This is my post for #freewriters 2171 prompt government approved censorship hosted by 
We had heard from other fishermen that there were Cuban rafts floating offshore of our inlet so with us leaving to go fishing well before daylight we were on high alert to not run into any of them because we did not know if there would be people onboard and did not want to damage our boat. All of the ones the other fishermen saw the day before had no one on them because the Coast Guard had already picked them up, but we did not know if they found them all. The Coast Guard would not let them bring any of their belongings onboard their vessel.
When it got daylight we were about 5 miles outside the inlet and we started seeing them most were empty because I am guessing someone else was first there and took whatever was on them. The one in the above picture was full of things but my husband would not let me take anything from it.
This was another one that had belongings. There was a homemade oar floating in the water and my husband let me get it but I do not have a picture of it and no longer have it.
This happened sometime in the early 1990s. I can not image how bad government approved censorship had to be to put myself and my family in one of these and cross the ocean. I would not want to cross our river in this.
photos are mine