IAughtNaut's Australian Adventure

Tim D wrote: You saw Rhonda get her ass KICKED? Now is that one clear cup or a bunch of cups stacked?

It was brutal. She was completely unprepared.

More than one, that pic was close to the end of the event, haha.

The Godfather wrote: Adam, looks great stop crying!! Would be super if some of us can come for a mini down across the big lake and how many cups are you holding ??

Bring it on Dave, standing invite to my CCFan homies.

Actually, the club would be a great spot for a mini. Big building with a bar and event space (available for rent cheap), a bunch of grills outdoors, pavilion style shelters if it rains, and a big dock that we could tie whatever boats we're not using to (obviously we would have to get the other Aussies to commit to travel here to accommodate, it will be hard for the US guys to just hook up and tow over). There's even a playground if people brought kids. If there is serious interest in a group of people making the trip I would say that late Feb, early March 2017 would be the way to go. Put it around the Moomba Masters and split our time between that event and hanging out on the water skiing. Or earlier, Jan-Feb to keep from conflicting with the River Ruckus.

I hope the walls are not sea walls as you will hate the rollers coming back off them.

Just go with a rough estimate of a kilometer = 3/4 of a mile and it will be close enough for you

LOL...you never have the 'warm beer' problem do you?

boat looks sweet. I think you'll love the 206....BTW...Ms Patti's favorite out of all that we have owned.

Apt looks very cool too.



john

backfoot100 wrote: ] Hey now, give the grey a chance. It'll grow on you. JBear and I are more than happy to let you into that very exclusive group.

I'll accept entry to any club you and jbear are in. speaking of exclusive entry, check your email. need your blessing.

Hollywood wrote: what's with the buzz cut

He told the barber to keep cutting till it looks like chit!!

Adam, you will be surprised how much different the 206 handles vs/sport, turns much flatter and tracks WAY better, the wake is also a bit more BF friendly for wake crossings.

Grey looks better on the water, my secondary stripe is the same color.

Hollywood wrote: pool table in the living room is legit

Do you have a "Cemet Pond" as well.

Wood that is a nudge bar a full protection unit is called a bullbar....but they work better on Roo's

Ok, been a little while since this thread was active, and that's not cause things haven't happened. Some of you who are facebook friends have seen some of this, only because as much as I hate it, its just easier to put stuff there.

So a couple weeks ago my job sent me to Queensland for two weeks and I decided instead of flying home on the weekend in between it would be just as easy to go check out the great barrier reef. Great decision. A better decision would have been to get scuba certified before, but live and learn.

Some pics-

From the plane





The view from the hotel in Cairns





The boat. It was pretty cool the way this worked. I booked a day on the boat with what were called introductory dives. Basically if you've never dived before or are not certified, the instructor goes under with you and drags you around to make sure you don't drown. There were about 140 people on the boat, not counting the crew. They gave all of us a number and told us that's how they were going to keep track of everyone. There were people who were certified, who were kinda let do their own thing. There were people who were doing the 2 day dive portion of their PADI cert. And then there were the rest of us, the newbs. They took us through a presentation teaching us stuff, then asked us a whole bunch of questions, made us fill out some forms. What was funny was the guide told us to write our number on our hand so we wouldn't forget it. As he's saying this, he looks out at the group of us, and says "holy ***************, who wrote that guy's number on his forehead? That's awesome, can everyone do that?" Sure enough, there's an asian guy with 131 written on his face. Fast forward a couple hours, the day included stops at two different reefs. When we were getting ready to leave the first, they had to go through the boat and make sure everybody was accounted for, using our numbers. I'm talking to this dutch girl...or maybe she was from the netherlands, I can't remember, not important...and an announcement comes on, "has anyone seen passenger 131? we can't find number 131". We both loook at each other and realize, how did they lose the guy with the number on his face. They eventually found him and we went on with our day, so there's no tragic ending, but it was one of the most ridiculous situations I've been in for some time.



Cairns also has bats. And they are LOUD.



Reef stuff. I'm definitely going to my PADI certification, because scuba diving is awesome. They geared us up, then moved us to a platform on the back of the boat. We got in the water, there was a bar about a foot under the surface. then another one about 3-4 feet below, like a big ladder. 4 of us were going at a time with the instructor, linked arm and arm. He swam around in front of us and had us perform two actions they said we had to do before we could go, clearing water from our mask and clearing water from the mouth breathie thing (I don't remember what it was called). We dropped down to hold on to the lower rung and get used to breathing. Problem was, the bar was only about 6-8 feet long, and with four of us shoulder to shoulder thrashing and kicking around there wasn't a whole lot of room. Not having ever breathed under water before, it wsa a little unsettling at first until I settled down and started to breathe regurlarly, you know, like they told us to do. None of the four of us had gone before, and they guy next to me was not doing well. He started to freak out and swam up to the surface. I thought that was what we were doing, so I swam up to. The guide on the boat was like, what's wrong with you? I said nothing, I thought we were supposed to come up now. He was like, nope, if you're ok, you're going, and kinda pushed me back down under...and off I went. You can tell from the pictures, it was awesome. I did 3 dives, about 20 minutes each, at a depth of up to 10 meters. On the third, there were three of us, and each of us were on at least our second, so the instructor was like, as soon as we get a little away from the boat I'm going to let go of you guys, but don't just swim off, because I need to be able to see your air gauges. Of course, as soon as he let us go we all swam off different directions, haha. I will say, it was way cooler swimming around on my own than to be locked arm and arm with four strangers. That's where the pictures of me in the water are from, handing my camera to one of the other guys and making "hey, take my picture" motions.









