Ridem cowboy! yeehaw!

The day started @ 4:20 am with being woke up by 30+ mph winds from a direction my anchors weren't set for . Thanks to Jim Crammond for the kick ass rope that held all by itself till 9am.
I moved to the south side of the bay to get some relief from the wind and wake , no sooner set down the hook and the wind dies....
So I prep to step out to Hawk Channel knowing that there would be leftover chop from the earlier wind, but needed to get somewhere else before the next gale hit.
Rounding the lil island into 4ft waves had me debating on turning around, but I continued.
the seas grew as the day rolled on. by noon I was sailing in 7-8 foot seas with 1-2foot chop.
by 1:45pm the seas were 10ft average and breaking with an increasing wind.
Reefing the genoa I continued on, one hand on the wheel , one hand holding me in place.
Miraculously I only got a little bit of spray. I felt the hull go airbourne a few times and landing made an incredible splash.
All the rockin an rollin that goes on in these conditions soon points out what I forget to stow or brace, having shut the hatch to keep the spray out also let me disregard the crashing noises coming from the inside of the cabin from my stuff getting tossed.
I watched a power cruiser go by on the opposite heading , it was also broadside to these waves but was rolling so badly that I could tell he was having a bad day with it.
Not long later I started hearing the radio announce vessels capsized while I am fighting to hold a parralell course to the shore on my downwind side and the reef between us.
Now about this time I get a message from Miss Lemann stating that she would rather be where I was since it was so cold where she was. Reading this text was an act of saving my phone battery for gps use but (after quickly glancing at the seas, nav , sail ) I couldn't help it. The laughter came and all my worries evaporated( for the most part). If my non swimming friend only knew how terrified whe would have been had her wish to be in my place been true , I am positive that msg would have read completely different.
So the laughter came and went for the rest of the day.
Towards the end of the day the seas subsided a bit and the frequency changed a bit when finally the wind was so slight that I rolled up the sail to continue on motor only.
I had the motor on an idle the whole day because of the severity out there then and the desperate flight to safety had to be done by dark if possible.

I have only been in waves this big 2 other times but those times were at night . Now that I have finally seen the big monsters that had their way with me at night I have the feeling that I wouldn't have any problems with these anymore pending proximity of shore.

Feeling more alive than I have felt in quite a while. Exausted sore and alive!