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I promised him I would do just that, shook his hand, thanked him again, and turned to leave.
“Oh, by the way Ken, what was that you were playing in your truck?”
“Ho bra, you saw me playing, bra? That was my ukulele. I like come down here and play.”
I told him I also played guitar, and I would like one day to hear him play.
I rowed smartly back to Déjà vu and laughed out loud when I saw little Murphy stretched
out as tall as he could with his two front paws up against the top taffrail watching my pro-
gress across. His big ears were peeping over the top. He meowed his hello and raced ex-
citedly about the cockpit, biting my foot as I stepped over the rail.
When I looked back towards the shore after clambering aboard, Ken was nowhere to be
seen. I wearily turned on the gas, went below, and made dinner with some fish, egg, and
flour fried in a pan and boiled potatoes. I was starving and so was young Murphy, who
paced back and forth under foot, hungrily looking up at me and trying to talk me into throw-
ing him yet another scrap of fish in his bowl. I tried raising Gavin again on the radio, but I
believe we were out of range. I washed up and turned in for the night. I was dog tired and
slept deeply.
I awoke to a typical Lanai morning, calm and hot. It was doubly hot in this little harbor
with the big, black backdrop of the sea cliff brooding overhead and reflecting the heat from
the morning sun. I did not want to be in this harbor when the barge came in. I knew I would
be in the way, and I set off early after my cup of hot coffee. I found that the battery cable
to the starter motor had worked its way loose again and synched it tight with a spanner. I
told myself to remember to put a spring washer behind that nut so it would not rattle loose
again.
I dropped the mooring buoy and motored out into the crisp, early morning air. I felt posit-
ively dwarfed by the tall sea cliff and felt its dark omnipresence as I worked my way around
the southeast point of the island. I was surprised to see a herd of horses roaming around the
barren hillside, feeding on what I wondered? I couldn't see what they were eating, but it
was great to see them. I held Murphy up to see them, but he wasn't as impressed as I, “Just
a bunch of scruffy nags, dad,” he squeaked in his kitty falsetto. I waved his paw at them as
I held him up, feeling his whiskers scratch my face.
I had not seen such a dry island as this. I motor sailed fairly close to the boulder strewn,
rocky shoreline, the land rising out of the sea in a sheer drop in some places. It was
crumbly, old, and weathered, and I expect at some point was a lot higher and greener. Now,
as it was melting back into the ocean as all islands will; it had become barren with little
rainfall. I learnt later from the locals that early settlers had planted a forest of the tall, Nor-
folk pine trees on the highest peaks in the hopes of snaring the rain clouds; I believe it
helped somewhat, as I would see later.
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