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Published: July 12th 2019
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With one eye on the National Hurricane Center website and one eye on the road, and with Satellite Beach in our rear view mirror, we left home this morning at 8 AM and 77 degrees and pointed the car toward Pensacola. As anyone who has driven I-10 in FL knows, it was an uneventful drive, often provided nothing for the senses except lots of green trees, namely live oak and southern yellow pine…we left the palm trees back in central Florida this morning and will likely not see anymore of them until we get back home.
We made an executive decision a couple of days ago to alter our route of travel significantly. Originally, we had planned to drive all the way to Dana Point, CA and drive north on the Pacific Coast Highway to Oregon, but I got weak in the knees when I saw the repeated reports of earthquakes in southern California and experts saying that this could be the precursor for the big one on the San Andreas Fault. As far as I was concerned, being on the PCH when that happens is not a prudent decision to make, so I wimped out and, despite Steve’s insistence
that it was not going to happen, I insisted that we put that off until next year, after things out there quiet down. So we will be turning north after visiting New Mexico and circling around California to get to Oregon. I take full responsibility for this and I pray that no one on the PCH gets stranded due to landslides, road blockings, or fissures in the road, not to mention the possible power outages or hotel closures. I was just not willing to risk it. Call me wimpy and that is OK. I no longer have the nerves of steel I once had when I was flying small planes over New England. Guess I am getting old.
So, back to today…the weather reports were predicting a lot of rain along our route, not coming from the tropical depression, but from a system working its way up the west coast of Florida. For the most part, we didn’t see much of that rain, only about an hour of it in the middle of the day, then it was gone. When we arrived in Pensacola at 5 PM eastern time, the skies were partly sunny. We checked into our hotel
and decided to stay on eastern time, despite the fact that we entered the Central Time Zone mid-afternoon. This will make it easier to get up early tomorrow morning and get on the road for the drive across the storm zone and out the other side, on our way to Beaumont, TX. Once we arrive there, we will be outside the danger zone and it should be free sailing from that point. Right now it appears that we will have beat the storm. The current update on the NHC web site has downgraded it and it looks like it will not become a hurricane after all. It should be hitting the cost of Louisiana at mid-day Saturday, with lots of rain but, by that time, we will be half way to San Antonio. They are predicting flooding around Lake Ponchartrain, but mostly from rain and Mississippi River run down, not from a significant storm surge. I hope the levies hold.
Tomorrow, off to Beaumont, Texas.
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Joanne burns
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Happy to hear the storm has been down graded and won’t become a hurricane. We will be leaving on Mon. For the Florida panhandle for a short time and hoping not to have bad weather and flooding on the drive. Safe travel. Keep us posted!