CT mini reunion: Aug 24-26, 2012

Halfway through Saturday and no pics of the morning runs?

Morning guys! Lots of skiing still going on as some of the footers are getting ready to hit the glass this morning. Its been a great weekend thus far. We tried to get 11 skiers up behind Joe's 83 at dusk last night but we were too much for even Joe's boat. PicturePat has the evidence as he was in the boat. In the end only 6 got up but it was fun trying. Reid was king of the hill as he was last man standing by the time they headed back. LOTS of pics have been taken but y'all will just have to wait till we get to some computers and upload them. The Benjamin Klan has gone more than above and beyond in making sure everyone is being taken care off. They're absolutely fantastic folks!

WOW - what a great weekend! Cheney and I had a blast!

Thanks a million to the fantastic hosts- the Benjamins- you guys went all out for this one!

Was great to see everyone again and meet new fans too.

We've got a lot of photos to process and post soon.

Hope everyone had a safe trip home- especially those of you traveling long distances.

-Brad

btw- for those of you wondering, I was the submarine in that mega trick line.

Wow, what a great weekend! Thanks to everyone for coming out- what an incredible group of people... too much fun. We wrung the weekend out for all it was worth, and then some!

Safe travels to those who are hauling back to points west and south today. I'm dragging at work, but it was totally worth it. Cant wait to do it again!

I have a few pictures, but theyre low quality and a few arent quite PG rated... so I'll defer to the pro's (Pat and Tim)... this event was very well documented. A+++ all around!

Did the Seniors Division get their line behind the Classic? How many Classics made it there? Photos?

I'll do a final recap from my point of view later but first.....



THE BOAT'S of "BENJAMIN LAKE"

I grew up in CT boating on Candlewood, Zoar, and the Sound. Doesn't look like anywhere i've been, what & where lake is this?

dwcar wrote: 74Wind wrote: I grew up in CT boating on Candlewood, Zoar, and the Sound. Doesn't look like anywhere i've been, what & where lake is this? Location: 52 Sandy Beach Rd, Goshen, CT

Thanks. In our youth we used to skip school and ski Mohawk Mountain, had we known there was such a nice lake 10 miles down the road we could've turned it into a multi-season "destination".....

Thanks to the entire Benjamin crew for a really great time, everyone skied like crazy and ate like kings throughout the W/E. As always, great catching up with the familiar faces and also adding some new ones to the list.

Indeed it was a great time, just too short as usual. Morfoot and I cruised up and hit Quinner's family cabin first at beautiful Candlewood lake on Thursday morning after driving all night. Chris treated us to a nice sightseeing trip around the lake. Then we hit the road around 6pm for the 45 min ride up to the Benjamin's and arrived in time for a little lake enjoyment and one of the great many delicious meals served served over the weekend. Tim and I took off Sunday afternoon for home around 3:30 and then drove all night AGAIN in order to have him at the airport in Charlotte at 4:30 yesterday morning. Tim flew into ATL and went straight into work there at the airport while i took my tired butt to the house and slept til noon. But the trip was worth every minute of it.

Highlights for me naturally included some epic boat and surprising performance displays such as:
*Tim's Barefoot being cranked back up again for the first time and then pulling off the fastest ever CCFan "confirmed" speed of the 62.8 shown above. The exhaust resembles a top fuel dragster rumbling away from the dock, and at full song sounds like nothing the ski boat world has ever heard before.
*Uncle Todd's recently rebuilt and hopped up 302-powered SkiTique (Tim's restoration job and former boat), which started out with a respectable 53.9 with a 40yr old prop, then jumped to 55.4 with a new Acme 1210, and then finally to satisfy everyone's curiousity, we slipped on a stainless TWO BLADE 11.5x15" racing prop Tim had found on line, and low and behold after the inherient crazy out-of-hole vibration transitioned into a firm bite, it went 56.4mph, and somewhat resembled a Jersey Speed Skiff by spending as much time out of the water as in it. You couldn't slap the grin off my face. I believe Morfoot has video of that run to post later.
*The GT-40 Powered Classic of Uncle Todd's. It's like driving a 50 yr old boat that somehow just rolled off the assembly line this year. Just hit the key and that fuel injected beauty fires right up and with the low end torque and throttle response that made the GT-40's what they were. Tons of attitude.
*Chris Mars' 72 Promo (new to him) with the 318 Chrysler. Wow, what a pleasant surprise! That thing really hauls the mail and it saw a fair share of the ski tow duty.     

Again, thanks to the Benjamin family for their incredibly hospitality. I've already got it on my calender for the same time next year.

This is my second time around hanging with you guys, and I had a blast! Tim, Greg, and Todd thanks for the hospitality, couldn't ask for better hosts. Having this weekend come around every year may make me switch brands

Laurie and Tony need mention for all the work they did with the food, which I'm sure a lot of others helped on too. The aluminum sandwiches were delicious.

JoeinNY wrote: Hollywood wrote: Laurie and Tony need mention for all the work they did with the food, which I'm sure a lot of others helped on too. The aluminum sandwiches were delicious. +1 A huge amount of planning, cooking, cleaning, and putting up with me gumming up the works in thier kitchen on occasion. They don't spend a lot of time on the boats so they are easy to miss but they were getting it done.

+2... they did a lot of behind the scenes work while I was busy drinking beer! So did Dad.

I know they got a few rides in, and quite possibly the scariest one of them all. That Ski Tique bow steering episode had disaster written all over it! Thank god there was some real estate over there.

The CCFAN'S, Places, and Things"

reidp wrote: *Uncle Todd's recently rebuilt and hopped up 302-powered SkiTique (Tim's restoration job and former boat), which started out with a respectable 53.9 with a 40yr old prop, then jumped to 55.4 with a new Acme 1210, and then finally to satisfy everyone's curiousity, we slipped on a stainless TWO BLADE 11.5x15" racing prop Tim had found on line, and low and behold after the inherient crazy out-of-hole vibration transitioned into a firm bite, it went 56.4mph, and somewhat resembled a Jersey Speed Skiff by spending as much time out of the water as in it. You couldn't slap the grin off my face. I believe Morfoot has video of that run to post later.

Nuff said and MAN what a ride. Thanks for letting me tag along Uncle Todd! Sorry bout the fingers in the shot. I was using my android phone and didn't wanna loose it.