High Tide Along Territory Road

     Our highest tides usually come in December – sometimes as high as eleven or twelve feet.   According to our tide table, though, the highest this year are happening right now –  a 10.4 (ten foot four inch) today at 11:43 a.m. and a 10.5 tomorrow at 12:29 p.m.  In the great scheme of things, neither one will be a record breaker but, if the weather is as stormy as predicted, both should be impressive.
     This year, we’ve already had a half dozen ten-foot tides – one or two in each of the spring months and a 10.1 yesterday.  Most ten foot tides stay within the confines of Willapa Bay, perhaps lapping up toward the meadows that separate our gardens from the high tide line.  But when there has been a big storm, the water sometimes creeps up as far as the road.
     During the storm of night before last, according to the radio, there were twenty-seven foot waves off the Columbia River Bar and the Coast Guard had closed in entrance of the river to ship traffic.  In my mind’s eye (and with my limited understanding of how tides work), all that water piles up outside the mouth of the bay and when the tide comes in, it just keeps coming and coming.
     I love it when that happens!  Yesterday, “The Meadow” at the south end of the village was almost completely inundated.  The seat of the stone bench with Willard Espy’s inscription on it looked as though it was afloat and the path leading to it was a ribbon of wet.
     One of the neighbors told me that some duck hunters had stationed themselves on a high hummock in the Meadow and were happily shooting away.  Apparently, notification that they were on private property did not diminish their ardor.  I think Fish and Wildlife and, finally, the sheriff were involved.
            I had mixed feelings about that.  I guess you can’t hunt on private property without permission, but in our watery landscape of yesterday, property lines, high tide lines, and the shore line were blurrily awash for an hour or two.  On the other hand, the Meadow is in the heart of ‘downtown’ Oysterville which should have been obvious, even when it was underwater. 
     We’re due for another big storm.  If only I had a rowboat, I’d be getting it ready for a voyage down Territory Road.  I think that there’s a fair chance that it will be underwater at lunchtime today or tomorrow.