Not a Shark Tale

About a week ago, one of my many daily emails was more than a little bit interesting. I believe it came from the Los Angeles Times. These communications usually close with a short tale from contributors that describes a California experience. In the instant story, this person had gone to the beach and found him or herself in the midst of a school of playful dolphins. The recounter was impressed by the magical nature of California life.

My story is the same, but some would not think so.

It was about 1967 during summer vacation. One of the clique, composed of Gladstone Douglas, Clive Mollison, Claude Foster and the writer, decided to build a raft- superior to that used by Tom and Huck, I assure you. Since Jumbo's (Gladstone Douglas) house was a mere 50 metres from the sea (Kingston Harbour) the engineering works were sited there. The chief engineer produced a contraption where an oil drum was placed at either end, and each was secured, by rope, to a "bed" made of 2 X 4s.

On the next morning, we muscled our masterpiece to the foot of Outlook Avenue and launched it.



I suppose we had the opposite side of the harbour, one and one half miles distant, as our destination. After paddling for some time we were some distance offshore, on the bathtub calm water, when one or all of us heard the sound of rushing, disturbed or parted waters. To our right were huge fins, parting the waters and, aiming directly at us; or so we thought, because all of us moved to higher spots; spots that were on top of the oil drums.

Moments later the fins went under water, only to resurface again. This was repeated until they crossed some distance ahead of us. We watched until they disappeared, off to the east.

We reversed course.

Upon making our way back to shore, a man standing at a concrete fence asked if we had seen the porpoises. Someone answered yes. The man informed us that they appeared at about the same time every morning, making their way to Harbour Head and then making their way back.

Indeed; I saw them on later occasions.

I remain unable to tell anyone about the time when I and my friends were attacked by a school of hungry sharks. It would be neither prudent nor true.


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