Grant Lawrence - Return to Solitude

Return to Solitude

Grant Lawrence

Return to Solitude

More Desolation Sound Adventures with
the Cougar Lady
Russell the Hermit
the Spaghetti Bandit
and Others

Copyright 2022 Grant Lawrence

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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without prior permission of the publisher or, in the case of photocopying or other reprographic copying, a licence from Access Copyright, .

Harbour Publishing Co. Ltd.

P.O. Box 219, Madeira Park, BC , V0N 2H

www.harbourpublishing.com

All photographs are from the collection of the author unless otherwise noted

Edited by Barbara Pulling

Cover and text design by Naomi MacDougall

Printed and bound in Canada

Harbour Publishing acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, the Government of Canada, and the Province of British Columbia through the BC Arts Council.

Title: Return to Solitude : more Desolation Sound adventures with the Cougar Lady, Russell the Hermit, the Spaghetti Bandit and others / Grant Lawrence.

Names: Lawrence, Grant, 1971- author.

Identifiers: Canadiana (print) 20220151547 | Canadiana (ebook) 20220151679 | ISBN 9781550179712 (softcover) | ISBN 9781550179729 ( EPUB )

Subjects: LCSH : Lawrence, Grant, 1971- | LCSH : Radio broadcastersBritish ColumbiaBiography. | LCSH : Rock musiciansBritish ColumbiaBiography | LCSH : Desolation Sound (B.C.)BiographyAnecdotes. | LCGFT : Autobiographies. | LCGFT : Anecdotes.

Classification: LCC FC3845.D47 L397 2022 | DDC 971.1/ 31dc23

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods, There is a rapture on the lonely shore, There is society, where none intrudes, By the deep Sea, and music in its roar: I love not Man the less, but Nature more

Lord Byron

Many of the stories contained herein occurred on the traditional territories of the Tla'amin, Homalco, and Klahoose First Nations.

It was always an incredible feeling to get back into the boat and motor out to the cabin, even when there was a bandit on the prowl. Photo Grant Harder

It had been another long, wet winter in the city, but the weekend I was pining for had finally arrived. It was time to make the return trip to the cabin to open it up for the summer season.

The Horseshoe Bay ferry lineup was an anaconda of cars twisting down the hill through the early morning darkness. Somehow I navigated the congestion, through the morse code of brake lights, desperate as always to get to the ticket booth in time for my pre-booked reservation. The menacing red digital clock behind the ferry attendants shoulder confirmed that I had indeed threaded the BC Ferries reservation needle one more time. By one minute.

You made it, smiled the woman in the booth, possibly noticing that I was sweating profusely while white-knuckling the steering wheel. Down Lane 7 to Lane 73.

Thank you, I panted, the # BC FerriesStress surely having shaved a few more minutes off my life.

Once my car came to a stop in line, I gazed around at the other drivers as the tension drained from my shoulders. Some were reclined and asleep with their toques pulled over their eyes; others nervously drummed their steering wheels, eager as I was to ride the Queen of Surrey, knowing that life was simply better on the other side.

Thoughts of opening weekend at the cabin occupied the idle moments of my winter months. I daydreamed of another summer of adventures in the oceanic wilderness of Desolation Sound. I also spent too much time worrying and hoping that the little wooden cabin, which has sat perched on the rocks like a kelp crab for over forty years, had managed to survive another winter. Had I turned off the propane? Had I drained the waterlines? Oh Godhad I flushed the toilet?

This particular year there was another unnerving concern: our rocky neighbourhood of ramshackle cabins had been invaded by an unwanted guest, a squatter of sorts, who had taken on the nickname of The Spaghetti Bandit. The man had been living in various cabins along our stretch of coastline, but he had never been caughtand he was still at large. The anxiety of being alone against the wilderness with that dude on the loose was something I tried to suppress as I flipped the morning paper over to the sports section. Canucks lost again?!

When I was a kid, there was no opening weekend at the cabin; it was always open, because we went all year long. That meant my little sister and I had to crawl begrudgingly into the back seat of our parents compact car in the early morning hours in weather that felt too cold and damp to be going anywhere. Not even halfway there, the pair of us would usually be firehose-vomiting everywhere, our typical reaction to the hairpin curves of the Sunshine Coast Highway.

These days Im the one urging my wife and our two children up and out of bed and into the car in the darkness to catch that first ferry, but we do so between spring break and Thanksgiving. The cabin is shuttered for the stormy winter months.

I always do the opening-weekend trek on my own. If I discover something broken or untoward, I try desperately to fix it before my wife makes the trip. That way, the cabin will appear as safe, welcoming and functional as possible (until something else breaks).

Six hours after leaving Horseshoe Bay, I rolled down the last stretch of blacktop winding through the forest, the same road that has led me to the Okeover government wharf since I was a child. On that one last turn, the trees parted like an evergreen curtain to reveal glistening Okeover Inlet on a blustery spring afternoon.

I let out my customary loud falsetto, my personal proclamation of arriving in paradise: Laaaaaaaa! My imitation of angels singing.

Old Bill the Biker was waiting in the gravel parking lot down at the wharf, right on schedule, the mountains of Desolation Sound stretching out behind him across the inlet like a painting. He leaned one denim-clad hip against Big Buck$, our beat-up and beloved old Hourston speedboat. Bill had the laid-back ease of a man who had spent most of his life at the end of the road. The boat sat on a sagging rusty trailer hitched to his pickup. Bill was responsible for looking after our boat in the winter, dry-docking it in a garage on his property up the hill.

This was the scene that greeted us upon arrival at the Okeover government wharf: Biker Bill DeKort and Big Buck$, our boat. Bill dry-docked the boat and met us down at the wharf to load her into the chuck. But dont be late!