I don't know why I thought this was interesting, but I do. This is how they tied the boat up at the first reef location. Big ole blocks on the bottom with chains that they attach to a marker and tie off of each day they're out there. I thought it was pretty ingenious. Sometimes its the little things in life.





















Not real sure what I was doing here







And a few videos









Then the Mooomba Masters came to town. Very cool event. Right on the river in downtown Melbourne, kind of the centerpiece of a large cultural festival. The police were nice enough to let me know that despite what my companion thought, we were not, in fact allowed to drink wine. The night jumping was really cool. Maybe its the Browns fan in me (ok, its definitely that), but I hated the DeWalt black and yellow 200. The boat was sweet, but come on, of all the color combos that are offered...



































TimBob came by for a visit in April and we went by Lewy's place. He has his own thread so I won't spend a lot of time on that. I think Mark and I did a pretty good job of showing him some different sides of Australia. City life with me, Aussie bush living at Mark's place.

And now the fun stuff. Again, some of this is repeat for the facebook friends, keep reading, the videos are new.

About a year ago Lewy told me he and one of his ski crew were boxing. I don't know why that stuck in my brain, but I figured, maybe I'll check it out. I joined a boxing gym around October and all I can say is, if anyone is looking for a good workout, boxing is it. I have the type of personality where I get into something and then go full speed ahead (see- driving and flying all over the country and now world to go skiing with you guys) and that seems to have happened again. I started slow, then after the first of the year started training harder and harder, and now in four weeks I have my first fight.

One of the owner's of the gym is a pretty famous trainer, so a couple times a year he puts on a fight night. Basically, I've been training with this guy for about the past three months, and on the 17th of June I fight. I don't know who I'm fighting yet, the boxing commission will match us up after our final weigh in a couple days before the night. The fight is above board, which I found out means its regulated by the state boxing commission. I had to register with the board, so after the fight, win or lose, I will be meeting people and telling them that I'm a professional boxer in Australia. Its just too funny to not.

Promo photo from the gym-



And Mark asked to see some of the training I'm doing, so I took my camera to sparring this afternoon.





And the not so fun stuff.

Completely outside of my control, my company has decided they want me to move back to the US. Its a very long story, I had an offer to stay permanently, but I couldn't agree to the terms. Or the permanency. What that means, is that while I'm training 7 days a week for this fight, I also get the pleasure of preparing to move back around the world a few weeks later.

The only absolute I have right now is the end date of my lease, which is the 12th of July. The other thing I don't know, is where I want to go when I get back. My job allows me to work remotely due to the amount of traveling I do, and they are fine with me moving pretty much anywhere I want. I've decided that as much as I love Cleveland (which is a lot), it isn't the best place for a person with a ski boat to live. I've realized after living in a place with mild winters that I really, really hate that white stuff that falls out of the sky 6-8 months out of the year. So I'm on the hunt for a new city. I'm a city person, I need to live in a place with some action. Bars, restaurants, sports, concerts, events...and most importantly, good water to ski on. Those aren't my only considerations, obviously, but if anyone has any suggestions, or is looking for a new ski partner in their area, let me know.

Getting all those pictures online took hours, so hopefully two pretty long posts should be enough to get Toertel off my back for a while.

Well that sounds like a bit of an unexpected turn of events......With that said, being raised in Maine and then moving to a warmer winter climate is something neither Sue and I have regretted.
Selfishly, I think you should at least consider either Charlotte or Raleigh as possibilities. It goes without saying if you need a place to crash or use as a base to work from the door is open.

Btw I work from home a bunch and the water is glass on weekdays 😀

Only one place to go - North Carolina. (Cary area or Charlotte area)

Home of MANY CCs (new and old)..., central to most reunions..... close to Ohio.....In between Ohio / FL / GA family ....... high "young single person" population (man, I am an old married guy)...... good lifestyle, weather, and people. Simple - that would be my choice.

Roanoke is the best place to retire after all that NC fun..... ask all the Jersey folks here.

While it's a bummer that your Australian adventure is coming to an end it will be good to see you back in the states again.
As for the boxing without head gear not sure you want to pursue that for very long, concussions have been getting a lot of attention lately and I know you don't want to end up like Quinner (I was told he was dropped on his head a lot when he was young.)
The pics were awesome especially that Black and Gold boat

I think my son values the thoughts and input of CCFans over mine. This has not come up in our discussions now that Mama Deen and I will move to the Cleveland ares early in June. Maybe I should have considered the Badin area. Anyone know any skiers there?Maybe Shelton needs a ski bud.

If I were a single dude such as yourself and considering atl, I would park myself in a high rise right smack dab in the middle of buckhead or similar neighborhood right where the action and nightlife is, take Marta or a cab to the airport, and stick my boat up in a rack on Lanier.

Another vote for charlotte.