This is a must-read story by Marty Cooperman.

Gone With the Wind by Marty Cooperman

It was evening on the 4th day of our 2-week spring vacation at Cedar Key, when the weather radio broadcast a warning: 'Tornado watch until 4AM'. Edie and I dashed downstairs from our condo rental at Cedar Cove to lash the canoe to the sturdiest object at hand: the tires of Edie's truck. That canoe [Souris River Quetico 17 in kevlar] was precious to us: sturdy and lightweight, it was the perfect craft for paddling the Boundary Waters lakes in Canada and the islands at Cedar Key. We had hauled it nearly 1200 miles from Cleveland for just that purpose. It cost nearly $2,000.

In the morning the canoe was right where we left it. The westerly winds, though still strong, appeared diminished from the night before. Edie, my friend Thury, daughter Laura and my Mom decided to shop for food in Chiefland that morning. I decided to take a walk to Rye Key, and, just as an after-thought, untied the canoe and left it upright a 100 feet from shore. Whitecapped waves filled the horizon when I left and were still there 4 hours later after I returned from my walk. What was not there was the canoe. Unbeknownst to me, while I was taking my walk, it was taking a walk of its own, down the grassy slope, over the sand and into the Gulf.

Thury's car wasn't there either. Perhaps they hadn't yet returned from shopping? Then I noticed the canoe gone too. Could they have come back and taken it out for a paddle? It was still pretty windy. Then I spotted the paddles in the back of Edie's truck and my heart sank. At that moment two women from the housekeeping staff called over to me: "Was that your yellow canoe?" I nodded, blankly. "It blew away into the water a few hours ago".

It took few moments to sink in: the canoe, gone, in the Gulf. Then I began to think of what could be done. "Does anyone here have a boat they could take out?" I was directed to Dennis, living aboard his wooden boat in the little marina. Dennis had seen the canoe blowing offshore, watched it roll over and then lost sight of it, thinking it had sunk. He had a boat but his engine was under repairs. Tony, another live-aboard who also had a boat, was away delivering a sailboat and, we later learned, had survived the storm the night before in the waters off the Panhandle after dragging 2 anchors 3/4 of a mile before they held. Dennis also managed the pontoon tour boats for the Island Hopper but these were not his personal boats. One of the women at the front desk at Cedar Cove, thinking quickly, called the owners who were off island and got permission for Dennis to take one out in the Gulf. Edie had at that moment returned from shopping. After blurting out the story we grabbed sweaters and dashed with Dennis to where the Island Hopper boats were docked.

Dennis was very experienced with boats. It was obvious from the way he maneuvered the pontoon boat out into the rough waters and used his throttle to keep the boat above the rough waves. We headed straight downwind where the canoe would have gone, on a diagonal south-east past Dog Island toward Corrigan Reefs. He was taking more of a chance than we understood. The boat was nearly out of gas and the wind and waves were much higher than the boat was suited for. We bounced around, despite his efforts and he cautioned us that the ride back into the wind would be worse. Edie and I stationed ourselves at either side of the bow and strained our eyes to took for something yellow. With the low sun behind us, lots of whitecaps looked like a yellow canoe, until they collapsed and built again. Suddenly the boat stopped dead in the water and as we looked up a wave broke over both of us soaking us with seawater. Dennis' reminder that the boat wasn't meant for these conditions took on new meaning.

Four miles out and still no canoe. With the gas running near empty, Dennis had to turn around, and managed the throttle so well, we skipped over the waves back to the marina with no mishaps. At the dock 2 older men came dashing up to us: 'We could see the canoe from our balcony; you were too far north by maybe a 1/2 mile'. They had been watching from the top floor of a Fennimore Mills condo and were waving fiercely at us to head further south. We, of course, had no idea they were there and at a distance of 4 miles they were mere dots blending into the background of the condo's porch.

