Tank's Travels

Giving me the silent treatment I took their smartphones away. I do this every class. They hate me. I’m the only instructor, apparently, who takes their phones away. They tell me they’re sad, annoyed and powerless. I also scold them for being late. This, they tell me, stresses them out. Pray for them.

How bad could it be? I really had no idea. Truth is, I didn’t really give it much thought until the night before I was to meet Don Julio, a young grey tabby, in Playa Del Carmen. I set up the soft-sided carrying case, put the pee pad in and got the harness ready. The reality of it hit me as I waited on a busy street under the hot Mexican sun at the appointed meeting place. Would I be able to…

I love red and I couldn’t help myself.

Readers of Tank’s Travels would have good reason to question my sanity (read: aspic photos). But, I’m likely not going to spend $2K on a suitcase. Rimowa makes good suitcases. But, they come at a high price. The company has been around since 1898 (bought by Louis Vuitton in the last few years, which may be the kiss of death). They made the first ever polycarbonate (hardshell) suitcases. Their…

Toxic traveller seethes and hates

So, here I was thinking my brother was going to be named “Boorish Traveller of 2017.” Tank travels with annoying brother Then I had the misfortune of meeting rude Ricky. A tense, brooding 50-something jerk from a North American city. Ricky had a special talent for turning toxic any environment he inhabited. From breakfast buffet to tourist excursion, Ricky scowled and, unsolicited, offered his…

Tank’s brother candidate for worst traveller!

Made it here despite the annoying sibling How’s this for an experience? Road trip to Osoyoos and Penticton B.C. Wine country. We do this annually. I’m driving my brother’s car because 1) it has cruise control and mine doesn’t, 2) I’ve got far more experience driving long distances. (Countless, long road trips in Northwestern B.C. during my CBC Radio years), and 3) I’m the big sister and the boss…

The soliloquy lady and her mom from last year. Their recent visit made me smile. 

I hadn’t intended to resurrect Tank’s View this year. For a variety of reasons. I came to believe my tales lacked fair context. To exclude this was to portray my street as a bit of a circus starring an ever-changing gaggle of shady characters.

They are people, of course, with complicated lives. No one aspires to live on Vancouver’s downtown eastside.

I’ve lived in this area for more than a decade — walking, running, shopping and riding my bike. Main and Hastings (google it) is three blocks from my street. Never have I been harassed, cat-called or made to feel uncomfortable or scared. Residents of Canada’s poorest neighbourhood give me a thumbs up and a smile when I run past them. They call out ‘good morning’.

The worst ‘resident’ of the area, in my opinion, is rich guy Bob Rennie. He hosted an out of control party last year at his nearby corporate office. A party that broke noise bylaws. The Vancouver Police fielded dozens of complaint calls. Shame on him.

Rennie’s contempt for the neighbourhood

I’d love to live here forever (despite Rennie and his ilk). Not likely given Vancouver’s over-the-top real estate prices.

Things are different on my street this year. It’s quieter. Some of the folks still visit. The soliloquy lady was back this week. Topless and arguing with her mother. I’ve not heard or seen the shouting couple who used to pass by my place several times a week. I always wondered what kept them together when it seemed like they never had a civil word.

So, where is everyone?

Fentanyl. Just a guess. No where more evident to me than on my street.

Here’s a photo gallery from last year:

Tank’s View 2016

Tank’s View 2016

Tank’s View 2016

Tank’s View 2016

Tank’s View 2016

Tank’s View 2016

Tank’s View 2016

Tanks Travels gets a sibling blog: Tank Submerged

Announcing the arrival of tanksubmerged.com. A sibling for tankstravels.com. Think of it as Tanks Travels with its mouth washed out with soap. Why? Why not? Here’s a Q&A (open-ended questions, of course) that should explain everything: Q: WTF Tank. What’s this all about? A: It was time to grow the brand (not really!). Actually, Tanks Travels, while brilliantly written, is on wordpress.com, a…

Travel to the U.S. or not?

