Today we were greeted by the regular wind, rain and a gray—the normal welcome party of New England.
It was cold and we were all had multiple layers on, I thought it was so silly that Dad told me to pack sweatshirts in North Carolina because it was in the 90’s but today I was very grateful for them. You knew it was cold when Dad (who always wears shorts no matter what the weather) actually put on long pants.
We put our anchor down around 5:00 this afternoon, when it started to rain again.
We had gone on land at Block Island once before with our friends and we had gotten clam chowder that Victoria absolutely loved. So we all wanted to go back to the same place and get clam chowder again. So we lowered the dinghy, but the motor didn’t start as expected. So Dad had to try to fix the dinghy in the rain. But alas that didn’t even work, so we had to call the launch. The guy seemed nice enough he told as that it would be three dollars.
“Total?” Dad asked.
“Per person.” The launch man replied. So we stood in their in indecision, but we decided since we hadn’t spent much at all on the trip and we all really wanted to go, so on board we went. We all squished in under the overhead of the launch in our rain coats and foul weather gear. I wore a shirt and two coats and my capri's, Victoria wore a shirt, a zip up and Dad’s big jacket, and Dad: shirt, sweatshirt, foul weather gear jacket, and of course shorts.
One other man was on the launch, he was one of the crew on one of the racing sailboats. We figure out (as we did last time) that it was racing week so the harbor was packed. We picked up a few more people and we were soon off and on our way walking up the road. But we had a problem. We didn’t remember where the restaurant was. We came upon a restaurant so we figured we duck out if the rain and ask for directions. This place served New England clam chowder too but we remembered the resturaunt looking different. So we tried to describe the place to the lady behind the counter.
“It had a porch I remember,” Dad started.
“Well there are places over there, one up from here and one further up, and this place and they all have porches.”
We described it further. “There is no place like this here,” The lady said.
Were we imaging? Was it in some other port?
“Unless you’re taking about in town. There is a place that looks like what you were describing.”
“Yeah it could be. Where’s that?” Dad asked.
The lady gave us some instructions. Dad asked her how far it was, she said it was about 10 minutes.
So off we went. The rain soaking through our pants and seeping into our shoes, and I kept slipping a lot so finally I took off my flip flops. (I’m not know for keeping shoes on my feet for long)
After what seemed about 10 minutes, we asked a person who had grocery bags in his hand (so we figured they came from town) we asked them how long it was to town. The man thought for a moment.
“Probably about 5 to 10 minutes.” The man shrugged.
“Okay thanks.” We said.
“10 more minutes, it was only supposed to take 10 minutes originally.”
So after about 10 more minutes we found ourselves at the right place. We recognized the place as we remembered it. We were soon seated in the screened in porch and sipping up warm New England clam chowder. For Dad and Victoria it wasn’t as good as they remembered it, but they thought it was still very good, but for me I thought it was better. :)
We looked at each other, wet coats dripping wet hair very wet pants. We smiled; we all thought it was worth it.
When we were done we were going to check out some of the shops, but we were all too wet and cold to look, so we decided to head back. It was already a wet adventurous day, but we had no idea that both—wet and adventure— were going to increase greatly.
We thought we would have a dry walk back expect maybe for some mist because when we were in the restaurant it had stopped. Boy where we in for surprise, just as we were a great distance away from shelter, it started to rain bucket loads.
“Run!”
We all bolted through the rain until we reached a tree branch that we stopped under. If we were not soaked through before, we were now. We were now practically standing in a puddle up to our ankles.
We ran a little ways and then stopped and just walked to catch our breath. The rain was getting a little lighter. A deep puddle that flooded over the road and onto the sidewalk was a few feet away. We looked back, a car was coming.
“Run!” Came the cry once more, and we charged across the “lake” as we tried to out run the car so we wouldn’t get sprayed on worse by the car running over the puddle that would send a small tidal wave over us. We did out run the car at last until we were past the puddle. We then walked a ways. Then it started to rain hard and we bolted around the corner and ducked under an overhang.
We waited for a few minutes to wait out the rain or at least until it slowed. We were so surprised to see so many people out and about. We past lots of pedestrians, bikers past us by, we crossed paths with joggers, and people who were just sitting on their porches.
I pointed to 12 or so people hanging out on the porch of their house up on a hill. Someone on the porch pointed back at us. I waved. They waved back. One even cupped his hands and yelled hello.
What a wonderful wet day!
Walking, jogging, sprinting, running, slowing, bolting, walking.
Then it started to rain really hard, and I mean hard! You couldn’t see very far ahead of you. Thunder, lightning, running once more, but of course there were no shelter. So we kept running, splashing through puddles and soaking our pants.
Bucket loads upon bucket loads, it was raining cats and dogs.
We soon spotted a shop with a porch through the rain and ducked under it to get out of the rain. We laughed as it came down harder and harder, gushing out of gutters pouring off the road and onto sidewalks. We were glad to be watching it instead of being in it.
The shop was closed so we didn’t go in but there was a bench, so we all sat and talked but mostly watched the rain. We sat there for probably 7 minutes until Dad coaxed as along.
We ran the rest of the way back to the marina. We waited another 15 minutes till we could get a ride back by launch. At last we were back on the launch although this time we didn’t bother to go under the overhang, we were already soaked, a few more minutes of it wasn’t going to make a difference.
We soon climbed back onto our boat.
“That will be 9 dollars.” Said the launch man.
“I already paid you on the way in.” Dad said.
The launch man paused and added “Its 3 dollars per person each way.
We protested, but we ended up paying the guy. Now unfortunately that wasn’t worth it. But nonetheless we had fun.
We stripped off our soaked jacket’s. Even under two coats my shirt was wet.
We all took warm showers and I even heated up some warm soup. What an adventure. What a day. What a very wet day!
May God be with you all always, and may he bless you greatly!
Your soaked friend,
Zani
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