Jonathan Stout,
A friend of mine for nearly half a century, called me the other day and suggested a trip up and down the Columbia..from Astoria (where his sail-boat is moored), up river to, perhaps as far as the gorge and back. This is just a thought right now but it instantly resonated with me as something I would really like to do. It would probably just be the two of us and of course wouldn’t take place until spring..when the weather is much more temperate..and safer.
This reminds me of another river trip Jon Stout and I took...long ago.
One time ...probably way back in the early 1990’s...and just before TGB and I moved to Bend...Jon and I met at the Jantze Beach Red Lion Inn where Jon had tied up his boat for a Denturist meeting. At the time his sail boat was moored close to this place.
We had a lot to drink that day so ..with a bottle of tequila in hand...a promising snoot full of booze and youthful bravado...we headed upstream..for some imaginary destination..Puerto Rico I believe was mentioned.
We traveled through most of the night...consumed most if not all the tequila and ended up on the north side of the river at a moorage to try and sleep off a rapidly approaching hangover.
It was a miracle we were able to navigate numerous sandbars and other ways to sink a sailboat..but somehow we did..and even survived the morning hang-over. Jon called Phil Taylor who happened to live close by in the small town of Camas Washington.
He kindly came down to the moorage, picked us up , took us to his and Heathers home just a mile or so away and fed us.
With a belly full of food and diminishing alcohol poisoning...we headed back down-river and the adventure was over.
The trip back, we both were soberly amazed as how the night before hadn’t ended in some tragic manner. It was an enlightening moment.
That may have been the last time I went sailing with my friend, Jonathan Stout.
No comments:
Post a Comment