Recreation Widow

Peril at Sea: A Recreation Widow Battles the Puget Sound Tides

May 27, 2008 9:36 AM | 0 Comments

We just completed our annual Memorial Day family weekend at Camp Orkila on Orcas Island, which is one of the San Juan Islands on Puget Sound. This is our sixth year of serving on a church committee, which plans this event, along with Sports Night and Advent Night. About 320 parents and families from University Presbyterian Church attend the camp, which is an old YMCA camp. Nothing fancy about the experience: Our family walks on the Anacortes Ferry, looking like human pack mules, and we set up camp in open-faced, three-sided cabins. Our cabin is right on the beach, so we fall asleep listening to the water gently lapping the shore. This kind of water lapping is nice, but there is another type of water lapping, of a ferocious, unpredictable nature, when you're in a rowboat, that is not so nice. This kind of water is the stuff that makes Memorial Day even more memorable.

Yesterday, our family, as usual lagged behind the other campers. A handful of us opts to take a later ferry so we can enjoy having the camp to ourselves. My 10-year-old son Austin begged me to take a rowboat out to nearby Constitution Island, aka Goose Poop Island. I informed the camp counselor at that post that I was inexperienced, but she urged me to give it a try and informed another counselor, who was operating the safety skiff, so that she could stand ready to aid us. Austin and I ventured out on the water, with him facing me and adding his boypower to the rowing. But while we were out there the winds changed, and the current became more defiant. As hard as we tried, we could not reach that Island. In fact, much of the time we were traveling in circles, or we'd just get a good groove and suddenly swerve in the opposite direction. So, we gave up and set a new goal: To row back to terra firma. Periodically, the woman in the rescue boat checked in with us, but we were determined to manage the situation on our own. Finally, after the first blister in my hand popped out and Austin and I were having some decidedly un-Christian, accusatory conversations, I yelled: "UNCLE!!!"

And, we were towed in.

Only, naturally, the tow rope didn't hook to anything so I had to hold onto it the entire way. When we got to shore, we felt that lovely combination of amused and humilated. We also found out that my husband, who is familiar with my strengths and weaknesses, had been demanding that they tow us in. Mostly, it will be a source of hilarity for years to come, and it's likely this will inspire Austin to become an adept seaman. Time to go watch Deadliest Catch.

Do you have any Recreation Widow stories to share? Remember, Life is a Contact Sport. Grab the Oar.
The Sports Widow
(aka Nan Hall)