2012 Flying Scot Wife/Husband Champ. Part 2

Sunday, October 7

Day 2 of Racing
Cold, dreary, cloudy, gray, colder than yesterday. The boats were pretty damp from a bit of rain last night, as well. Two extra shirt layers recommended, and since we noticed there was some breeze this morning, we continued with the old main and spin, new jib sailplan. Two races scheduled for today, hope it doesn't blow much more!

Our results were better today, third in both races, or so we thought...the second place boat in the second race was OCS, which gave us a two! This helped our cause substantially, although we didn't medal in the event, fourth place will motivate you to continue training for four more years(!!!)
Wilson and Bonnie Jenkins (with help from their girls) put on an excellent event with an Olympic themed awards ceremony. The symphony played (over the sound system), the music from the Olympics and gold, silver, and bronze medals were awarded accompanied by a bouquet of colorful flowers. Great job, Muscle Shoals!!

Gold: Jeff and Amy Linton
Silver: Chris and Monica Morgan
Bronze: Sue and Tim Stombaugh

Overall, a strong performance by Team Florida. Way to go, you traveling fools!

We thought we might stop in Dothan, AL, lots of hotels to choose from...I was imagining chips, salsa, margaritas...the hotel/restaurant pairings featured Mexican restaurants prominently. As we drove past Dothan, we discussed how tired our eyes were (stinging, actually) and how nice it will be to close them, suddenly, the road was dark. Ahhhh, the emptiness of LA (lower AL) and north FL (above I-10). Thank goodness Marianna has grown to 5hotels. We were able to find an acceptable Microtel for the night and caught the end of the SD/NO game. Showered and in bed by 10:30CT/11:30ET

One positive, more driving tonight, less driving tomorrow...and closer to the pups!

Safe travels to all our driving friends who may be going till late into the night.

2012 Flying Scot Wife/Husband Champ. Part 1

Wife Husband Weekend, October 6,7 2012
Joe Wheeler State Park, Muscle Shoals, AL

We were able to take Thursday off work, and we hit the road just before 11:00am. The plan was to drive as far as comfortable, and arrive in Muscle Shoals on Friday early enough to set up and sail. For the ride, we recently borrowed Randy Wayne Wright's Black Widow from the always reliable and fantastic, favorite dog-watching family. Silly bridesmaids.

3:30 pm. Driving past Tallahassee, and the rest of Team Tampa are meeting at the rest stop at I-4 and 75, when Lisa checks in. Good to hear from the Haywards, we'll be checking in with them along the way, maybe you've seen the Linton-Hayward-Silvernail convoy pics on fb. Mark is also in attendance as support crew/bartender, the gang is all together, and Team FL will be complete when John and Sue Domagala meet us at the Lodge.

Crossed the time zone line around 4:00, turning north after Marianna, FL and heading toward Dothan. A quick stop at the AL Visitor's Center scored us some hotel coupons and info for the night. Attempted a stop at exit 179 which seemed to have a good selection of hotels and restaurants, but a surly counter girl and some full hotels had us back on the road a bit to Clanton, exit 205, where a Best Western was our home for the night.

Friday, October 5
After a leisurely wake-up, the second half of the trip went more quickly than we expected. The rest of Team Tampa ended up with our surly friend at exit 179, and we arrived at the beautiful entrance to Joe Wheeler State Park around 10:30 local time. Harry and Karen were already in the parking lot setting up, and we joined them. Sailors needed to ramp launch and sail or be towed to the docks at the Lodge. By noon, we're in the water, and by 1:40 pm, we're checked in. The Lodge has a restaurant and we had some tasty lunch before tuning up out on the lake.

Saturday, October 6
First day of racing!!!!
Tune up wardrobe consisted of T-shirts and shorts, this morning it was gray, and 52 deg. Ugh!
We brought and wore most of the clothes we owned and after the skipper's meeting, an enterprising soul golf carted some hats to the docks and scored a bundle from the chilly, unprepared southern folks. Capitalism at work!
As we sailed to the course, "Smoke on the Water" came to mind. The water was warmer than the air for a very cool effect. As lakes will be, the shiftiness abounded. We did well in the first race and the wind shifted left and right and up and down. RC made a few adjustments and the sun started to make an appearance. We haven't auto tacked in a long time, was the observation of the day. In the third race, it seemed like we couldn't do anything right, and poor planning at the start snowballed into a big mess.

Back at the room, warm, showered and dry, dinner is outside at Shelter #3 in a little bit. Thoughtful RC left some time to catch up on some football and blogging before dinner. Anticipating similar conditions tomorrow.
Gators just beat LSU!