Larry sailed passed our stern the other morning, he’d never mentioned that he was leaving, but there he was heading up the bay. I watched as the boat grew smaller, and thought that it was odd. The weather forecast wasn’t that favourable, the seas still up from the storms a couple of days ago and as I said he had never mentioned going. I went back to reading my book and thought no more about it until Jackie got up and came on deck.” Larrys’ gone”, I said, but then scanning out into the entrance of the bay, where there’s one or two yachts parked we spotted Larry’s boat anchored next to Bills Cat-Sass, he must have a problem, we thought. Later that day at the snack bar we discovered what the problem was, it was that bloody dog.
The dog in question belongs to the owner of the Manatee hotel that sits about five hundred yards away from us poking out of the mangroves and the dog is the size of a small horse. Its bark is about two octaves below most other dogs and it barks constantly day and night. I usually get up at about six am, and at six am it is barking. What it’s barking at heaven only knows, perhaps some passing stranger, you would think, or a constant parade of strangers, but that’s unlikely, the hotel is not that busy. Maybe it’s another dog, a chicken or some army of ants scurrying across the yard. Whatever it is barking at we have no idea, but it provides a constant background to the otherwise serene backdrop of Salinas Bay. In the evening as the sun sets and we settle down with our obligatory G&T on the poop deck around about seven o’clock there it is again, “WOOF WOOF WOOF” and on and on it goes well into the night. It is very annoying, and Larry who had been anchored just a hundred yards in front of the Manatee hotel had had enough. He wasn’t leaving that morning he just had to get out of ear shot of that bloody dog.
Jackie thinks it’s practicing Jingle Bells, but can’t get passed the first line. All the night and every dawn, I don’t know if it barks all through the night, I don’t know if it ever sleeps, as the alcohol usually manages to numb my oratory senses, but for Larry it was all too much. Some times we get dogs in stereo as others join in, dogs on other boats will provide an echo, but not for long, they get out barked by the staying power of the beast from the manatee eco hotel.