The heat hasn’t let up and is rumoured to stick around for another week – so much for the forecast. David put up the boom tent this morning which helped keep things cooler and allowed Sally to spend the afternoon on decks in the shade while we floated around on the kayaks making regular trips to Chatterbox Falls for an ice-cold swim. With the sun dipping behind the mountains by 5 pm, the evenings are much more pleasant here and we’re beginning to see signs of an appetite again. But it seems others on the dock aren’t able to manage the heat as well as we are. While we’re having an incredible time together making the best use of our surroundings, there are a few people who have unfortunately allowed their tempers to rise along with the temperature.
Around 6 o’clock this evening, a launch came into the anchorage and made a mess of the place with their wake. Nobody was very happy about it, including us. Normally when someone comes in, people gather to help them with their lines, but this time only one man came down and, very politely, let them know that they had upset a lot of people with their messy approach and should probably take a walk down the dock to apologize. That should have been the end of the story but, not two minutes later, an Eastern-European man soon came down and aggressively told the skipper, a baby-faced father in his forties, that he needed to go back from whence he came and learn how to drive his boat before returning. The guy was shocked, but not as much as his wife was minutes later when a woman came down and proceeded to ask her if she spoke English and understood something or another. I couldn’t believe it and, before I knew it, I was telling this lady that her behaviour was uncalled for: it was a mistake, he thought he was going slow enough, end of story. Meanwhile, the wife and three teenage daughters are in tears. It was awful and so disappointing. The last time we were here, most folks strolled the dock in the evening chatting with each other and sharing cocktails. We’d already gathered that we weren’t going to have the same social experience this time around, but we weren’t prepared for this. On separate occasions, David and I tried to talk the family into staying or, at the very least, anchoring nearby for the night and coming back in the morning after most of these people had left, but it was too late for that. What a shame. A man brings his family to one of the most beautiful places in the world, and a couple of crazy rednecks drive them away over something as silly as a boat wake.
But it didn’t end there, after dinner we were talking to a boat that came in from New Zealand when a few people started to run down the dock. The next thing we knew, a man was thrown in the water and people were trying to separate the offenders. The details are sketchy at this point, but we understand that there was a retired Royal Canadian Mounty tied up to the docks who took a list of witnesses and informed the victim of his rights so hopefully charges will be laid.
After spending hours sitting on the deck shaking our heads in disbelief over the evening’s happenings, I went down to get ready for bed. As I was finishing up in the head, I saw movement out of the corner of my eye – a field mouse had come aboard (our first) and I screamed bloody murder surely scaring it more than myself. He was a slippery little fellow, but David caught him with the help of a kitchen colander and sent him back to land. Sally definitely dropped the ball on this one; next time, we’ll get a cat.
0 comments