Scattered Thoughts . . .

Every year we always look forward to a few different annual events. The annual Lake Champlain Antique Boat Show has always been one of these annual events and it has always been a great time in the past.  The show was yesterday and, since it has been raining almost everyday here in Vermont, we were very fortunate to have a beautiful sunny day! I was feeling "fair" (which is better than I've felt in the past week) so I packed up a camera, a couple of lenses and a bag full of medications and we headed to Burlington in anticipation of viewing a fleet of antique boats on beautiful Lake Champlain with the rugged Adirondack Mountains looming in the background.  It was a beautiful day for walking around Burlington. The sky was clear. The sun was shining but it was still quite comfortable with temperatures in the 70s. Since I don't do well in hot climates, this was my kind of weather!  Our walk toward the waterfront was very nice and a much needed break from recove

Over the weekend, Sheila and I tackled getting the boats ready for our very short summer season. I ran into some issues with the sailboat... I left the sailboat sitting upright on a homemade dolly with the mast in place. The sleeve for the mast filled with water while the mast sat in this wet sleeve...  probably froze, thawed, froze, thawed, etc, over and over through the winter... and when I lifted out the mast the other day, it fell apart. I won't make that mistake again. The sailboat will be disassembled and put away for winter this year! I managed to make do with spare parts I have on hand but the mast will need to be replaced eventually. It should be okay for this season though. Everything else looked pretty good and functional. That being said, I still would not be surprised if I find a new problem when we put the boat in the water at the lake house. While I fixed, cleaned, waxed and re-rigged the sailboat (replaced some old, worn rope), Sheila cleaned up and waxed the

Today was the day to prepare the boats for the summer and, specifically, for our time at the lake. The weather was perfect and I'm running out of time already so today was the day. My body is telling me it is April yet summer is here already! My spine has been rather inflamed the past few days so it was slow going but I managed to get everything ready... well... I think everything is ready... you know how that goes... Chances are we'll unload the boats at the lake house and find I missed something. I cleaned and waxed three kayaks. Then I figured out a way to mount my little waterproof camera to the bow of my kayak so I can get some video clips while kayaking with the kids. That should be fun!  The kids really enjoy seeing themselves in video and they enjoy videos of the boats so they should really light up when they see themselves in video on the boats. One of these days I'll shoot some video of them watching themselves in video... they're pretty funny. The

As most of you already know, I enjoy sailing.  Of course, I enjoy just about all boating, but sailing is a lot of fun on my fast, little Minifish sailboat. Not only is it a lot of fun, but my little Minifish has some history to it... my history. It holds many memories and stories.  I was a young teenager when I received this boat so it holds a lot of memories and stories.  Putting aside the history of this particular boat, sailing can be fast, wet, and heart-pounding exhilarating which is always a plus for enjoying an activity! It should come as no surprise then that ice boat sailing has always intrigued me. Ice boats are sleek and fast...  and, I suspect, very cold!  With the speed and all that wind whipping across a frozen lake on a cold winter's day, I imagine the cold could be brutal.  These little 'boats' gliding across the ice seem to move much faster than a sailboat can in water.  All that friction and drag of the water really slows a boat down considerably.  This