b'The entries below were contributed by various operatorscruise. The gentleman said that he could not understand FOGHORN FOCUS and are in their voice or that of their customers.why the cruise couldnt happen since the boat floats no matter the river height. The staff member politely said the river was over the parking lot and up to the grassyou HOPE, AND BOATS, FLOAT couldnt physically get on the boat without swimming to the dock. He hung up on her. Myfavoritehappenedthispastspringafteraweekof massive flooding around our area when we had to vacate our offices for a week. A woman asked me, What did youHONING NAVIGATION SKILLSall do? I replied, Well, we all went home and waited for the water to go back down before coming back to work. II have been asked if we could change the route of the cruise mean, we had maintenance staff looking over the facility,for them, such as going upriver (where it is extremely nar-but the rest of us went home for the week. row and dangerous) because they wanted to.The woman looked puzzled and asked. Did you guys have any damage? The water got really high. After consideringIs Catalina Island in America? What currency doesher response and her tone I got the sense that she didntthe island take? quite comprehend the situation. So, I simply said, Well you understand that everything floats, right? Like, as theCatalina Island is part of Los Angeles County, and Avalon, river rises, so does all our stuff. And, then I saw the em- incorporated in 1913, and was the 13th city in the county. barrassment fill her face, and let me say, her face got veryMerchants accept U.S. dollars as payment.red. We all got a great laugh about it after she came to the realization of what I was saying. Ive had people ask me if the stairs go up, or just down. One person was standing next to the stairs on an upper deck The same flood we had a customer screaming at our tick- and asked me how to get downstairs. I, without a word or et agent, not understanding why we were canceling theirany emotion, pointed to the staircase they were standing Unlike boats, parking lots do not float, making cruises impossible during a flood. Answering questions about weather-related events and other natural wonders is a part of the job for staff and crew in the passenger vessel industry.PHOTOS FROM LEFT: BB RIVERBOATS, STAN STEPHENS GLACIER & WILDLIFE CRUISESFOGHORN 30'