VA to NC and Tornadoes Too Close For Comfort!

Apex, NC
61 deg. cloudy, no wind.
Forecast today = high temp. 78 deg. mostly cloudy, NE winds @ 5 mph. Possible storms this afternoon.

OK!!! Enough already with the tornadoes!!!! I was barely missed by one yesterday afternoon!!!!

But first, let's go back to yesterday morning before we left Emporia. On the radar, I could see that there was a big red blob over Raleigh and it was headed in a NE direction, right over the route we would be taking, so I knew that I was in for a rainy travel day.

We left the park about 9:25 and headed South on I-95. When we got down to US 64, near Rocky Mount, NC, we turned SW on 64 and followed it over to Raleigh, then followed it around the South side of the city and then West, here to Apex. We hit rain shortly after leaving Emporia, and it lasted all the way to Raleigh. It did stop raining as we were going around the city, and it held off until Jim got me parked here at the Crosswinds CG at the Jordan Lake State Recreation Area. It was about 12:10 when we got here so we traveled 146 miles in about 2 hours and 35 minutes.

Not too bad considering the weather.

After getting me hooked up to the 30 amp electric and water, Jim and Linda both relaxed and took naps before heading to Mike's at about 4:30. While they were gone, the storms hit, and I'm here to tell you, it got really scary for awhile!! The sky got black, the wind came up and the rain poured down!! The whole area was under a tornado warning, and here I was, sitting in my site, all alone, with nothing to do but hang onto the ground, just a tight as I could!!

Well, the storm passed and I was alright, but I did learn later, from one of the rangers, that there was a tornado touch-down just across the lake from me. Now, this lake isn't that big, so that meant that it touched down less than a mile from me!!!!

WAY TO CLOSE FOR COMFORT!!!!!

After the storm passed, (about 7:30), Jim and Linda came back from Mikes, and boy, was I ever glad to see them. They checked me over for damage, and found that I was OK, and then we all settled down for the evening. While we were relaxing, CLT (Cute Little Truck), told me that over at Mike's, (which is about 10 miles SE of here, there was no storm at all, just some heavy rain for a short time.

Now this morning, the people on the TV are saying that there may have been as many as 8 tornadoes in NC yesterday afternoon and evening, and some of them did some serious damage to homes and property. They're also saying that that cold weather front is still setting right over this area, and so this afternoon, we could have more storms.

I hope not.

Did you know that on an average, there are more than 900 tornadoes in the United States each year?