Hurricane Leslie. The first hurricane ever to
hit Europe. That's how they described the big storm, that was heading
directly towards us and our RV parked at a cozy spot near Peniche, Portugal. Concerned of the strong wind and
stuff flying around with it, we decided to head a couple dozen
kilometers inland around 6 PM last night. At the time, the wind had already
started blowing quite rapidly and the sea was getting messy around
the Baleal Island – the place, where both of us had been surfing
just a few hours ago.
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| Some big swell at Baleal 24 h before Leslie was to arrive. |
We first noticed Leslie on the
weekend's surf-forecast.
The forecast looked kind of sketchy with all the red
triangles, big swell and rising wind speed. On Saturday afternoon,
our neighbors (i.e. a the guys living in vans next to us) also warned
us about the approaching hurricane. They were going to move inland
later in the evening and suggested, that we would find some shelter
too. After that, there were several people asking around about what
to do and where to go.
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| Leslie on the wave map. |
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| Leslie on Saturday night's surf-forecast. |
Indeed. What to do and where to go in
case of a big storm or even a hurricane, if you're out there with
your home on wheels? Leslie turned out not to be a full size
hurricane, but it certainly was powerful enough to break things (didn't experience ourselves, but saw on the news).
To
avoid possible damages on our RV, we did three things before the
storm arrived.
First of all, we gathered some
information about the storm. How fast and from which direction will
the wind blow? How long is the storm likely to last? In Leslie's case
the worst weather was supposed to be around midnight and the wind was
predicted to blow first from south and then turn 180° to blow from
north.
Based on the gathered information, we
started looking for a safe parking lot for the night. The weather
forecast leaded us to
Losa del Obispo, our RV parked in the middle of
large buildings and between two vans. What we were trying to find,
was a some sort of parking lot with either terrain formations or
buildings sheltering us from the storm. That being said, a forest
would not have been a good option, because of the possibility of
trees falling or sticks and whatnot flying around.
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| Sheltered from three sides. |
What else did we do before
Leslie arrived? We secured our RV's skylight windows with a few cargo
straps. The window hatches sometimes flap even when it's not that
windy, so we were afraid of them flying off during the night. The
odd-looking installation worked well and the window hatches were
still in place in the morning. On the other hand, we were quite sheltered from the wind as well and slept our night peacefully.
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| A stormproof way to secure a skylight window. |
Do you have some other tips and tricks
for surviving a storm on the road? Feel free to post them on the
comment box below. I would love to hear other people's experiences on what
works and what doesn't, when the weather is about to get ugly during
a road trip.
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