I’m sitting in an old wooden Adirondack chair on our dock. The wind ruffles my shirt’s flutter sleeve. And a random wake from across the channel arrives beneath me, causing the floating dock to bounce and jostle and creak and moan.

Off in the distance, I see it. Poo Island.

[cue ominous music]

From the time we got the boat, the kids begged for us to visit the little island across the way. Not much more than a forested knoll, it rises out of the water with a skirt of red clay and a jumble of rocks for protection. Last week, Charlie finally relented. After a morning of tubing, he surprised us by beaching the boat (intentionally, he assures me) on the verge of the isle. When we arrived, another boater was just pushing off, his yellow lab dog gazing sloppily at us over the waves.

We disembarked, the kids yelling that they were off to explore the 15 feet of “forest” in the middle of the island. Nobody had any shoes, but I figured their summer-toughened feet could withstand being poked by any rocks or pine needles. So they ran off.

And then I saw it.

Poo. At my feet. And then a few inches ahead of me. More to my left. To my right. Stretching off down the beach. There was basically poo every few inches in every direction all over the entire island. I looked up to see the kids frolicking through it. They’d already figured out how to navigate the island, leaping from tiptoe to tiptoe like ballerinas. If those ballerinas were surrounded onstage by a minefield of poo.

Now I knew why that other boater was there. Apparently this island was THE place where every boater with a dog took it to do its business. Not exactly the wonderland we’d imagined. I truly had never seen that much dog doo in one place before.

So the island was christened that day. I don’t know if it has any official name, but for us it will always be Poo Island.

And our escape was swift. We could now say that we’d explored it. But no one was tempted to look back.

Today, from my vantage point on the dock, the island shines in the morning sunlight. But I know the dangers lurking on its sands.

Escape from Poo Island is originally posted at: The Red Clay Diaries - Rambling down the dirt road of life Copyright 2007-2011. Use only with permission. Follow me on Twitter. I'm redclaydiaries