The Commodore
Orangish sunrise. Still looks like Montana. If Montana wasn’t land locked and had blue dolphins. 🐬
You can’t take any food off the ship so we will eat before we go. Enjoy!
I got a ticket for the tender early. I’m on #2 of 27. Unfortunately, we are riding with a chatty Kathy. She seemed very friendly at first. Fairly attractive too. She’s wearing a yoga outfit, with a light jacket, and stylish hiking boots. It looks good but has questionable functionality. Real hiking pants look like cargo pants and are weather resistant if not waterproof. She’s got a half dozen people trapped on her side of the tender. She’s talking really fast and seems to be asking the others questions but doesn’t wait for them to answer.
She’s talking about her adventurous life as a nomadic explorer. She says she’s married to a tour guide pilot in Alaska but he wanted to do a cross-glacier trek by himself instead of this cruise. I don’t see a ring. The story is plausible because I can see why he would want to be by himself for a while.
As she goes on and on, she goes for some sympathy ploy by saying she broke her foot surfing and had to stay in a hospital room for 9 weeks until she could hobble out of there.
“Surfing in Alaska?”
She didn’t specify. She says she started her adventure by selling her house. She’s clearly very early 30’s and says she’s been traveling since 2015. Whose house did she sell? How did she get it? I’m starting to sense she’s lying about how she got here. She’s also talking about the career she left behind. When did she have time to do that? You had a career at 25 or younger? No details.
On and on she keeps talking about herself and asking questions but she won’t wait for the answers. She asks them if they want to give her their phone numbers so they can chat and get together later. Nobody is giving her their number. One person says ‘I don’t have cell service’. Another says ‘I can’t text on my phone’. The others don’t say anything. I just keep looking the other way out the window. I know better than to make eye contact.
“Probably looking for followers to ask for go fund me money soon. Why are we going so slow? It’s a 30-minute ride from the ship to shore. It isn’t that far. I need to get away from her.”
We are going slow because the locals are maintaining their quiet sleepy harbor town feel. No wake allowed for the cruise ship tenders. This is a retirement community, I think. There is only the harbor tour to do here. There is supposedly wildlife to see in the harbor besides the dolphins we already saw. You have to take a bus excursion into the countryside to see something else. It’s a 90-minute bus ride each way.
“What about that guy? He’s having fun on a jet ski. He’s got a wetsuit on but I’m sure he’s warm. It looks fun. Let’s do that.”
That’s not for us. Those guys are from the private yacht there. They unloaded the jet skis off their own yacht. He’s probably a Bitcoin billionaire or something.
“I don’t see any yacht girls. Are they sleeping? It’s almost 9:00 AM.”
Even yacht girls aren’t fun to be around all the time. They might not even be there. Those girls are rentals so maybe the guys just get them for special events like the Cannes film festival. Just to show off they can throw money away on Insta-models and B actresses who are part-time prostitutes.
“Meghan?”
They love to show off on Instagram and whatever else but they don’t say how they got there or how they manage to have that kind of lifestyle.
It’s pretty loud here in the ‘jungle’. Lots of crickets or something. Sorta scary and smells like fish. We are on the harbor and there’s no breeze. Not much desire to hike into the hills. Not much else to do.
“Hey, here’s something interesting. There’s a yacht club and there’s an open space here for a commodore! You can be a commodore! I’ll be your skipper.”
Commodore Wesley? Hmm…
I don’t see any yachts besides the one those guys have. Just a handful of sailboats and some guy in a rowboat. He’s probably the Vice Commodore. There’s a Toyota Corolla parked in that spot.
There’s probably a golf course around here they think is better than it really is.
“Is there going to be a ‘Snails’ joke here?”
I think it was Judge Smails.
“Smells? Or Snails?”
Could be either. Ask Rodney Dangerfield.
Lets go with Snails.
“Well, how about a bike ride then? They get to wear those touristy neon green outfits and the kiddie helmets.”
Lame. You know we’ve been mountain biking since we were kids. No way I’m wearing a sissy helmet to ride around on a flat road we just walked on for free. Maybe if we had a sled team to pull us. At least if we had a skateboard.
“Look, a trailhead. Could be adventurous.”
Ok. We’ll check the Dysentery Cemetery but if it’s lame, we are going back to our hot tub and hot Irish Cream.
“Wollemi Pine. Wollemi Nobilis. Survivor of the Jurassic Age.”
Looks a whole lot like the pine trees at Manly beach.
“And every tree in the fjords.”
Mrs. Felicity probably made that up. Who’s going to fact check an old lady? Let her have her moment.
“Walnut tree. Were walnut trees wiped out? It doesn’t seem special.”
It does look like the locals have come up with some interesting uses for recycling old pallets. Did I tell you my story about a use for used pallets?
No! That’s from ‘The Usual Suspects’. I mean the idea for old pallets.
“A thousand times. Pet caskets. Sell them on Etsy. ‘Here lies Fluffy’, burned onto the wood with a blowtorch. People throw away money on anything pet related.”
Here’s the Dysentery Cemetery.
“I wouldn’t eat any cake that lady made. Probably has ground glass in it. She looks like one of those old killer women from long ago. I bet she has an axe behind her. Who’s this pharmacist chemist guy? What’s a dandelion pill? Maybe we can find one of his descendants and see if he can cook us up something.”
Now you’re interested in the past?
People just didn’t live that long. We are in the bonus years now! That dysentery is a killer!
“Did you just walk on their graves to get that shot?”
Zoom lens skipper. You bored? You seem grumpy today.
“We don’t have any yacht girls, jet skis, or Dr. Dodds dandelion pills!”
Or any of his other pills!
“How about we search for a genuine New Zealand hippie? Maybe he can help.”
We can try.
Well, if we were going to find one, he’d be here. Nobody here. It just isn’t going to happen. Sorry.
I bet this is the place. This guy was pretty ‘inspired’ when he came up with this idea since there are no bears on this island country. Those dandelion pills must work.
“Back to the ship Commodore!”
90 minutes later.
News of my new position has reached the ship.
Port side.
“Left.”
We’re the first back. The Spinnaker bar is getting ready for a full evening. We’ll be leaving this sleepy town before nightfall.
Starboard side.
“Right.”