To fly through the United States ….  hmmmm I was in a meeting recently when the talk turned to travelling to the United States. One women, a beauty of Portuguese descent, said she’d cancelled a visit to New York. She’d planned to celebrate her 50th birthday there. Instead, she would visit the Canadian maritimes and “keep the money in Canada.” Surely this wasn’t all about patriotism and the…

Galapagos diving nightmare – epilogue

Me, practicing deploying an SMB. At Whytecliff Park, West Vancouver, B.C. Photo taken by Greg McCracken, Ocean Quest Dive Centre (February 2017) By now, you know I lived to tell the tale. The experience spooked me. Even more so after I’d returned home and had a chance to really think about what had occurred. Learning about the deaths of Donna Newton and Eloise Gale frightened me. Wanna read the…

Screw you single #scuba #diver

Divers arriving back to the main boat. I wasn’t able to be with them due to the danger of my situation arising out of the buddy-fiasco. Within hours of being abandoned underwater by my ‘buddy, non-buddy’ Jose and ignored by Flo’s ‘divemaster, private servant’ Eduardo, I was gearing up again. Getting back on the horse was crucial. Otherwise, I may not have ever dived again. When dive guides put…

So how did I end up alone, in choppy seas struggling to catch my breath? How to die scuba diving in Galapagos The three people in this photo, plus Jose the dive guide, the mastermind behind the dive plan. That’s how. When Ivan proved to be a dangerous and disastrous dive partner/buddy, I became Jose’s buddy. World’s worst dive buddy Only Jose was busy shooting video. He wasn’t paying attention to…

Left to #die #scuba #diving in #Galapagos?

The zodiac (panga). The yacht had two. This is how we were taken to/from dive sites. I’ve never before had the feeling I might not survive a scuba dive. It happened THREE times diving in the Galapagos in December 2016. The most terrifying was when the inflatable zodiac (aka panga), to which I was assigned, left me bobbing alone in the choppy surface waters after a dive. Took off without me. Jose…

Of three dive guides on the Galapagos yacht, Jose was the most arrogant. Thirty-something guy with a swagger.

Jose led the majority of the safety and dive site briefings. He was easy to dislike. As an ‘older’ woman, I got an inkling early on the feeling was mutual. (He was very fond, however, of the 25-year-old skinny girl – more on this in a future post.)

I recall a particular briefing on the third day. Jose forcefully lectured us on not being annoying to the turtle mamas-to-be who needed to surface from time to time during the mating season. “Stay out of their way”, he said. “Don’t swarm them to take photos.”

Dive guide Rueben and his GoPro on a stick

So, what does Jose do as soon as we drop in the water? Shoves his GoPro in the face of a turtle. Other divers followed his lead. WTF?

Ivan the terrible – world’s worst dive buddy

Turtle-abuse aside, I was astounded the dive guides were shooting videos during our dives. A revenue stream, I guess, if they can sell their videos to the divers onboard.

I thought priority one for a dive guide was to keep an eye on the divers. Especially in the dangerous, strong currents of the Galapagos. Video shooting is a distraction.

Remember, AT LEAST two women divers have drowned during dives from this ship –  in 2009 and 2015.

Seems dive safety might not be a thing on this vessel

Enough. A wonderful diver on the ship (kind, caring, animal lover) was equally annoyed about the dive guide’s video-shooting and turtle harassment. Together, we decided to have a chat with the captain.

Long story short. The captain reiterated that ‘divers dive at their own risk’ (yeah, we know – the ship isn’t responsible if we die), but agreed to curtail dive guide videography for the duration of this trip.

What was most remarkable – the other diver is my witness – was a comment the captain made. That in his opinion, the dive guide to diver ratio of eight to one (8 divers looked after by 1 guide) was a source of concern considering the challenging diving conditions in the Galapagos.

I was already getting a taste of dive guide inattention and there was more to come, courtesy of swaggering Jose.

To be continued…

Ivan the terrible – worst ever #scuba #dive buddy

The worst dive buddy ever – enabled by a unsafe dive crew Imagine paying thousands of dollars for a bucket list scuba trip to one of the most challenging dive sites in the world (the Galapagos). You get there and discover the crew is lax about safety. On a yacht where AT LEAST two divers have drowned since 2009 after they were abandoned by their dive ‘buddies’. Lax safety on Galapagos scuba yacht…

Lax safety on #Galapagos scuba yacht?

YOU’RE FIRED. Ivan, the useless lump of a dive buddy. I did only one treacherous dive with him.Where to begin? Along with my drysuit, scuba gear and camera, I guess should have packed a ‘dive buddy’ as well. I booked my seven-nights-aboard-a-luxury-scuba-dive-boat Galapagos trip in October 2015 (to happen December 2016). Nowhere in the fine print did it say, “we won’t give a shit about your…

Die-ving #Galapagos – is being a woman a risk?

Darwin’s Arch, Galapagos. The currents here can be deadly for diver. If I’d know about scuba divers Donna Newton and Eloise Gale, I might not have been so eager to book a liveaboard dive trip to the Galapagos. Unlike Donna and Eloise, I made it home alive from my Galapagos dive trip. But, I can identify with the circumstances that seemingly were factors in their deaths. I’ll leave my own…