The gulf coast is less than two hours from where we live, but it feels like going to a different country. Every so often—maybe once a year—we rent a place in Surfside to get away from it all. We spent the last four days enjoying the sun and the tide.
This time was a little bit different because it was more than just the two of us. My wife’s family has a regular reunion, and this year it happened at Surfside. We ate some good meals, had a lot of margaritas and beer, and soaked up some rays. This was the view from our balcony in one direction:
and this was the view in the other.
We had the full benefit of the Harvest Moon, which rose before us on Thursday evening, and the balcony faces almost due east, so we were treated to a nice sunrise every morning. We took quite a few walks on the beach, and some in the group played in the water, although the tide was running high and there were rip tides further out, so caution was required.
One night during our walk, we passed a truck that was bogged down in the sand. It was clear to us that alcohol was involved. We were surprised the next morning to see that they had somehow rescued it.
However, the main event took place on Sunday afternoon. We were on the patio of the bar that you can see in the top photo when we noticed a truck in trouble. The truck had backed in with a trailer to extricate a couple of jet skis from the water and it got bogged down. A while later we looked back to find out another truck in a similar situation. So, nosey Parkers that we are, we went down to find out all the details.
Turns out the guy in the dark truck volunteered to help his friends out with their jet skis. They attached the trailer but were having a hard time setting the locking pin. He called out for them to forget about it until he pulled the trailer out of the water, but they either didn’t hear or they ignored him and they continued to fritter around with the pin. The tide was coming in and soon the truck’s rear tires were spinning. Then something snapped, and that was that.
A friend driving a big white truck (NOT the one in the picture above) tried to pull the dark truck free and failed. Another guy (with a smaller truck) decided to have a go. End result: a few minutes later he was stuck, too. We saw geysers of sandy water shooting up in the air as his tires spun. The water was so high around the dark truck by then that the driver had to climb out the window. If he’d opened the door, it would have flooded the cab. The chassis was resting on the sand, and the tide wouldn’t be at its highest point for another few hours.
A guy with a jeep and a nylon cord on a winch thought he’d try to pull the white truck out, but he didn’t understand the laws of physics and, well, that didn’t work out at all. A Surfside police officer arrived on the scene. At first she seemed fairly dour, but she lightened up after a while and the whole incident ended up being pretty amusing. She left her truck idling and my wife’s uncle heard it making a sound. He recommended a course of action and soon they were attempting to diagnose the problem. Someone in the group wanted to capture the moment, so she took out her camera. “Are you taking my picture?” the cop asked. “Wait a minute,” she said…at which point she pretended to be arresting my wife’s uncle for the photograph!
Vehicles get stuck in the sand at least once a month, she said. “But this is the first time in a long time where the drivers weren’t drunk.” She said Cecil was coming. Who’s Cecil, we asked. He’s a guy who knows what to do…and when to give up, she said. Cecil arrived in a huge, camouflage-painted truck with a massive winch, and he started to work on the problem.
Surprisingly, no one seemed terribly upset. The guy in the dark truck was quite nonchalant, and the driver of the white truck said he was planning on getting a new one anyway. A woman who knew one of the drivers said that someone in their group had gotten stuck last weekend, too. “We’ve been on YouTube two weeks in a row,” she said.
One of the fascinating things about situations like this is how it brings people together of all cultures. Everyone had an idea about how to solve the problem, or at least an opinion about whether the current effort would work or not!
It didn’t look like it was going to end quickly or well, and it was really hot out, so we went back to the rental house for a margarita. About 20 minutes later I went up on the upper deck to see how things were progressing and, to my amazement, both trucks had been pulled clear of the water. Cecil to the rescue, although we have no idea how he did it, and especially how he did it so fast. We should have stuck around a little longer.
