Day 5

4:12 p.m.

This morning I woke up late to yet more rain and a lot of stiff wind. The sky outside has remained an opaque white. The rain slacks off, coming in light to moderate bursts, stops awhile. I get all excited that it has stopped. Then it returns with renewed vigor. It’s raining hard as I write this. The wind has remained constant all day, rattling masts, howling in the rigging, and rocking the boat.

We ventured out before a late lunch to take a look and to chat with one of the dockmasters. Before I go on, a tip of the hat to both of them. We are at Portofino Marina and dockmasters Katie and Dean have been here the whole time on their boat. They take their dinghy around and check on us liveaboards every day. Every day they are in the office. They are really keeping up with things and are on the ball. Not something I could say about other places we have lived. Thanks, guys.

Anyway, we chatted with Dean about grocery stores and roads. The Kroger and HEB and Walmart are all open! I am flabbergasted. And evidently there is no problem getting to them. We are fine for food, although tomorrow is the last day of fresh and then we are into beans and rice and canned fish. So I’m guessing as soon as the wind dies down we’ll be on our way to shore, a hot shower, and the store.

We sat glued to the news on our computer last night, mouths agape. I have never seen anything like it. The entire city seems to be underwater. We watched as people were driven to safety on a huge front loader, sitting in the bed of the truck, clinging to the sides, sitting in front in the shovel. Volunteers are all over the place, driving their boats down drowned streets and plucking people off cars, out of doorways, off roofs. People were wading in chest deep water, walking out of submerged residential areas. We feel so blessed and grateful to be warm and safe and dry, and were so cheered by the volunteers. A large furniture store had opened the store to refugees, housing about 300. My only question was – where are the governmental troops with boats, etc.? There are definitely some Coast Guard and National Guard, but there don’t seem to be many. Thank God for all the fishermen in this area with their flat bottomed boats.

We got word that our church has, amazingly, not flooded. It is a stone’s throw from Dickinson Bayou. I have no idea how it has escaped.

We keep watching the water levels. The rain continues, they have opened some levees, and we worry about a sudden cascade of water. So far, nothing has reached us, and the brown tide continues to sweep past us toward the Bay. I am so thankful there is nothing to block its exit.

One funny thing: David saw two pelicans floating on the surface of the channel, as they often do, whizzing past at about 10 knots, enjoying the ride.