Up at their unit we soon saw the canoe. With the setting sun glancing off the canoe's hull, a flash of yellow would appear every 10-15 seconds as the canoe slowly rolled over in the waves. We called Dennis up. He had been skeptical. He'd seen the boat rolling over hours before, then saw it disappear and assumed it was sunk. With binoculars from the 3 rd floor balcony he scanned the horizon. Then he saw it. His trained eye knew where the canoe was. The tide must have taken it south of the wind's direction. "Too late", was his judgment. And it was too late. The sun was setting, the wind was still strong, and the tide was ebbing leaving oyster shoals nearly exposed. No place for a pontoon boat. We had missed our chance. We thanked everyone and sadly headed back to our place.

The next day, with a heavy heart and little hope I went through the motions of doing what there was left to do. I went down to the dock at dawn and asked every fisherman launching from there to keep an eye out for a yellow canoe. I called my insurance company only to find that homeowner's insurance is exactly what it says: if the boat's stolen or destroyed on your property, it's covered. If not ... only special boat insurance covers that. I called the Coast Guard and the Wacassassa Preserve. I spoke to the Cedar Key police who said they'd keep an eye out for any reports of a lost canoe. One officer said he lived near Yankee Town and suggested looking in that area. 'Lots of boats wash up on shore over there'. We heard stories of other people who'd lost their boats in storms. One fellow's boat was washed offshore during a past hurricane. The broken hull was found on a Mexican beach with his Florida stickers attached and the owner suffered the additional indignity of having to pay for its removal.

People were very kind to us. Doris who owned the Island Hopper turned down my offer to pay for the expenses of the pontoon boat rescue run. 'That's how we do things around here' she replied. Maureen, at the library, allowed us to post a 'Lost Canoe' notice on the bulletin board and offered to place an ad in the Cedar Key news of which she is an (the?) editor. Joy, Gay and Debbie at Cedar Cove offered help in printing notices and looking up phone numbers in Yankee Town and Crystal River. They pointed me to several people who rented canoes and kayaks and we eventually rented a canoe for our remaining week from Perry at the Gulfside Motel, for a reasonable price and a handshake that if this one blew away I'd owe him the remainder of its cost. We kept it securely tied up that next week, living up to the old adage about locking the barn door after the horse was gone.

Denise from the Sunset RV park, whom we met early one morning paddling her kayak with her Sheba Ina barkless dog aboard, offered her phone number as a local contact and promised to check the papers in case a 'Canoe Found' was posted. She told us stories about people leaving awnings on their boats or deploying screen porches from their RVs, not realizing what a turn in the weather could do. 'They'd be out in the middle of the night with a knife trying to cut away the screening to keep the RV from toppling over in a storm'.

People whose names I don't know offered to post our notices prominently at City Hall, on Jiffy convenience store doors and grocery store windows. At several places, people had already heard about our plight. 'You must be the fellow who lost your canoe'. Somehow, this made it hurt a bit less.

Dennis offered us the use of his sea kayak, untying it from the roof of his boat and leaving it on his dock. My daughter Laura, more familiar with kayaks than we were, took it out to the islands several days, with us in the rented canoe following behind carrying her art materials. While she remained at a scenic spot on one of the islands, Edie and I would paddle off for an hour or two and return to find a finished oil painting vividly depicting the view. She painted 12 such scenes of the islands for her Art school class while on her spring break and they were well received by her professors after she returned home.

We eventually got used to the notion that the canoe was gone. An unintended consequence was meeting such nice, interesting people. It must be normal for people to express concern or sympathy for even so minor a plight as ours in a small town like Cedar Key. Back home I'd expect a one-word acknowledgement 'Bummed' and the topic to quickly change. We got to talk to Dennis and found him to be a refugee from an intense sea kayaking business that had him taking customers out 10 - 12 hours a day, 7 days a week in the Chesapeake area. He told us stories of clients who got tired after a modest paddle and expected him to tow them home. 'I threatened to cut the line if they wouldn't help me paddle', he related. 'I had customers who thought they didn't need a guide. I overheard two fellows I had taken out in the Dismal Swamp in Delaware telling each other they could do this sort of thing next time without a guide. I got them thoroughly turned around in the swamp, then led them over some mud flats that are worse than quicksand. You have to know how to lean on your boat while pulling it along, so as not to get stuck. One of the fellows was thigh deep in muck before I rescued him. There was no more talk about dispensing with a guide after that.'

