A tiny sign of spring - and a bit of drama

Flashead's (Joni's) boat is on the winter dock yard on Hietaniemi. Today we went to shovel off the snow from the boat. It took us about an hour to get all the snow away.

Now the ice just have to melt so that Joni can put his boat back in the water.

Here is the other side to this story: as we arrived to the dock yard Joni was carrying his camera and tripod as well as two shovels.

The path in the snow leading to his boat was so narrow that he put his camera standing on the tripod on the ground. It was only about 20 meters from the boat and there was no one else on the dock yard.

As we were ready with the job and came to the spot where Joni put his camera we looked and the camera was gone. We could see the traces of the tripod in the snow. Also we noticed other shoe traces than ours.

The first thought that came to my mind was to call the cops and then go through the paper work with the insurance company. Joni said that he'd knock on the door of the house which was close to the parking lot. I thought that would be a long shot.

Joni knocked on the door and a woman's voice said: "What do you want?" without opening the door. Joni knocked again and she came to the door. "Give me a cigarette!" she spluttered and we could hear that the woman was completely drunk.

Joni gave her a cig and asked if she'd seen a camera. She said that she knows nothing about any camera. Then Joni said that we have to call the cops. The woman said to Joni: "Light my cigarette and let's negotiate!"

WHAT? Let's negotiate? Joni started to become nervous and she noticed it. Suddenly the woman jumped back in to the house and Joni heard a sound "klick - clack". The sound was from the tripod, he recognized it straight away. At that point I was so angry that I just started walking towards the car.

Joni got his camera back, which I think was really amazing. Never leave your camera anywhere, not for a minute. That's what I learned.

Have a great weekend!