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Melissa & Dave - Adventures at Sea

Day 5 - Dinner with Auntie Bill

This morning when we awoke, all was a bit calmer than last night.  But we slept till about 1:30 after having been up half the night, so we elected to just hang out on the dock and not try to go further north today.  We went to the pub and ordered up burgers and sandwiches for lunch.  Before our food arrived, the marina manager, a strange character nicknamed "Fly" came running up and said "Oh, there you are!"  We were all quite startled, each of us wondering what had befallen the boat now?!  But Fry was just wondering if we wanted to move over to another dock where we could connect to shore power.  So Dave and John went with him to move the boat.

That afternoon Melissa went over and invited Jeffrey and his family aboard for dinner.  When she arrived, Jeffrey was debating with Fly and Suzie (his wife) whether they should leave now, or wait for early morning.  When I suggested dinner, the debate quickly ended as they decided dinner with us was worth staying the night for.

When they came aboard later that evening, Jeffrey and Suzie had with them "Auntie Bill".  Auntie Bill was Jeffrey's 89 year old aunt that he had recently reconnected with.  She had been aboard their sailboat for a couple of weeks traveling up to desolation sound with them.  She had obviously been having the time of her life.  A spry old lady - we should all be so lucky to have her energy at that age.  We discovered she had lived an amazing life.  When she was in her early 20's, living in England, "the great war" had killed off most of the men.  So afraid that she would never marry, she decided to travel to Vancouver Island Canada, where most of her relatives lived.  She booked passage on the Lusitania.  She said that the minute she made the reservation, her life improved immediately.  On the way across the Atlantic, she and her room mate found themselves invited to the captain's table for dinner every night.  A couple of elderly gentlemen took an interest in them and would invite them for drinks and dancing after diner every night.  Upon leaving the ship, she then made her way across Canada - stopping along the way to visit folks she met on the ship.  One of the women she met that they nicknamed "the duchess" turned out to be a plumber's wife that she stayed with for several weeks.  She made it to Vancouver Island and was introduced for the first time to many relatives.  Within a year she met the man who was to become her husband.  She moved with him up to the cold north.  For most of her life she lived without running water and electricity.  She had to learn to do everything herself - including sewing her husband's suits.  She said it was a "wonderful life".

For dinner we had bacon wrapped mushrooms, followed by curried shrimp and fruit salad of pineapple, papaya, and mango with fresh lime juice.  After the meal Jeffrey invited us all to his boat for more wine and conversation.  They were on a wooden hand-built ketch sailboat.  The interior was all wood and was huge inside.  The guy that built it was over 6 ft.  So he built it with tons of headroom.  Jeffrey and Suzie plan to sail it around the world, and Jeffrey hinted that he was looking for crew to take it down to Mexico.  Dave is considering it because it would be great experience.  It also turned out that Dave and Jeffrey are both in telecom for public safety so they were able to talk "techie" all night.

At one point, Melissa remembered there was still a load of clothes in the dryer up at the marina, so she hopped off to retrieve the clothes.  On her way back, one of Jeffrey's dogs went nuts and started barking and growling at her as she made her way back down the dock.  Frightened, Melissa ran back up the dock.  Jeffrey came out and apologized.  If Melissa hadn't been petting the dog not 10 minutes previous, she might have been tempted to kick the dog into the water to protect herself!

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