly nice day we did
have ended up falling on work days.
I made it up to
the boat a couple other times for non-sailing visits;
whether I planned on sailing those days or not, I ended up
not going out, either because of lack of wind, or
unanticipated fog on the water, or both. At least I
was on the boat, but I wasn't getting any sailing time in.
Last year, I was extremely busy at work, which
limited my time on the water; this year, I had more
flexibility in my work schedule, but the weather was
interfering. Oh well.
Website note: I
decided after last year that I would no longer post regular
sailing logs here. So you won't be reading about
daysails and other non-noteworthy events. Maybe I'll
post some pictures from cruising and sailing as the season
goes on. The usual focus on maintenance and upgrade
projects will of course continue, as always, on this site.
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July Wasn't Much Better... |
After enduring a tough
June, we hoped that July would bring an improvement to the
weather. Typically, July and August bring pleasant
summer weather--after all, we wait all winter long for a
couple special months in the summer.
Unfortunately,
the weather pattern this year continued to remain unsettled
through most of the month. There was plenty of fog and
many rainy days. Our plans for a long weekend over the
4th were reduced when bad weather interfered; we managed to
spend the afternoon of the 4th aboard, and overnight, with
an excellent sailing day on the 5th, but the weather seemed
more like Labor day--cool, crisp, and breezy. Nice,
but not July-like. But this one day was only a brief
break in the seemingly never-ending upper level trough and
series of low pressure systems that passed along the trough:
we had high temperatures only in the 50s for a few days
after the 4th. Dreary.
I had one simply perfect
daysailing day when I played hooky from work one Friday (and
I'm glad I did). We had a disjointed one-week cruise
in mid-July--disjointed because Heidi couldn't get away from
work as planned on Friday, so although I went to the boat on
time, I needed to return the next Tuesday to pick her up.
Then, poor weather intervened and conspired to keep us on
the mooring at Buck's Harbor for the remainder of the
week--startlingly silly, really. It was relaxing, but
not really a cruise in any way, shape, or form.
What
will August bring? Who knows. Expecting more of
the same seems the only safe thing to do, and perhaps we'll
be pleasantly surprised instead.
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