Wind and Water Forces

Today  something happened that I have read about but never seen before.


It was a very blustery morning. After Keep Fit D and I thought we would investigate how choppy the Lake was and go swimming, or not, depending.
By the time we had walked down to the water, light was shearing through the thinner areas of cloud in long shafts, spotlighting a turbulent scene of grey waves set against moody hills shrouded in haze. The wind groaned in the oak trees, whipping twigs and battering leaves. Breakers pummelled the shore in boisterous abandon. We could not resist such an obvious invitation to play, and finding a sheltered cubby hole under the bank we changed and jumped in.


It was hugely exhilarating, as the gusts alternately lifted the water into grand lumps and troughs, to ride up and over, or with an extra push flattened it out and mottled its surfaces into seersucker patterns with a hiss of cold presse; and then, by way of a wet flannel joke, sending a series of short sharp ridges to smack up our noses and down ears.


We had noticed, in passing, that towards the lake centre where the gusts were strongest, vapour droplets were being plucked and flung up in long chutes and streams on the updrafts, thick as smoke, and as quickly being beaten back by long downdrafts racing over the surface. Very dramatic.


It became even more dramatic a few seconds later when suddenly, the air was filled with a vibrating growl and before we knew it one of the chutes was driving down on us faster than a goaded horse, rearing, flailing and twisting. It passed a few yards away in a grumbling roar of sound, its base digging a hole in the water as big as a cauldron until it hit the lake edge and collapsed in a fall of heavy spray.
A stinging surge of a second following of wind and water grazed our bare arms and faces in a pepper shot of violence and then as suddenly as it had begun, reverted to the relative calm of choppy inconsistency.
 
We were in instant agreement that it was time to get out, dry off,  and have a cup of calming coffee.  
We supposed it was a fledgling waterspout, but as it was Crummock, I think more probably an escaping Kelpie.