THE CASE OF THE MISSING KAYAKS

One morning,
I woke up …
and I knew you were gone….

Yes, no kayaks swimming from our stern. As has been our practice, we often launch the dingy and kayaks at anchorages. We keep the dingy tied using it’s painter and our kayaks are tethered to a longer floating line and stainless spring hook. I’ll also use a bungee on the dingy to temporarily sinch is up to the swim platform. We had two neighbors anchored with us in the Newby Cemetary Bay as well.

Well, yesterday there were no kayaks there….just a cut line hanging out of the water at the swim platform. After a few minutes of shock, I told Vaughn to file a police report and I went fishing (looking for kayaks). It didn’t take too long before I spotted the orange/yellow and blue white tubes along the shore in a small bay at the end of the cove….one more point over and they would have been on down the Tennessee River a few more miles!

Interestingly enough after our Perry Mason and Sherlock Holmes training we had a mystery on our hands…..The rope had been cut cleanly at the swim platform above the water….knife! The painter for the dingy had been slashed too….two zip ties cut and some cuts on the painter line….maybe too tough to cut through or did the auxiliary bungee foil the attempt to abscond with the dingy too? Or were the kayaks the second attempt?

The kayak line had a number of cuts on it that looked like a propeller had hit the line. Spaced equally and progressively deeper. This end cut was shredded. We later found the third piece of line floating….again, some propeller cuts and a severely shredded end….

So the theory goes……stolen kayaks but the line gets caught in the getaway vehicle. They have to cut the line out of their prop and either lose the kayaks or abandon the theft in the process. We are lucky to have them back……and yes they’re again swimming off the back of the boat, albeit it with a shortened line and a few more sharpie marks!

Maybe we’ve been hanging around this area too long!