Adventure

Hi Gang,
Well Tuesday night myself, Corey and Craig M., and Stanley B. went on an advanture. The 4 of us took Satnley's rubber dingy, and went out to Bear Island -near Smith's Cove. I wanted to check out the Island to dtermine if we could take a punch or our youth out there on an extreme camping trip, over night, survivor kinda thing. So we had to go check it out first.

Stanley offer to use his dingy (small rubber boat) which was powered by an electric motor and a battery. Well sounds good so far. Stanley brough an extra bettery - just in case. Good thing; the first battery died about 3/4 way over and we had to paddle the rest of the way to the Island.

Once we got there the place was inhabited with 1000's of seagulls and very ugly black 'looking' ducks. Waste materianl was everywhere and fly and dropping everywhere. There 100's of dead or dieing birds. The shore line was good, but inland the brush and plant growth made it impossible to safely explore. Corey and I decided quite quickly that this was not a place to bring our (active) youth. It was just to dirty and not a safe place to hang out.

So off we went to explore the coastline and walk all way around the island. As we walked everyong started to pick up shinny rock, rope, bouyies and things. I had s few rock and seashells in my pocket. We walked and walked and finally the very point of the isalnd came into view. It pointed out to sea, out the 'gull,' the passage between Victoria Beach and Digby - that went out to sea. I hurried along as the rest were still beachcombing for things shinny. I went on ahead of them; I want to go to the very point of the isalnd and stick my foot into the waters - just to say I was there.

About 10 feet from the very end of the sand/gravel bar, something caught my eye - stuck in the mud/sand. It was very shinny, it was a glass bottle and itside was a piece of paper. I yelled to the others; "Hey, look, a message in a bottle." Sure enough it was. The top was rusted and hard to twist off and the paper inside was worn and the writing was faded. This was a real0-live meassage in a bottle.

Corey looked at the language and through it was Spanish. There were a few words he could translate; 'beautiful, gift'. Also written on the note were the words Mexico and Brazil. It also looked like it had a few different handwrittings on it.
Quite a find!

Well, Craig was very jealous, and he should be, for I had found the great prize that night - not him. Well we combed around the rest of the island and didn't find too much more out of the ordinary. More rocks, shells, and robe. Stanley gathering some colorful plastic bags and Craig secured a long pole. Once we got back to the near-side of the isalnd they attached their plastic bag utop the pole and planted the pole into the ground - as a marker and a 'sign' that we were there.

Crawled back into the boat and headed back to shore - we got about 2/3 the way before the battery failed enough that we had to paddle again. We left shore about 6:30 or so, and arrived safely back on shore at shorty after 9:00. A great adventure and some real male bonding.

I WILL write a sermon on our adventure. It will surround us going to the isaland in hopes of one thing, but discoverying something totally different. It's a lot like the Israelites entering the Promised Land for the first time. What were they expecting? What was waiting for them? What did they receive that was unexpected.

Well the story continues later.
Blessings all you adventurers.
PBB