Storytelling for Week 4: The Katherine

This has been the worst vacation of my life.

I started planning this trip like a year ago. A cruise with dream destinations and once in a lifetime excursions. I arrived at the dock and the sight nearly took my breath away. There she was, The Katherine. I had never seen a more majestic ship! She truly had no equal seen by man. I reached my room and soon after we departed on our journey.

Kalamitsi Beach in Greece by Ggia via wiki commons

We spent all afternoon at sea. I played mini golf, watched them make an ice sculpture, and ate half of the all you can eat buffet. Just as I was eating what seemed to be my forty-second chocolate chip cookie, the captain announced, "Good afternoon we are now entering the legendary bermuda triangle!" I run up to the top deck to look around and take a selfie so I can post about it on my blog when I return. After I take my selfie, I look around and enjoy the view. It is amazing how all you can see on every side! I can definitely understand why people used to think the world was flat. Right after I finish that thought, I suddenly see an island close by. I swear that it wasn't there five minutes ago.  The closer we get to the island, the slower the boat becomes. By the time we are within one hundred yards of the island our boat comes to a complete halt. The captain comes on the speaker again, "Hey folks, we are having a few issues, but we are going to fix it. In the mean time, we are going to lower the life boats and have you guys over on the island and we will get you when we are done! I am so sorry for the inconvenience, but you get more beach time this way!"

I change back into my swimsuit really quick and get on a boat. This water is beautiful. It must be fifty feet deep and yet I could probably count the pebbles on the ocean floor. The sand on the beach was white as snow. There is a hiking trail close to the beach so I decide that I would go look around the island. After I had been walking for about thirty minutes I hear a banging noise. There are a bunch of kids hitting this rock. It made this ringing sound, almost like a bell. Suddenly, the rock broke. There was a dead bird inside. The wind picked up and the sky darkened. One of the young girls screams and points at the sky. Above me there were two enormous birds the size of small house that could only be this dead bird’s parents. We all beeline it back to the shore and yell at everyone to get on the boats and head back to the cruise ship. We can hear the birds cries as we get on the ship. The ship starts to move but the birds have already reached us. They are each carrying rocks the size of a car. One throws theirs at us and it misses the ship by inches. The other, however, had better aim and hit the ship in the side. The Katherine was going down and going down fast. We all run back to the lifeboats and manage to return to the island unscathed. So now we are all stranded on an island in the middle of no where, hiding so that the birds will not find us.

Needless to say, I will definitely be asking for a refund when we get rescued.

Authors note: My story is based off the Fifth Voyage of the Sinbad Unit. In this story Sinbad goes on another voyage and land on an unknown island. The merchants he was traveling with decided to destroy a roc's (huge bird) egg and eat the baby bird. The parents of the bird get really mad and throw rocks at the ship and destroy it leaving the ship completely wrecked and abandoning them on the island. As you can see, I pretty much stayed with the plot of the original story. I just put the story in my own terms by making the ship a cruise ship.

Bibliography: "The Fifth Voyage" from "The Arabian Nights' Entertainment" by Andrew Lang (1898) Web source: Untextbook