Fun Weekend - Part 2

We took a short trip with another couple, Charlie and Earlana, to DeGray Lake in Arkadelphia, AR.

We haven't been to the lake in several years. Recently Mr. H has been trying to get our boat ready to use again. It's just been sitting in our barn. Well, all it took was a new battery and it started right up! Our friends have a Sea-Doo that hasn't been running well, so they took that. We decided this way if there was trouble we could help each other.

It's a beautiful lake, but it was pretty windy and the water was white-capping! We didn't gripe about the wind though, because it was in the upper 90's and humid.  The wind coming off the water helped to cool us down!

You grandkids will want to know that Gramps can still get up on skis.

He just popped right out of the water and skied for a long time across the lake!! You'll have to excuse the quality of the pictures, the water was very rough and the boat was quite bouncy. And no, I didn't take the new camera!! Not about to get it that close to any water!!But, you get the idea, he's skiing!

Yep, and he still loves to swing outside the wake!!  If you look closely you can see the red ski rope. He's almost up even with the back of the boat as we are turning!

While we ate lunch, we watching a catamaran. I've always thought they would be fun, until I saw how long it took him to get everything ready to set sail!

After lunch, Charlie got his Sea-Doo out on the water. We were on the bank watching him, so we could go get him if he had trouble. He played around for a while and then it quit and of course he was not near the shore when it did. We started to get on the boat to go get him when Mr. H noticed that it was taking on water. We couldn't start it because part of the motor was under water. He had to turn on the bilge pump to pump out the water, which took a long time!!! In the meantime, the wind was blowing toward us and Charlie on his Sea-Doo just slowly drifted to shore. And I mean SLOWLY! He just lay back on the seat and sunbathed till he got close enough to swim to shore! So much for helping each other out!!

They all wanted to go back out in the boat, but I didn't. I really didn't want to be in a sinking boat in the middle of the lake. But, they convinced me it was OK and we'd stay closer to shore. I should have known better!! We get back out, Mr. H gets into the water to ski and the boat won't start and there's more water coming in. The solenoid had gotten wet. They were finally able to  get the motor started using a pocket knife!! Don't ask me what they did, I was just so thankful it started. He turned the bilge pump back on to get rid of the water, which by the way wasn't much!   Yet!!   Now, just get me back to shore and out of this boat, PLEASE!!

And that was the end of our boating. Loaded them both up and came home. But, we did have a very good time!! I'm so glad we tried out the boat before we got anyone else like grandchildren on board. We'll have to find out the cause of the leak, probably just a dry-rotted gasket somewhere. We'll be trying it out again I'm sure!!

 

On the way home we got off the interstate at Malvern because Mr. H wanted to show me the Ouachita River.  He thought I might want to take pictures!!  I'm so pleased that he thought of that!  I think he may be getting used to the idea of me carrying my camera everywhere we go and that I love to take pictures.  Anyway, it was special that he thought of that. 

It's a pretty river, lots of boulders and rapids.

 

As we were turning around to head back home, I spotted this wrecker on top of a sign.  I thought the grandboys would like to see it!

 

All in all, a very fun weekend!!  Hope you had a special one also!!