With visual aids by google

Way back when, at the beginning of May, I managed to have a house warming party/cookout. My earlier attempt had been snowed out. The weather was wonderful. All the flowers were blooming. The company was good (if maybe smaller than I had hoped). The entertainment was well received. And it ran from 2PM until 8PM or so.

Then the next weekend, Tyson and I decided to go take a rolling class from Charles River Canoe and Kayak. That was very good. The only problem is that I haven’t gotten out to practice again since then.

Emilie Flying a Kite on Mockhorn Island

Trudy, Emilie, and John paddling off Delmarva

And then the weekend before Memorial day, we went down to the eastern shore of VA to paddle with my parents. Friday we paddled around Cape Charles (see the map). It was quite windy so we didn’t make it very far. Saturday we paddled out from Oyster and meandered around Mockhorn Island. It really is more of a marsh than an actual island. Sunday we did a brief paddle from Red Bank out to Sandy Point. On a culinary note, Mom ordered country bacon at one of the restaurants. It turned out to be real southern salt cured country bacon. Dad and I tried some, but Tyson wouldn’t even touch it. We also got recommended to a good restaurant in Cape Charles Saturday night which had an excellent beer selection.

Tyson at Cuttyhunk MA

We have been talking about getting a tandem for a while. So, we decided to rent one for the saturday before Memorial Day to see how well we dealt with being in the same boat. Looking at the tide charts, we determined that the trip from Woods Hole to Cuttyhunk was possible. The current started going south west at 8AM, turned around at 2PM and stopped again at 8PM. That is a trip that we probably can’t do in our singles, so we figured it was a good thing to try in the tandem. It turned out to be about 32 miles round trip. We got to Cuttyhunk at 1PM rested for a bit and then turned around. We got back, both completely exhausted, which is different from usual. Usually I am tired and Tyson is fine. But we both decided we enjoyed the trip a lot. We do need to match our paddle types a little bit more, though.

Then last weekend we decided to go out to western NY to test paddle the Bullitt tandem Tyson has been looking at since last fall. On the way there we stopped by Ithaca to visit with his brother and I hung out with Kara and went to a little bit of the Ithaca Festival. Tyson’s car has been having alternator issues. About a month ago, his alternator died. Then the replacement was acting flaky and it turned out it was under a recall, so we got a second replacement. Well, on the way out to Ithaca, that one died. The belt had been making unhappy noises for a while, but never when we stopped the car to look at it. Luckily it died close enough to Tyson’s brother’s place that we just drove it there. The two of them then spent the afternoon swapping in yet another alternator. Sunday we made it out to test paddle. This guy makes boats custom for people. Most of his boats are rough water racing boats. The one we were looking at was one of his more touring models. It was still a bit more of a race boat than I expected. It probably doesn’t have enough capacity for more than a 3 day trip on the ocean (where you have to carry your fresh water). But it definitively fit the requirement of allowing us to go further on day trips. We got it up to 7mph and I think were cruising at 5~6 mph unloaded.