Pensacola Beach Blogger

Ida brought an overbearing surf and pushed enough sand around to close J. Earle Bowden Way.  This is also known as the “road to Navarre” on the east side of Pensacola Beach. On my way to work, I was stopped by this roadblock. You can see the sand completely covered the road. In some places, you could see where the water crossed the road (click to enlarge):

I had to turn around and head back the other direction. You can see just barely see Portofino in the distance:

I’m not sure if this is re-opened now or not… please comment if you know otherwise!

Ida came with about 4 inches of rain, big winds, and a strong surf, but left with a lot of the sand on the beach. You can see how high the surf got over the night. See the water line on the walkway over the dunes? You can also see where it spilled over the dunes to the left of the walkway:

This is a perfect example of the sea oats doing their job. You can see where the surf ate away at the dune until it reached the sea oats:

See these blocks of wood in the sand? There used to be 4 foot high fences on those. The sea oats certainly outperformed the sand fences.

Other than the beach erosion, Pensacola Beach held up fine. I didn’t see any damage on my walk this morning. Fort Pickens Road is washed over, and still closed, but that’s about it!

We are starting to feel the effects of hurricane (now tropical storm) Ida. It has been raining for several hours out here on the beach, and we are starting to get some wind. It looks like Pensacola Beach will take a direct hit in this one. Thankfully it has been steadily weakening.

Down at the pier, the local photographers and Weather Channel reporters congregate… I saw Jim Cantore, Stephanie Abrams:

but my favorite sighting was David from Beach Bum Photography.  He and his wife took our wedding photos!

The island authority has been busy removing anything that hangs, swings, or could blow away. I took this from my iPhone this morning while driving. They are taking down the road signs:

Here’s what the radar looks like as of 11am:

Stay tuned for updates. I’m riding the storm out on the island, so I’ll be updating as long as I have power!

Looks like more rain heading our way today. Pensacola has had 8.82 inches of rain this week. Yesterday accounted for more than 5 inches, and it looks like more on the way today. I snapped this shot before the clouds moved in this morning:

Let’s get all of the rain out of the way this week! Folks start arriving on Monday for our wedding next week! 8 days!

Got these shots this morning. The colors of the water and the sky were great for a photo shoot!

Calm for now though:

Remember you can click the pictures to enlarge them.

There have been some awesome summer clouds over Pensacola Beach the last few days.  In the summer I usually walk around taking pictures with a plastic grocery bag wadded up in my pocket just in case it downpours (need to protect the camera!), but lately I’ve been forgetting it, making these walks a little  nerve-wracking!

Yesterday was a beautiful cloud day:

Rain in the distance:

I saw this one later in the day, from the Pensacola Beach Pier:

One thing is certain. Big cumulus clouds like this always make for interesting sunsets!

Get ready for some rain tonight, Pensacola Beach! Tropical Depression 4 (soon to be Tropical Storm Claudette) formed in the Gulf last night and is headed our way!

We walked out to the beach this morning. The waves were coming in from the east, which is kind of unusual. The storms and wind were starting to show up!

This poor little guy got washed up by the strong surf:

At least the surfers can take advantage of the waves before the rain comes in:

Now is the time to make any last minute preparations for hurricane season if you haven’t already: Candles, drinking water, emergency radios, extra batteries, and flashlights should all be stocked up on if you live out on the island! And most importantly, remember not to lose your head (like this guy) when the storms come rolling in!

Hurricane Ike is causing some high tides and flooding over in my neighborhood on Pensacola Beach, the sound-side in particular. I woke up this morning to a beautiful sunrise:

But water rushing down the street is never a good sign:

Looks like the Gulf is coming over the dunes! Not a good thing for our expected turtle hatchlings on Pensacola Beach.

In fact, I found this screen covering used to keep crabs out of the turtle nests. I’ll be sure to let Barrier Island Girl and Traveling Turtle Girl know.

The Santa Rosa sound is rising:

And it is causing plenty of problems for my neighbors on the sound-side of the island:

I took many more pictures down at the pier this morning… I’ll have them up shortly!

I certainly don’t like the projected forecast for Hurricane Ike. Ike is now a borderline category 2 or 3 hurricane headed to the Keys of Florida, along with Haiti and Cuba. Computer models are now showing that Ike will most likely end up in the Gulf of Mexico, which is bad news for Pensacola and the rest of the Gulf Coast. Later next week, we may be closing up hurricane shutters once again.

Many of my neighbors have kept their windows borded up and the hurricane shutters closed since taking action for Hurricane Gustav. Let’s hope we can open up our windows again soon!

Hurricane Gustav is gone, but he took something with him! My beach! This walkway usually ramps down into the sand. Today there’s a 2 foot drop-off:

You can see some damage to the sand fences (or whatever those are called):

But the good news is that the sun is shining, at least for now. There are still a few storms rolling through though. I snapped this picture around noon today: