Quantum Entanglement: Pipes, Pipers, Parades, Surfing in October, and Partially Naked Drinking as a Sport

 If you’ve been following me for a bit, you’ll know that I have this crazy quantum entanglement thing going on and if you know anything about quantum physics, you’ll also understand that space and time are irrelevant in these matters. I have written about this in the past and if you're interested, you can check out this 3 part post series: 

https://steemit.com/marijuana/@rebeccaryan/a-shaman-a-cannabis-coach-and-a-62-year-old-newfoundlander-part-one-meeting-the-shaman

This particular entanglement involves the Piper family. @jpiper20 and @pipertomcat.  (I’m writing this piece for both of you and your clan of people who love all things "surf".) 

As I understand it, you reside in Savannah, Georgia, USA and I currently live near a city called Quinte West, in Ontario, Canada.  You guys are closer to the eastern coast of Florida and I’m land locked, not near a coast of my country, but approximately 1100 miles due north and a hair to the east of your location. There’s a two day drive and a border crossing between us geographically. Let’s just say, it would be an epic journey by car, but it feels like something that both of you would benefit from at some point because of your surfing and artistic skills. So, in an effort to honour the direction I am receiving from the Universe, to share this information let me explain further.

I’m not originally from the Quinte West area, even though I have lived here for over 20 years.

I still call a small town, named Kincardine my home and that's part of the reason why I'm...well....a bit stranger than most.

In fact, my home town's tag-line is "Welcome to Kincardine. Where you're a stranger only once." Anyone who's lived there always jokes that you just become "stranger" the more time that you spend there. (I'll let you be the judge as I lay the stage for you to try and understand this special little part of our planet.)

It’s on the shores of a huge body of water called Lake Huron. It’s a fresh water lake that is approximately 23,000 square miles. It’s the second largest of Canada’s five great lakes.

On this particular day (Oct. 13, 2016) the lake was behaving, not too badly but trust me, it can be an unforgiving, grouchy, unpredictable lady, at times. (Not unlike many of us, of the female persuasion. I myself have been known to morph into a hillbilly with knife skills, for no good reason. I’m not proud of it and at least I can admit it).

This characteristic is especially true of Lake Huron in the fall, during the month of October.  This is where this story original begins in 1856, with another “Piper” named Donald Sinclair. 

My home town was founded 8 years earlier in 1848 by two Scottish Immigrants.

Donald and his family had relatives who had settled in the area a few years earlier and he (Donald) decided that he should bring his family from the Island of Skye, (a small island off the west coast of Scotland), to start fresh.

They came in good faith and hope that they would be able to make a new life for themselves. They were driven by their thoughts of a better life, with more food, natural resources and their dreams of abundant opportunities for their children.

The last leg of their journey by water was to sail from the Port of Goderich to the Port of Kincardine which is approximately 26 nautical miles. When they set sail, the sky was overcast and a little breezy but about ¾ of the way along it became nasty and the wind picked up and changed direction. The water and sky became black and stomach-turning rough with high swells. They sailed on in fear for their lives.

(This is a picture of a freighter that was taken about 2:00 pm on August 2, 2015 by a talented photographer named Dale Matthies, of Huron Sunset Photography. The vessel is trying to leave the Goderich Habour before a storm actually hits. It was ominous and Dale captured the emotion of the impending danger and angry water, beautifully. It was the middle of the afternoon, but it's so black, you'd think it was at dusk or early evening.) 

Anyways, Donald went down into the hull of their boat and grabbed his bagpipes. Once above deck, he started to blow them as loud as he could, hoping and praying that his song would be carried to the shore, by the westerly gales.

In the meantime, an unknown “Good Samaritan” heard the faint bellowing and grabbed his bagpipes and began to blow loudly from the Kincardine shoreline.

Eventually they could hear each others’ pipes and the captain of the boat was able to put in safely, in the harbour, with no lives lost.

After that, Donald (believing” in paying it forward”) would often go to the harbour around dusk and “pipe” the setting sun down, in an effort to help anyone else who might need to find their way to shore.

Many years later, the lighthouse was built. To this day, in the months of July and August, a “Piper” still pipes the sun down, every night, from the top of the light house.

(Notice the Piper piping from the cat-walk around the top of the lighthouse.)

There is an exception to this ritual being as, on Saturday nights, all the “Pipers” of the town are busy piping in the weekly pipe parade. (Yes, you read correctly, there is a parade every Saturday night during the summer months.

(Video credit is given to Troy Patterson who writes for the Kincardine newspaper. He uploaded this video to Youtube on June 26th, 2016. It was the first parade of the 2016 season.)

Any of the townsfolk or any visitor to the town are welcomed to follow the pipers the entire length of the main street which is about 4 blocks or two sets of lights long.

(The parades go down this street about as far as your eye can see in this photo.)

Every year there is a Scottish Pipe Band festival with Pipe Band parades and competitions. There are 100’s of “Pipers” in attendance and all piping for three days straight.

(This video credit is given to S. Wolfe, who posted this video to YouTube on July 2, 2016. 18 Clans, comprised of 150 Pipers, participated this year. Clans are traditionally representing by family last names. Each clan or family, has their own tartan which is represented by the different colours of wool and patterns used when weaving the kilts. Both men and women wear kilts. If you know your tartans by sight, you can tell what each person's last name is, or a very close rendition of it. It's like a brand and often there is a family crest as well. It is not generally customary for men to wear underwear while sporting a kilt. Women don't typically follow this rule.)

Words of sound advice: if you aren’t fond of the sound of a bagpipe, stay the hell out of Dodge during the Pipe band throw-down is all I can say, because Hell is probably more forgiving after the 13th hour and the 500th rendition of Amazing Grace.

Which brings me to the next special feature about my home town, every ten years whether you like it or not, there’s an Old Boys and Old Girls reunion. 

Everyone who’s ever lived there comes back on the same weekend with their friends (most of whom have never even heard of the place before) in tow. The normal year round population of 12,000 residents swells to 50,000 people overnight.

Now, I want you to envision lots of Scottish people, lots of bagpipes, lots of people wearing kilts, lots of metropolitan flabbergasted city dwellers, and lots of all of those people drinking cheap beer and not so cheap scotch, ALL DAY LONG.

What happens next is almost indescribable. I struggle to find the words...oh, who am I kidding, of course I can find the words. It begins after the Saturday night regular Pipe parade. It morphs into what’s called a Shirt-Tail parade. Sounds innocent enough... but it’s not.

Everyone dresses or undresses to whatever level they want to. They come in droves. They come in costumes. They even come in teams... dressed up in themes. (Hey! That kind of sounds Dr. Seuss-ish, don't you think?)

They bring lots of alcohol and it is openly consumed...in public...for hours. It’s loud, it’s packed and for most people, it turns out that underwear is optional. 

(This video belongs and is credited to YouTuber: ccga235. It was uploaded on Aug. 3, 2008. It shows the transition from Pipe Band Parade to the complete mayhem that can only be described as the Reunion Shirt-tail parade Kincardine-style.

(This video belongs and is credited to YouTuber: Ham. It was uploaded on Aug. 4th, 2008. Why, yes, that is a gigantic inflatable penis and fireworks are, in fact, actually hitting the buildings.)

 

(This is where the parade finishes. It's normally a baseball diamond with a track all the way around the outside perimeter. This photo was taken from the top of the bleachers. Aug. 3 2008.)

During the last reunion in 2008, I was standing shoulder to shoulder with about a 1,000 other revelers on a bridge, waiting to get into the baseball field. A guy threw a piece of paper directly in front of me, proceeded to bend over to pick it up, wearing an apron, shoes and a hat. What I didn't know was that he was "only" wearing those articles of clothing. It turns out, that he had big “W”s painted on each of his butt cheeks.

“WoW” is right! (I can never "un-see" that and now... neither can you. Yeah, you can thank me or flag me for making a poor decision to include this photo, if you feel you need to. It was real and it happened.)

The next reunion is scheduled for August 5th, 2018. So you might want to "save the date" as they say.

If you go, please be prepared to do a lot of parading, with or without your underwear, oh and wear comfortable shoes because they are an absolute must. (It's free to go. You will walk a lot. Bring a cooler full of ice. I know, it’s pretty awesome, right?)

I think we’ve successfully established that the people who live where I come from love bagpipes, Pipers, parades, and any excuse they can find to drink naked.

Now there are a few more things that make this sleepy little town unique and that is that it provides an awesome environment for surfing (long and short board), body boarding and kite sailing.

October is generally the best time for these activities because of the strong north-westerly winds. The sand bars create 3 natural breaks and the water gets really deep really quickly, just off the south pier. This produces the swells and on an October day, the wind can be upwards of 8o knots with 8 foot high waves or higher. (This is precisely why Donald Sinclair thought he and his family were going to perish that day so long ago in October, in 1856.)

(This video was shot by Jerry Fabian on October 19, 2015. It shows how nasty the Lake can be. The structure that the surfers are jumping off of is the south pier of the harbour. This spot has claimed lives so you need to be a strong swimmer.)

(I took most of these picture on Thursday, October 13, 2016. I was "home for a visit" during my holidays and from my vantage point standing on the hill, you can see the south pier and the lake was behaving for the most part.)

 (I'm back on the beach now and am facing the harbour and the lighthouse. It will snow in about 6 weeks from now so, there was a crane at the harbour lifting boats out of the water. They will be stored in dry dock (on land, all wrapped up) for the next 6 months. It will take at least that much time for the ice on the lake to melt. The water in the harbour that day, was really calm compared to what the lake was actually doing.)

There were about 20 surfers and Kite sailors in the water. It was 50 degrees F and the wind was ferociously blowing as you can hear in the video I took. I uploaded this video on October 15, 2016 but captured the footage on the 13th.

All the surfers were in full wet suits. This area gets, on average,  about 50 good surfing days a year but it's ranked pretty high in the surfing world as one of the best surfing spots to go to in Canada. In addition to its waves, this location has free parking very close by and washroom facilities with hot showers. A lot of coveted surfing locations are remote and you often have to hike into them with all your gear to access the water. Plus, they usually have no facilities around them. In 2013, the first surfing competition was held here. Surfers came from different countries to compete. Now it's a yearly event and each year it gets more attention from the surfing world.

If anyone wants to immerse themselves in the experiences I have tried to put words around, my recommendation would be to plan to come for the Homecoming reunion, August 5th, 2018. There will be decent surfing conditions, it will be hotter than 50 degrees F, you'll get to parade with 20,000 partially naked people and listen to 100's of Pipers. What's not to love about that, I ask you?

@jpiper20 and @pipertomcat, let's see if we can't carve this steemit-watersports tag/topic on to Steemit permanently. Maybe it will catch some air. ;)

Thank you for making it all the way to the end of this post.

I welcome your comments and am happy to respond to any questions or concerns this content might create. If you want to join me on my journey please don't hesitate to follow me.