It was a nice quiet day on the water, we were the only ones in canoes. Rebekah seemed unsure about wanting to be out there, but she settled in pretty quickly. Before we left the ecology office we were told that there is a small island we could dock at and explore, and Emma soon saw a teepee structure that she was curious about.
We paddled over to the island where we noticed two geese guarding the dock area. Emma was determined to see the teepee, so we continued walking up onto the island, much to the dismay of the geese who hissed at us. Alyssa yelled to us from the other canoe that one of the geese was in it's "attack mode" and we should retreat to our boat. It was pretty fast work to scoot past the mad geese, and we thought we were in the clear.
About half way to our destination on the opposite side of the island, we saw the clear source of our unwelcomed arrival at the island.
Photo 153 of 365, taken May 25th:
Poor Rebekah looks terrified in this photo and I wish I could say that the worst part of our adventure was behind us. Getting back into our canoe proved more challenging than getting on the island had been. I had to take the girls one at a time {Emma hid behind a tree while I took Rebekah first}, placing myself armed with a big stick between the girls and the geese. Alyssa was curious about the island too. Not curious enough, however, to leave the safety of her own canoe, where she remained the entire time yelling out encouraging advice. Thankfully, the stick was enough to keep the geese at bay. I debated yelling and swinging the stick wildly at the geese to let them know I meant business, but it seemed logical that a quiet presence would exude the least amount of threat, so being new at goose evasion, that's what we went for.
The girls talk about this incident every time they see a goose anywhere now, Emma has educated her entire team about how mean geese are, and I am pretty sure I will never be able to get Rebekah to willingly go canoeing again. Just another family fieldtrip turned traumatizing experience for the children.
1 comment:
It'll be something they laugh about for years... "Remember the time mom took us canoeing and we got attacked by angry geese" :)
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