Tuesday, May 28, 2013

Memorial Day 2013 with Children at The Lake.

After a long cool spring, Memorial Day - Monday May 27th 2013 - was forecast to be fine, sunny and 70 degrees. Bradley had called and asked if he could bring Caitlin and Andrew, two children that he babysits, over to use the kayaks and the pedal boats. We of course said yes.
When he arrived he also had with him his brother Zachary and his girlfriend Kelly. Kelly had come in her own car as she had to go to work in a couple of hours, so she was not able to go out on the boats for fear of getting wet but she did help to get a fire going in the fire pit for hot dogs and smores.
After Kelly left, the boys and Caitlin launched the two kayaks and the two seat pedal boat and all four of them alternated the use of each while pedaling and paddling, frantically at times, around The Lake. Their frenzied paddling/pedaling was in their frantic attempts to escape being splashed by each other as first one and then another joined forces to "attack" their "foes". Finally when all were thoroughly soaked, they made their way back to shore and engaged in more leisurely activities.
I think that it was Zachary that first discovered the presence of clams in the sand and began collecting them. Soon Andrew, Caitlin and Zachary were digging for clams. I explained to Bradley and Zachary that their mother had also found clams there when she had been digging in the sand some 30 years earlier! Fortunately they were all wearing some form of shoes or flip flops because other things began to appear apart from clams. Things like glass bottles, some whole and some broken. There were also plastic bottles, soda cans, a foam cushion, various pieces of plastic and a lot of bricks.
Meanwhile Bradley was busy cleaning up the beach, removing pieces of driftwood etc. He also sawed off and removed some bushes that were covering a large piece of beach, exposing it for the first time in years. He dragged a long straight pole out at right angles to the beach and lifted one end onto a concrete block. This he announced would be the limiting area for his two charges to stay within when he brought them over again.
As the three clam diggers collected clams and trash and Bradley raked the sand under the water the pile of junk built up until we had the best part of a 5 gallon bucket full of rubbish.
When it was time to leave there were 30 large clams as well as a big pile of brush and driftwood and about 15 bricks!
It was decided that it was too late to cook the clams for consumption then, so we put them into a bucket with holes in. Unfortunately the bottom of the bucket fell out, so the clams were transferred to the minnow bucket and put into the water. Hopefully we will be able to cook them up on Bradley's next trip.
A good time was had by all.