the scariest halloween ever
Something crazy inside me thought it was a good idea to go on an overnight paddle trip monday night with some of the guys from here. I figured I didnt really have a whole put costume together anyway, i've never been that into halloween, and Matt, Nat, and Walt had planned an overnight to Sucia island. They are all fun guys and I knew I wanted to get at least one more trip in before i leave here.
So there I was on Halloween afternoon paddling North away from my nice warm room in my nice warm house (not to mention the awesome sparkly green dress that was all i had as the start of a costume. it wasnt complete, but it sure was a great dress). The paddle there wasn't too bad, it was windy, but the wind was at our back. We made pretty good time on the crossing, ran into some rowdy water when we got close, but made it around to beautiful Ewing Cove on the North side in about an hour and a half. We immediately got to work setting up tarps and building a fire. Both proved to be difficult due to the constant wind and rain we've been having lately. By the time dinner was cooking and camp was set up we were in complete and total darkness -- at about 5:30 pm.
This is about the point when I started to realize that by not celebrating halloween, not only was I missing out on wearing that great green litte sequined number and instead was sporting some stylish plastic rain overalls, but I had also put myself into the scarriest setting ever! I suddenly discovered that we had been acting out the perfect beginning of a horror movie. Here we were, four twenty-something camp staff on an island alone (or so we thought!) it is completely dark, cold, windy, and rainy,....and it is Halloween night...DUN DUN DUUUUUUUNNNN!!!!
Seriously!! When we started to see lightning flashes I was about ready to hop back in my kayak and make for Orcas in the dark, but then i definetly would have died!! Really though, I was totally excpecting a crazy to come out of the woods and start hacking us up one by one. It was a darn good thing none of us were making out. The couple that sneaks off into the woods allways gets killed first.
but alas, none of us were hacked into any more peieces than we started in. It rained on us all night and our tarp, which was sagging from all the wind, puddled and dripped, but we survived none the less. Our paddle back took almost twice as long since the wind and rain were now both right in our faces. After about fifeteen minutes my hands hurt so bad from the cold that i had walt get my socks out of my back hatch and i wore them as mittens for half of the crossing. it made it a little hard to paddle, but i did not care.
Dont worry too much. My story still has a happy ending: we had a staff pot luck last night and i decided that since I missed out on dressing up with everyone else that i was going to dress up for dinner.
And that dress looked hot.:-)
Here's another little fun halloween adventure some might find amusing:
As i was sitting around my house eating breakfast before getting ready for our trip we got a call from our director that there was an emergency at the salmon pond! (Camp orkila has a salmon pond up in the woods where we get about 1500 salmon from the hatchery on the island every year. we use them for teaching and then in the spring they get a ride in a truck from the pond to the bay since our stream is more of a trickling creek.) Anyhow, a tree had fallen in the night due to all the wind we've been having and it broke a valve in the pond. So the entire pond and all the little salmon fry went gushing down through the woods. It was rather tragic. Myself and Nat were the only ones in our house when we got the call so we went right away to see how we could help. When we got there the former pond was now just a mud pit and a puddle. It wasa pretty tragic scene as we walked down stream. Little salmon bodies dead all over the banks. And so we spent the next couple of hours with all our directors and a few maintenance staff crouching over the stream trying to grab with bare hands or tiny nets all of the little salmon fry that were still alive and hiding in the stream. i must say, those little buggers were rather difficult to find, and even harder to grab. They are awfully wiley. It was a pretty hillarious scene. Each of us were hunched over little pools and would suddenly lunge forward diving our hands into the muck screaming something like, "hey! get back here you! You cant get away!" then either, "Dammit" or "HA! take that! Punk! Just saved your life!" and throwing them into buckets. We ended up saving quite a few. I felt very in touch with my inner raccoon and am confident that I could now survive in the wild.
So there I was on Halloween afternoon paddling North away from my nice warm room in my nice warm house (not to mention the awesome sparkly green dress that was all i had as the start of a costume. it wasnt complete, but it sure was a great dress). The paddle there wasn't too bad, it was windy, but the wind was at our back. We made pretty good time on the crossing, ran into some rowdy water when we got close, but made it around to beautiful Ewing Cove on the North side in about an hour and a half. We immediately got to work setting up tarps and building a fire. Both proved to be difficult due to the constant wind and rain we've been having lately. By the time dinner was cooking and camp was set up we were in complete and total darkness -- at about 5:30 pm.
This is about the point when I started to realize that by not celebrating halloween, not only was I missing out on wearing that great green litte sequined number and instead was sporting some stylish plastic rain overalls, but I had also put myself into the scarriest setting ever! I suddenly discovered that we had been acting out the perfect beginning of a horror movie. Here we were, four twenty-something camp staff on an island alone (or so we thought!) it is completely dark, cold, windy, and rainy,....and it is Halloween night...DUN DUN DUUUUUUUNNNN!!!!
Seriously!! When we started to see lightning flashes I was about ready to hop back in my kayak and make for Orcas in the dark, but then i definetly would have died!! Really though, I was totally excpecting a crazy to come out of the woods and start hacking us up one by one. It was a darn good thing none of us were making out. The couple that sneaks off into the woods allways gets killed first.
but alas, none of us were hacked into any more peieces than we started in. It rained on us all night and our tarp, which was sagging from all the wind, puddled and dripped, but we survived none the less. Our paddle back took almost twice as long since the wind and rain were now both right in our faces. After about fifeteen minutes my hands hurt so bad from the cold that i had walt get my socks out of my back hatch and i wore them as mittens for half of the crossing. it made it a little hard to paddle, but i did not care.
Dont worry too much. My story still has a happy ending: we had a staff pot luck last night and i decided that since I missed out on dressing up with everyone else that i was going to dress up for dinner.
And that dress looked hot.:-)
Here's another little fun halloween adventure some might find amusing:
As i was sitting around my house eating breakfast before getting ready for our trip we got a call from our director that there was an emergency at the salmon pond! (Camp orkila has a salmon pond up in the woods where we get about 1500 salmon from the hatchery on the island every year. we use them for teaching and then in the spring they get a ride in a truck from the pond to the bay since our stream is more of a trickling creek.) Anyhow, a tree had fallen in the night due to all the wind we've been having and it broke a valve in the pond. So the entire pond and all the little salmon fry went gushing down through the woods. It was rather tragic. Myself and Nat were the only ones in our house when we got the call so we went right away to see how we could help. When we got there the former pond was now just a mud pit and a puddle. It wasa pretty tragic scene as we walked down stream. Little salmon bodies dead all over the banks. And so we spent the next couple of hours with all our directors and a few maintenance staff crouching over the stream trying to grab with bare hands or tiny nets all of the little salmon fry that were still alive and hiding in the stream. i must say, those little buggers were rather difficult to find, and even harder to grab. They are awfully wiley. It was a pretty hillarious scene. Each of us were hunched over little pools and would suddenly lunge forward diving our hands into the muck screaming something like, "hey! get back here you! You cant get away!" then either, "Dammit" or "HA! take that! Punk! Just saved your life!" and throwing them into buckets. We ended up saving quite a few. I felt very in touch with my inner raccoon and am confident that I could now survive in the wild.