Coastal standbys we've lost in 2017: Dragons, punkin cannons and trains

As January approaches, it has become traditional to look back on the year that has passed and reflect upon those aspects of coastal life that will no longer be with us in the new year. 

While I would very much like to include Overbrook Town Center proposals as one of those aspects, it appears that that will need to wait until the December 2018 column. In the meantime, let’s explore this year’s Top 3 departures.  

First, after a pull of five years, the organizers of the Dragon Boat Festival have decided to permanently disembark. Gone will be the colorful, canoe-like vessels, with their dragon’s head prows and rear tails to match. No longer will those boats be powered through crab-infested waters by 20 synchronized paddlers in pursuit of fame and glory.  

With the demise of the Dragon Boat Festival, area residents will need to find a different nautical means of pursuing magical dragons (like Puff) that live by the sea, as well as the fire-breathing variety that have been known to vacation in the coastal region when not filming an episode of "Game of Thrones."  

While we search for those alternate means, we may want to attend an event that is still very much alive — the annual Recycled Cardboard Boat Regatta. 

Held annually on the Nanticoke River, near Seaford, the regatta features watercraft made entirely of — wait for it — cardboard, often of the corrugated type. I am not sure why the cardboard has to be recycled, but I’m certain the organizers have their reasons.

In any case, no wood or metal can be used in their construction. However, duct tape and multiple coats of polyurethane or enamel paint may, and really must, be applied if the boat is to stay afloat for the full 200 yards of the race.  

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Even with duct tape’s renowned strength and water-resistance, the cardboard boats have a decided tendency to tilt, to buckle, to capsize, and, ultimately, to sink. All of which has led the organizers to create a special “Titanic Award,” which is given each year for the “Most Dramatic Sinking.”  

Second, this year also saw what appears to be the final demise of the World Punkin Chunkin Association’s somewhat annual championship event. This brings an end to the chunkaroo after 30-odd, and I use that modifier advisedly, years of airborne pumpkins. What was probably the most spectacular vegetarian sporting contest in the nation is no more.  

While there may be a need to dispose of excess Sussex pumpkins (try saying those last three words repeatedly), there must be a more expedient and safer way of doing away with those left over from Halloween. 

Employing air cannons to shoot them almost a mile downrange, only to have the pumpkins smashed to smithereens, gives new meaning to the phrase “cannon fodder.”  

Regardless, the question remains of what to do with those unemployed air cannons? One enterprising coastal resident has proposed selling them to the Quaker Oats Company. 

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Makers of puffed wheat and puffed oats cereal, their sales took off decades ago when Quaker adopted the now classic slogan that they were "the cereal shot from guns.” Now, the proposal goes, they can launch a major new ad campaign, promoting “the cereal shot from air cannons.”   

Finally, it appears that 2017 will mark the end of an era, as train service disappears from the First Town in the First State. DelDOT announced in July that it would decommission the Delaware Coast Line Railroad segment that runs from Cool Spring to Lewes. 

“Decommission” is a four-syllable word that government agencies employ to indicate that service will “cease” or come to an “end.” Either of those one-syllable words would have been sufficient in this context, and would have saved countless tax dollars in printing costs.  

In any case, it seems that the hand-cranked swing bridge that trains have used for 100 years to cross over the Lewes-Rehoboth Canal was out of alignment with the connecting track on either side. Apparently, the bridge has sunk some 7 inches into the canal bed. State inspectors concluded that no amount of hand-cranking was going to overcome that discrepancy.  

Mike Berger is a freelance writer and retired university administrator with a home in Lewes. Contact him at edadvice@comcast.net.