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Memorial Day '04 Redux
After a cool and wet winter, it was finally the
beginning of another Texas hover season. The seasons beginning was
marked in the usual fashion with the first hover-in of the year being
held on the Memorial Day weekend at Lake Somerville. The gentle winds
and glass smooth lake water with which we had become accustomed to were
notably absent. In their place were strong Easterlies and white caps
just beyond the cove. Mind you this is a shallow and relatively small
lake – what we call in these parts a one-gallon lake. That is, it takes
at most one gallon to go from one end of the lake to the other end.
Finding white caps on Lake Somerville is like finding Jaws in your
bathtub: inconvenient at best and unexpected for sure.
Undaunted by the adversity, the usual suspects
arrived with their various hovercrafts and water toys. Lane Crampton
and family came with their Aircommander AC-3; Rudy Bonifay brought his
Hovertechniques Hover Tour 700. Mark Loch brought his black UH-10F
while Ralph DuBose brought his sort of Scat racer. A new attendee this
year, Harlan Oehlkeb, brought an Aircommander AC-4 he had recently
purchased off of Ebay. Mark, my neighbor brought along his nifty UH
model R/C hovercraft while I took along the Canair 506 that I had
recently acquired. There were also a number of guests that came to see
the hovercrafts and get rides and such.
I should mention that this was a special hover-in
that was dedicated to Rob Tilton’s new Geo powered hovercraft the 15S.
This is not your father’s Geo powered hovercraft. No, it was a
4-cylinder 60” prop hotrod. Rob had worked very diligently over the
winter on his craft and we were all most eager for rides in it. To
celebrate the new arrival, we had the BBQ dinner catered and with the
help of the kind contributions from Hovercrafts of Texas and The Hover
Store, we hired an Austin band, The People’s Choice, for the evening’s
entertainment. Well, the food shows up and the band shows up. Lets see,
what is missing?
Two months before the hover-in Rob and I discussed
his progress on his hovercraft. He said time was short and he may not
get the craft painted quite the way he would want to before the hover-in
but he would do a quick paint job and come. Six weeks before the
hover-in he said, “well it is close but I can make it.” A month before
the big day I received an email saying, “man, not much time left.”
Three weeks before the hover-in he says “I just have a few things to
finish….” Ok, it is 9am on Saturday and most everyone is there. I call
Rob on the cell phone: “Rob, where are you?” He says he is on his way.
Great!!!
Rob lives in Austin, Texas which is about 50
minutes from Lake Somerville. He typically commutes from his house to
the lake in the HMS Doubtful, his trusty white mini-pickup truck. I
wait and wait and with the passage of time I fear the worst. The
possible headlines go by in my head: “Doubtful swamped by neighbor’s
yard sprinkler as it drove by -all hands lost”; Flying squirrel sinks
Doubtful - large loss of life feared.” But I should have had more
faith as soon enough the familiar shape of Doubtful sails into sight
with Capt. Rob at the helm. But, wait, what is that being towed – oh
my! – That looks like a water plow. As Capt. Rob docks in between the
rest of the cars by the camping area, he immediately starts explaining
about not having time to finish his hovercraft because of his work, his
family, his house, he had to help an old lady cross the road – twice
(turned out she did not want to cross the first time and was pretty
mad), his gerbil ate the paint brush, his sock drawer was a mess…. What
can you say in such a situation? Well, it is a universal truth,
hovercrafts take longer to finish than you would ever imagine. I won’t
mention that I was also supposed to have my UH-18sp finished but that is
another matter.
In spite of the wind, some folks went out on the
lake for a spin. Rob departed the Doubtful and took his water plow out
for a short while but returned reporting the water was pretty rough.
The rest of us did what we normally do, fix hovercrafts and especially
talk about fixing hovercrafts. We can talk an excellent fix! For
example, the AC-4 was not performing properly so some present launched
into a lengthy discussion and more than one theoretical dissertation was
heard on what major changes to make. Neither the motor nor the hull was
spared a full and major redesign. After all had been discussed and
debated fully and in great detail, the good Dr. DuBose noted that the
fan was installed backwards and everyone just kind of faded nonchalantly
away.
In due course it was time for the band to go on
stage and we all retired to the air-conditioned pavilion to listen to
music. The People’s Choice were quite good and everyone enjoyed the
music. Lane and his wife Rhonda took to the floor for a dance after
which we all dug into the BBQ and stuffed ourselves. After dinner the
wind had died down considerably and a number of the folks took to the
water. All the band members wanted rides and Lane and Rudy kept busy
taking the 12 of them in and out on rides. They clearly enjoyed the
rides.
After dark those camping retired to their tents
including Lane and Rob. Lane was particularly smug all day due to his
new invention – “The Crampton Tentcooler”. This was a tent air
conditioner made with a small radiator through which ice water stored in
an ice chest was pumped. A small fan blew air across the radiator
thereby cooling the air in the tent. In truth, it worked quite well –
for about two hours. Then the ice water lost its enthusiasm and Lane
joined the rest of the happy campers enjoying all the benefits of the
fine Texas summer weather….
Meanwhile back at the Tilton’s tent, Rob had
settled in for a long summers snooze with visions of finished
hovercrafts floating through his head. However, this year the
campgrounds were also being shared with a group of families that had
gathered at the state park to celebrate one thing or another. While the
park rules prohibit alcohol, it seems that reading was not the group’s
strong point and many of them were having a good time. Having got off
to an early start, the group was in fine form by bedtime. One gentleman
in particular apparently had a very good time. It appears that during
the night he, emboldened by his consumption of a beverage or two,
decided to take up a life of piracy and boarded the Doubtful while the
honorable captain was resting ashore. The pirate having taken over the
Doubtful promptly decided to rest on his laurels and passed out in the
truck bed.
It was an ill wind that blew in the morning for
sure. Captain Rob awoke to see the Doubtful in hostile hands with the
tail pipe pointed menacingly at his tent ready at any moment to send a
devastating cloud into his quarters. The Captain quickly assessed the
situation and mustered all his crew together. Finding he had no crew,
he shanghaied a somewhat drowsy Lane and pressed him into service. The
two armed themselves with the deadly weapons at hand. Lane chose a
nasty looking breakfast burrito while Rob selected a sharp Pop Tart.
The two quickly boarded the Doubtful and the fog of war soon descended.
The battle appeared to ebb and flow a number of
times. At one particularly bleak point in the battle Captain Rob jumped
up on the quarterdeck and yelled encouragement to Lane. His words are
somewhat in dispute with some saying he yelled, “be British” while Lane
reports he said “every man for himself”. Whatever the truth of the
matter, with a powerful swish of the Pop Tart through the air, Rob
jumped back into the fray and the two fearlessly battled on.
What with all the commotion and all, the pirate
finally woke up, made what passed for apologetic sounds although the
sounds might have been unrelated to an apology or any other words, and
promptly stumbled ashore. The Doubtful was once again in friendly hands
and the Captain and his erstwhile mate went ashore and finished
breakfast.
The rest of Sunday was uneventful and the wind of
the prior day had abated allowing those that wanted to hover or fish the
opportunity to do so. By noon or so most of the hovercrafts were loaded
on the trailers and the hover-in officially came to an end. Next year I
think we will reserve all ten camping spots by the cove and eliminate
the opportunity for an honest person to turn to a life of piracy.
Till next year, happy hovering!
Howard
HCA #5959
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