Raccoons Again

One week ago, we were on our way to the airport. This morning I am sitting in the quietly at 5:30 PDT and typing in the dark. The girls remain sleeping on the air mattress (bless their hearts for giving up their bed) on the other side of the couch, and I sit computing in the dark. I can do that with Pufferpoo's lighted Mac keyboard. Cool, eh?

We've been busy, even when we've been not busy. To wit: yesterday was an unplanned day as both girls had to work and study all day. That left Cuppa and I to our own devices, and we opted to walk the circumference of Stanley Park — around the seawall. We ambled around for much of the day, timing our return to coincide with sunset.

At sunset, we've more than once found ourselves sitting on, oddly enough, Sunset Beach, which is just outside their front door. We watch as Old Sol quenches his light into the cool Pacific. Of course, we've taken photos of this and everything else, but I won't be posting be posting any until I get home. However, I couldn't resist popping in to talk to y'all for a minute since I am up early this morn.

What I really wanted to focus on, although it's taken me three paragraphs to get here, is ysterdays rather unnerving encounter with the local raccoons.

Cuppa and I had been enjoying a snack at Prospect Point in Stanley Park around supper time yesterday. We had finished our munchies and remained in place for some time looking out at the ocean and across to the mountains. When it was time to get up to begin the long trek back to the apartment, we decided to remove some left over food items from our bag to deposit into the nearby trash container.

That was when were were swarmed by four, yes four, bold and frightening raccoons who were desperate to snatch our leavings. Their movements were incredibly bold and more than a touch alarming, let me tell you, especially in light of our experience on the previous night.

We had been sitting in the living room conversing about nothing of consequence when we heard a dog yelping a rather frantic and continuous yelp. When we sprang to the window in alarm, we beheld a large raccoon chasing a woman and her small dog. Really. She fell in the street and was in danger of being struck by a car, but the raccoon was relentless in his aggressive pursuit. Fortunately, she and her dog were able to escape into the apartment building, and the raccoon disappeared into the bushes.

So, you see, when we were swarmed by four of the blighters the very next day, we had every reason to be just a tad alarmed. In retrospect, I don't think they would have actually assaulted us, but I assure you that we were in no frame of mind to test that theory, and we both made haste to leave the rascals behind.

For those who haven't seen it, I leave you with our raccoon encounter of two years past when we last visited Vancouver and Stanley Park. While I'm sure that most locals live here for years without such encounters, we short term visitors seem to attract the blighters. I wonder if anyone captured this latest episode, for there seemed to be some cameras trained on us? In fact, bystanders seemed to think it was pretty funny.