3.30am. It sounds like a Boeing 747 is taking off outside the yurt. I've never heard wind like this before. The noise is literally deafening. Gusts build and howl around us and I lie, frozen, waiting for something to give - the yurt to suddenly uproot or a tree to appear through the roof. Then it all goes eerily quiet momentarily... (and breathe)...before the next gust comes bellowing.
I'm on my own with the girls tonight. Therefore 'in charge' and feeling ill equipped for the job! Previous worries on occasions I've been on my own have included imagining the mad man of the local village making his way up to us. I don't know if such a mad man exists (though I am inclined to think most villages have one) and he'd probably be more scared finding his way up our long winding track in the pitch dark. But this is scarier in any case. I have grabbed my phone as a distraction strategy.
On the last stormy night the tarp, which covers a hole in the roof, blew off. (Our future yurts will be more robust I hasten to add - this one was bought second-hand off the sister of a friend's friend!) The girls were asleep inside, we were having supper and saw it happen. It was all action stations trying to save it/fix it before the yurt got flooded. This storm sounds way louder. I can hear the tarp flapping wildly outside. There's no way I could fix it on my own (in the dark!) if it did come off.
So I'm replaying the sequence of my emergency plan in my head in preparation; grab the baseball cap with the LED light (thank you Jani for making me buy this Aldi special), grab rain jacket, grab baby no 1 (no idea who is no 1...who to choose first?..mother's nightmare), run to car and put baby in car seat. Return (hoping yurt still there!) grab baby no 2 and repeat. Turn on car engine to drown out noise of the howling wind, will also help settle presumably screaming babies, and will heat car. Take a breath. Back to yurt to grab more clothes for all of us. And back to car. Maybe go for drive to calm nerves. Though falling trees...probably shouldn't. I contemplate relocating to the camper...no mattress there to make a bed (bed area was converted into a play area..as are increasingly more areas, the world will soon be one large play area!), no heating, would need to grab duvet from yurt, can't leave one baby alone in there while getting the other and who am I kidding that any of us would be able to sleep by then.
In the meantime the storm rages on, the yurt is creaking, tarp is flapping and the babies unfathomably are sleeping through! (Seriously calling into question the tip-toe-ing around we usually do.) I'm secretly hoping one will wake soon so I have someone to cuddle.
3.51am... This didn't kill nearly enough time.. Best put phone down to save battery for aforementioned emergency.
Next morning I wake. So I did manage to fall asleep eventually. The yurt and its contents are all in one piece. I look outside. Our small picnic table and chairs are still upright in the usual position. There doesn't appear to be a twig out of place! The sun is shining. And so another yurt life-lesson...weather conditions are never quite as bad as they sound from the inside.