Dennis was also an expert in sea kayaking difficult surf conditions and he told us stories of big waves generated off Cape Charles at the mouth of the Chesapeake. He'd ride the outgoing tide several miles to where that wave began, then surf it all the way back in his kayak. Off the Indian River on Florida's east coast there was a subterranean trench in the sea floor that generated 20 foot waves: 'See the 2 nd story balcony over there and that one over there', he said pointing to the Cedar Cove units towering above us, 'you'd be down here in the trough of the wave, then a few seconds later you'd be up where they are on top'. When asked what he did for surf in Cedar Key he told us that when the east winds were strong enough they bounced off the sea wall in the harbor and gave him some practice.

A week later, Edie and I set out for the towns running south of the Wacassassa River, where the canoe was headed a week before. My heart wasn't in it, but we still posted notices on supermarket bulletin boards, convenience store windows and Chamber of Commerce doors. Often times we'd see the poster of the young girl who was abducted from Homosassa as well. It made losing our canoe seem a lot less tragic.

We also saw bait shops near Yankee Town and began posting notices there too. At the second one the young fellow began reading our notice as he walked inside to post it and then stopped. 'I might know something about this ... let me make a call'. A few minutes later a fellow drove up in a pickup with 'Fowler' written prominently on the door. Eldridge Fowler who ran a hunting and fishing camp with his sons had gotten the call from the bait shop. It seems he knew of a commercial crab fisherman, Lester Green, who found a canoe recently. 'He's out crabbing and won't be back until late afternoon'. 'What was your's like?' he asked, a bit suspiciously. We described the canoe, the Ohio tags on the side, and, as an after-thought I mentioned: 'I've got rope tied to the stern in a loop'.

Eldridge was wary of showing us the boat. He hadn't found it. Would Lester want to give it up? Was that really our canoe? He wanted us to leave our phone number with him and he'd contact Lester. Lester had no phone for us to call. Then there was the matter of a reward. 'Lester's had a run of bad luck recently', he told us several times. I showed him our note and the part that offered a reward. I finally convinced him to take us to see the canoe. 'No sense wasting all this time if this is the wrong one' I coaxed. We follow him for a mile and pulled up in front of a house with fishing boats and equipment covering the lawn. Also on the lawn was our yellow canoe, in fine shape with perhaps a few more scratches on the hull. Eldridge looked skeptically at us, then saw the rope on the stem. 'Well, I guess that's your canoe. Give me your notice and I'll leave it for Lester with a note from me. Come back around 4PM when Lester will be back from fishing'. I offered Eldridge a reward, but he turned it down. 'Lester's the one who found it; you can work that out with him'. We thanked him, took several brochures for his camp and drove off.

It was a strange feeling. We had both given up on ever finding the canoe. We were just doing the responsible thing posting notices, and here, in a coincidence we did not yet fully realize, we almost had it back. It was very tempting to turn around, leave some money in an envelope and take the canoe. We kept looking at each other in amazement and disbelief, almost the same as when I discovered the canoe was gone. But it was light-hearted this time. We pondered what to do. Edie was firm; that gentleman trusted us enough to take us to the canoe. The least we can do is be trusting enough to wait for Lester Green to come home.

We drove around Yankee Town with 4 hours to fill. We had stomachs to fill as well and when we spotted a sign 'Yankee Town Women's Club lunch, all you can eat, $6 March 16, we turned in. The community center was filled with women and food.Two dozen varieties of pasta salad and a dozen of dessert jello salads were spread out before us. At several tables were a group of women in red hats and purple dresses. I asked Edie about this and she told me of the 'Red Hat' society, taking their name and garb from a poem espousing the desire to gently throw off society's strictures of female dress: 'When I get old I will wear a red hat and a purple dress...'. Plates overflowing we sat down in the back of the room to be joined shortly by 3 women who were officials of the Women's Club. We chatted with them and told them the story of our lost and nearly found canoe.

