Hurrican Irene hits Barrington, RI - our previous home town

I'm making the assumption that Diana's regular photo post, Captured, will be delayed today due to power outages all over Rhode Island. I kept in touch with a few of my friends and neighbors yesterday (during the brunt of the storm) via cell phone - that is until their batteries died. Many have now been out of power for two days. I saw plenty of game playing by candle light photos.

Since Barrington (the town from which we just moved) is on the Narragansett Bay, we often experienced high winds and rain on the tail end of hurricanes. The town's last big hurricane was in the 1938. Last year we also experienced a 100 year flood that I posted about at the time. I understand this was a pretty intense storm for our little town. I saw pictures of trees uprooted, sailboats blown off their moorings, and breached seawalls on Facebook.

Here are some general photos from RI that I've found on Facebook or Flickr.  This first one (most certainly doctored)  made me laugh.  The other photos were taken in and around Providence, just a ways away from Barrington.

photo by Chris Mongeau

photo by Chris Mongeau

photo by amojarro

photo by amojarro

photo by amojarro -That's a BMW under that tree!

photo by Amy

I'm glad everyone is safe and that the storm is over. I hope electricity and clean up gets underway soon. I was vicariously  riding the waves with all of you!

Batten down the hatches for hurricane Bill

Thursday we took are Chicago friends to Newport for a day at the beach. As we drove closer to Newport, a thick fog developed making visibility extremely limited. It was eerie. I've never seen the weather like this here in RI. The waves were pretty big which the kids loved. They body surfed for 3 hours with very few breaks as the lifeguards stood noticeably on alert. We overheard one say that they had never seen the weather change so drastically. They announced that swimmers could go no further than waist deep and began walking the edge of the water with keen eyes. I did not envy their jobs that day. As a mother, this was very nerve racking but the dads were with the kids at all times. Today this particular beach is closed due to Bill.

On the news I saw that Newport boaters were securing their boats to moorings or taking them out of the water. One boater said that RI'ers typically don't worry too much until the hurricane is about 100 miles out. Bill is predicted to pass within 200 miles of Nantucket. It is currently 442 miles from Providence and we are under a severe tropical storm warning. It will interesting to see how the weather develops tonight. Currently, it's sunny (hot) and a bit windy.

Our neighbors have been out on their sailboat for the past week. I hope they've found a place to batten down the hatch until this storm passes.

I've never experienced this type of weather. Being from the Midwest, I saw a lot of tornadoes and funnel clouds. I guess it's nature's way of reminding all of us, no matter where we live, that we have no control over the elements. I'm glad we aren't on the Cape this weekend and that my friends are heading back home...inland.