PHILLIPE

 Tropical Storm Phillipe struck us last night (October 2, 2023) along with Guadeloupe and Martinique, our near neighbours. After a weeks-long drought and hell-like heat we finally had  RAIN, RAIN, RAIN, causing much destruction.   Not to us, we were snug and dry, but today Salisbury is underwater, the cliff at Tarrish Pit is crumbling, and the road from Trafalgar to Woten Waven is awash and not passable. Probably the road from Calibishi, over the bridge is also impassable. The usually calm and patient Caribbean Sea was very high, and noisy and brought a lot of detritus and debris, and the bloated body of a rather large drowned dog.  EBoy and Darius waded in and got it but couldn't bury it because there was just too much water and heaps of beach shit.  The Sea is still rolling and the several local rivers that flow into it are running hard and fast.  Today it is raining off and on and it is dark. 28 degrees C, so it is not cold at all.  Damp.  Nothing is drying.  There are barges, cargo ships, and tugs moored way out.

McDowell is worried about what happened in the heavy rain at Destinee.  The pomme cythere trees were loaded.  Is the fruit now all on the ground?  Lemons?  Plantain?  He will try to go up there tomorrow.

                             Pomme Cythere - makes good juice.  Said to lower blood pressure

Is this the last storm of the season?  The hurricane season does not close until the first of November.

Wednesday, October 4, 2023 - 35 degrees C, sunny, west breeze.  Nice.  Cleaning up.  The beach stinks.  The sea is filthy, but calmer.  The tap water is orange!

McDowell went up to the farm early this morning. No real damage but a lot of fruit on the ground.  He came back with 20 coconuts, several bushels of pomme cythere, guavas, lemons, and lime. He took the puppies; they romped around and went for a walk up the Waitakubuli Trail (segemtn13, a difficult hiking section of the system) which was never properly opened up after Maria. He saw his 8 Valencia orange trees just beginning to bear. The puppies are asleep, knocked out from their morning in the bush.

 I'll be making guava juice this afternoon.  I don't make the pomme cythere juice as it is too much work