Men Overboard

This Best Western Lakeside Lodge & Suites is a very nice place.  They serve breakfast in a large corner room on the third floor, with sweeping lake views.  In addition to the normal breakfast fare they have cheese omelets.  Both local papers and USA Today are available for guests.  In good weather you can sit outside.  It's cold today and even snowed on the mountains overnight.

We met at the seaplane office at 11 for our 11:30 flight.  Everyone was early so the plane left by 11:15.  It was fun to fly over Lake Chelan.  The only way to get to the other end of the lake (Stehekin) is by boat or seaplane.  It was a clear morning and we had pretty views during the half hour flight.  One of the interesting facts that the pilot told us is that the lake and surrounding mountains form the deepest canyon in North America: 10,000 feet.  The lake is 55 miles long and about a mile wide.

At Stehekin, we walked around and enjoyed the scenery, also explored the National Park Service visitor center.  Around 60 people live at Stehekin year round.  They must be pretty hardy souls.  The Lady of the Lake ferries run all year from Chelan and bring food and other supplies to the residents.  In the summer there are shuttle buses that take visitors to falls and hiking trails.  This time of year two hours was enough time to spend.  We boarded the Lady of the Lake for a four hour trip back to Chelan.  The ferry is large but there weren't many of us on board.  We had a leisurely trip on the lake, enjoying the views and reading. 

About a half hour from Chelan we saw two men and their canoe, which had overturned.  They were hanging on to the almost-submerged canoe and they looked very cold.  The captain maneuvered the 113-foot long ferry close to the two men and a crew person threw out a life preserver.  This took quite a while.  Mark and I both were ready to jump in and help but it wasn't necessary.  The younger man got the life preserver around his dad, who we learned is 91, and he was pulled to the ship.  He had no strength and couldn't hold on to the preserver.  Passengers pulled on a rope attached to the preserver rope and hauled him up.  He was ready to fall out of the preserver when the crew member grabbed his life vest and got him onboard.  The poor man was freezing cold.  I helped get him inside and layers of jackets, shirts, and shoes off and bundled in warm blankets.  Mark helped with the ropes and winches.  They pulled the canoe out of the water and were going to tow it to Chelan but the son said he would paddle it there.  Kind of a dumb idea as far as we were concerned.  He was no spring chicken himself and must have been very cold as well.  When we got to Chelan, the paramedics were waiting.  They came onboard and took care of the older man, who seemed to be okay except for being so cold.  Mark and I went to Safeway, got a few things for dinner, and when we drove back by the ferry dock the paramedics were still there, presumably still waiting for the son to arrive?  They were sure lucky the ferry came by when we did.  It was the last ferry of the day and there was no other boat traffic on the lake.