NORRIS LAKE — Retired marina hand Wendell Tackett runs a pontoon sightseeing tour over the site of Loyston, the town TVA flooded to make the lake. Tackett owns the boat. He started the tours because tourists at his old marina kept asking what was under the water, and he started answering them.
He gives his answers in the present tense. Tackett steers by a depth finder, a small screen that shows the lake bottom, and passengers who are looking at the shore are asked to look the other way, toward downtown.
“The store’s open,” Tackett said on a recent trip. “You can come around this side, there’s room by the steps. I go wide on account of the delivery truck.”
A passenger asked whether the store carried ice. Tackett said the ice was around back.
Near a dip on the screen he eased off the throttle and let the boat drift beside a lot he said was reserved for the church supper.
“I leave some room along here,” Tackett said. “People come out of the kitchen carrying pans, and my mother always wanted her pan back.”
When a woman at the rail asked whether anybody lives in Loyston now, Tackett said not on a weekday.