After lunch the women at our table left for their respective positions in the room, one of which was speaker. She introduced the women with the red hats to a round of applause and then introduced us 'two folks from Ohio, staying at Cedar Key where they lost their canoe. They've come here to pick it up'. And another round of applause followed. After a group of girls from the local schools finished singing, a raffle was held using the stub of the admission tickets. Coupons for discounts at local gas stations and restaurants went to various winners, until the last prize was announced. 'The grand prize is 2 - $50 bank certificates of deposit. Don't look at your ticket stub; look under your placermat for a dollar sign written there'. There was a shuffling of plates and placernats for 30 seconds, a minute, two minutes and still no winner was found. More out of amusement than anything else Edie and I turned over our placemats: blank. I then reached over and turned the placernats of each of the women who had sat next to us. Nothing; nothing; noth ... wait, a'$'! I waved it in the air and the speaker announced 'We have a winner'. 'This isn't our's, we said, 'it belongs to her' pointing to the woman who had sat there and was now in the back of the room'. It was a bit embarrassing. Club officials weren't supposed to win the grand prize. The woman said she'd be giving it to her grandson for his college fund. Not everyone realized what had happened and as we were leaving the speaker actually came over to us to tell us at which bank we were to cash in the certificates.

We finally could wait no longer and drove back to Lester Green's house. A storm was forecast and we didn't want to be loading the canoe in the midst of it. Just after we hoisted the canoe onto Edie's truck and tied down the first strap, Lester Green and his sister-in-law drove up in a pickup truck with a fishing boat towed behind. I introduced myself and thanked him for finding the canoe. 'Glad you came to get it, Lester replied, 'It's a really nice canoe. I reported it to Fish and Wildlife and they're trying to track you down from the stickers on your boat'. I handed Lester the $100 reward then listened to the story of how his sister-in-law had spotted it as they were coming in from crabbing near Turtle Creek by the Withlacoochee River. 'I just saw this yellow thing in the bushes and asked Lester to take a closer look. We emptied it out, hauled it aboard and set it down here on the grass just yesterday.Told Eldridge about it last night'. Had we come one day earlier we'd have missed it.

'My family's been crabbing for 3 generations, Lester told us. I'm 61 years old and I just love it'. He then held up some blue crabs for Edie to photograph in front of his work boat and our canoe. The crabs were none too kind to each other. One of their neighbors stopped by and after learning the story told us: 'Everyone loses a boat now and again; it's just the nature of boats to get lost'. Lester's sister-in-law then told us a harrowing story of fishing with her husband and another fellow for stone crabs '...in 23 feet of water and 7 foot waves. The bilge pump wasn't working and before we realized it the boat began to sink. The engine box broke loose and we grabbed on. Both the men were wearing life jackets, but I didn't have one on, so they stayed in the water trying to keep that box from breaking apart in the waves, while I stayed on top of it. We were in the water 8-1/2 hours until someone came out and rescued us'. For us in our canoe, danger was a game we played at our discretion. We called it adventure. But commercial fishermen don't have the luxury of choosing their time on the water. On my walk out towards Rye key I had strolled through the cemetery. On one stone was written 'Lost At Sea'. This wasn't some ancient grave of a seaman lost a century ago. The date was 1989.

Lester had to get his crabs to market, so we shook hands again and left. We stopped by the bait shop and gave the young fellow $20 for his efforts. He told me that Eldridge Fowler had come into the bait shop just an hour before we arrived. Had we arrived an hour and a half earlier, we'd still be posting notices at every supermarket down to Crystal River. It was that close.

We drove back to Cedar Key still gaping at the canoe overhanging the truck, still not quite believing it. People who saw the canoe and knew we had lost it pointed and said 'is that the one?' and 'You found it! 'We pulled all our notices down and told everyone we'd talked to that we'd found it. It took perhaps 2 more days until we fully grasped that the canoe was really back. By that time we were packed up and heading north to the worst March Cleveland had experienced in over a century. But we didn't really care. We had our canoe.

Post Script: Upon returning to Cleveland a phone message was waiting. It was from a fellow at Florida Fish and Wildlife whom Lester had contacted. He had tracked us down via our boat stickers and the Ohio Dept. of Natural Resources, gotten our phone number and called to tell us they'd found our canoe. I called back and told him we found it too.