THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, March 10, 1996 TAG: 9603060047
SECTION: REAL LIFE PAGE: K1 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: MY JOB
SOURCE: BY KRYS STEFANSKY, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 93 lines
SKIP DORE spends his days at the helm of an elongated go-cart.
``It can probably do 10 knots downwind with all canvas set,'' he says, his strong sailor's hands firmly planted on either side of a skinny steering wheel. ``Or, as they used to say, with everything aloft but the skipper's pants.''
There's not a wave in sight, unless you count the ones from landlubbers flagging Dore down at the Virginia Marine Science Museum.
They want a ride. Dore can give it to them. He is captain of the museum's electric tram. The fellow with the Caribbean blue eyes and salt-and-pepper beard ferries visitors through the marsh and over the bridge between the museum's two buildings.
Every fifteen minutes, four times an hour, he drives this third of a mile through the woods along General Booth Boulevard in Virginia Beach, turns around and heads back the way he came. Every trip is ``deja vu all over again,'' he jokes.
The repetitive job has its rewards. ``The little kids are the nicest part of the day,'' he says. He's outside, he meets new people all the time, and there's little chance he'll whip along and lose a man overboard.
``I've never had the pedal to metal, but I doubt you could get 10 miles per hour out of this thing,'' he says. Back and forth, back and forth he drives, in weather that has made Dore long for the days he lived on St. Croix.
No, this is nothing like a balmy sail around the islands in his 20-foot sloop, the Bivalve. On freezing cold mornings this January and February, Dore sat like an ice cube on his plaid blanket in the open car, bundled into a thick fisherman's sweater and snapped into a yellow slicker with the hood up. Some days he fantasized about having roll-up plastic side panels to hold off the wind and rain.
``When it's cold and damp and when you come out of the trees and there's a breeze off the creek, my goodness, that straightens you right up,'' he says, shivering.
In really cold weather, he advises riders that they'd be better off walking and generating a little body heat. But, he says, shaking his head, it's amazing how many insist on the transport.
``The original intention of this is for the elderly or the handicapped, but of course the people who want to climb on are these healthy young characters,'' he says, waving off a handful of giggly, gangly would-be hitchhikers on a junior high class outing whose teachers want them to get a little exercise.
His gruff, no-nonsense voice hints at a few years Dore spent in the Marine Corps and has its own teacher's edge. That's what he is when he's not doing this.
Dore, 55, was a one-time doctoral candidate at Columbia. He quit when pursuing the degree got too expensive. Now he teaches English and public speaking to adults at night at the Virginia Beach Public Schools' Adult Learning Center and at Saint Leo College. He spent 20 years teaching high school, most recently in the Virgin Islands.
Three years ago the Richmond native moved here to marry his fiancee.
They live in Back Bay in an old hunting lodge. The urge to volunteer brought him to the museum a year ago and then landed him this job chauffeuring the tram.
``One of the things I like about this place,'' he says, nodding at the museum's buildings on the other side of the trees, ``is the learning process.
You stop learning and it's the beginning of the end.''
His teacher's instincts make him wish more people would walk, not ride, from one building to the other.
``It's kind of fun, kind of exciting, working in a teaching museum,'' he says. `
Even this old salt has made a few discoveries since coming here. He slows on the ride back to the main building and points into the marsh. ``I saw my first kingfisher right over there,'' he says.
To keep from breaking the outdoor mood, Dore wears a wooden duck call on a cord around his neck. Sounds more natural in this setting, he figures, than the tinny toot of the tram's horn.
``When the mud in the salt marsh gets to 60 degrees, some critters will come out, and when it hits 68 you'll see three or four different kinds of crabs down there,'' he says, pointing at the muck.
Wheeling down the path, he shows riders what they might otherwise miss - the bat house, wood duck nesting boxes and osprey stands.
Dore pulls up to Owls Creek Marsh Pavilion, waits a few minutes and takes on new riders - two women and two tots, one fast asleep in his stroller.
The captain grins at the kids, pulls away onto the blacktop toward the trees, waves and calls out, ``Bye. We're off to see the wizard.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
STEVE EARLEY/The Virginian-Pilot
Skip Dore operates the tram at the Virginia Marine Science Museum by
day. By night he teaches adults English and public speaking.
by CNB