Photo: Scenic Pruth Bay, Calvert Island.

Six o'clock in the morning, there's frantic banging on the hull.

Both Henry and Marie, who are strangely already up and moving around, jump up the gangway steps into the cockpit to find an oldish couple standing in their tender whilst hanging on to Sänna's stern rail - they are in a foul mood. The guy begins to rant at Marie, saying we anchored too close to his rather posh American flagged Nordic Tug when we came in to Pruth Bay the previous evening, which, of course, we had. I dressed quickly to sort out the frantic argument being played out on deck. Instantly I'm confronted by a fifteen foot tall yank, a well built Ronald Reagan lookalike who's accompanied by a sort of Nancy Reagan who chooses not to look at us directly for some reason, she's either angry herself or she's embarrassed... it's difficult to tell which and I need to make a quick decision...

We're sitting over their anchor and our chains are crossed, or rather our chain is crossed over theirs he says. I see that all the boats in the anchorage, which still has plenty of space, have drifted around at various angles overnight with no wind or current to disturb them. It's a magnificently calm morning with the sun rising over the anchorage in fine style. It's a glowing yellow orange, just appearing over the tip of the forest with radiant colours streaking across the cloudless sky. The quiet stillness of the bay is broken only by our visitor who's frantic ranting can be clearly heard over the water; heads are beginning to appear out of hastily opened hatches on neighbouring boats... clearly something is afoot on Calvert Island. Oddly, it's an amusing but sorrowful spectacle entirely of my own making but this strange fellow is losing the plot and Henry whispers to me, "maybe he's gotta gun..."

I take a look around and quickly decide that we cannot have crossed anchor chains. It's simply not possible. Maybe we have drifted over the top of his anchor but that surely shouldn't be a problem? But I did drop our anchor too close and that must have baffled him, when the anchorage had so much space. And he said exactly this in rather no uncertain terms... he'd obviously got himself wound up overnight and decided to come over at first light to sort these Brits out. In a shockingly loud voice he demanded what's to do if our chain is crossed over theirs which, of course, it isn't. I say to him, if our chain is crossed over theirs then it's a simple procedure to extract his chain from beneath ours which, I quickly assume in my mind, he doesn't have the skills or the experience to do. This stops him dead in his tracks. He tries to figure this out... I can see this in his perplexed and mystified expression. Then, a stupid masterstroke, you know, one of those you regret afterwards, I offer to send Henry over to his boat to do it for him...

I feel sorry for them both and I understand his anxiety. He is in the right. We are too close but our chains are certainly not crossed as he vehemently claims. Should there be another way of sorting this? My good Canadian friend Del Boy onboard Blow by Blow recommended this anchorage to me and stated categorically that space must be left on the north side of the narrow bay for the seaplane that lands daily, usually early in the morning. Because it sometimes has difficult problems landing and then manoeuvring through overnight anchored pleasure boats crowding the anchorage. The seaplane then cannot reach the embarkation jetty. Del Boy's friend's brother is usually the pilot. And that's why I anchored where I did. When I offer Henry's services to help out Ronald Reagan's lookalike he loses his cool, starts his engine and speeds off in a terrible temper. Henry whispers he thinks the guy didn't have a gun.... Marie gives us both one of her looks, she knows full well I'm in the wrong and shouldn't have said what I did...

Just when the glorious sun rose higher in the sky to bring another fabulous new dawn the sound of an approaching seaplane splits the new found silence. We all three stand and watch it approach majestically from the east, out of the golden sunrise - it lands in the exact spot our American friend said we should have anchored.

Often, there's no peace in paradise.
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