Retired Mountain Lady

 Willie report:

Yesterday afternoon Willie discovered a new toy to add to his collection.  It's a buoy that our friend and former neighbor, John Underwood, gave us back in May of 2010.  

We were on a fishing trip to the Washington coast with our other neighbors, Ann and Neil Wimberley.  Jon, Neil and John were going to go fishing for halibut on a charter out of Westport on Gray's Harbor.  

While the men were out fishing the women spent the morning on the beach scavenging for shells and interesting pieces of driftwood.  Ann, who lived in Mobile, Alabama for many years, was very familiar with beachcombing and loved spending hours doing just that. 

When we woke up at 3:30 a.m. on the morning of the fishing charter, the winds were just howling outside.  I remember wondering why anyone would want to do anything that required waking up at 3:30 a.m. and then going out into the wind and cold.  As it turned out those winds were gale force winds and there were 16 foot swells.  There was also a "crossing the bar" warning for the harbor. 

We did not have that information and only learned of it later.  The charter boat captain decided to go out while many of the other boats did not.  It was a risky adventure.  The conditions were such that the day long trip for the guys was not that much fun.  Everyone on the boat got sea sick, except for John Underwood.  He was smiling when he got off the boat.  He had also caught the biggest fish.

Both Jon and Neil looked pretty haggard as they were walking up to the dock.  The good news was that everyone recovered and by the next day the winds had died down.  We rented another charter to go out to look for whales and we did see one, but I did not get a decent photo of it. 

Ann and I found many treasures that we brought home from the beach, plus the buoy from John.  I don't remember what I did with all of the shells and driftwood, but I hung the bright orange buoy on a tree branch in the woods on the east side of the house.  It's been there all that time until yesterday when I'm guessing either the branch broke or Willie decided to jump up and give the rope a pull. 

What a great dog toy.  He spent at least three hours outside pulling and tossing it around.  It slides really well on the icy snow and I think he could probably chew forever on the rope without it coming apart.