Sailing Adventure Story 1

I wish I could say that this was going to be some kind of pirating adventure with lots of booty and rum. But, there was neither, only a little bit of beer and the sweet taste of victory. I have been Racing in a C&C 35 sailboat every Wednesday for the past two summers.

There she is...The 2nd Chance! (I don't how we got this picture)

We had a lot to learn last summer. And this summer most of the crew came back (Many of us were recruited from the Martial Arts School I attend and where the owner of the boat is a Black Belt!) Well, we have learned and yesterday we came in FIRST! I guess now when asked the question if we are more Pirate or Ninja we need to say we are getting closer to pirate.
Here is a link to the results page if you don't believe me...RESULTS! We are in class three (I bet this link won't work next week and if any body cares please tell me to update it because I will probably forget.)

I added this 'cause we be a little more pirate now!
(and because it is from the church of th flying spaghetti monster, click on it to learn more!)

Family Kayaking

This past weekend I celebrated my Sister and my fathers Birthdays. My Father wanted his children to spend the day together so rented kayaks for all of us to play in. My sister has been out traveling the world for the past few years and we have not seen much of her much less celebrated her birthday! (Look for link on the side to my see what my sister has been doing!)



We started out at Narrow River Kayak in RI and headed to Narragansett Beach. Avoiding hazards along the way. Unfortunatly, Thomas could not avoid my sister's paddle and got smacked across the nose.







This is my sister and Thomas, Thomas got her back for the nose whacking by putting her in the bow as they went out to explore and crash through the waves.

Here I am playing in the surf.

And this had to go in because it was a cool shot of my brother also playing in the surf.We all had a good time!

With out much more to say no one needed to go to the hospital and we all came back with a little more than some sun and salt exposure.
Click here for some more pictures

July Vacation in the Finger Lakes

When summer starts I really look forward to a few things. First is the time to sail whenever and where ever possible (I will talk about that in future postings). Next is visiting the Finger Lakes (what I mostly want to talk about now). And since giving up Television over a year ago now ( I am proud to say that I have only watched television about 5 or 6 hours all year and that was either in hotels or checking out coverage on things like the Live Earth Concert!) is the opportunity to read.

I have a great affection for the Finger Lakes as I have spent most of my life around them and a whole lot of time on them. Every year since Marika and I moved to the Nutmeg State we have had made sure to get back to Seneca Falls and spend sometime in the Huntington Family (Marika's mother's family) Cottage on Cayuga Lake.
We drove out on Friday Night and were in the cottage that night for 8 days of enjoying the Marika's Family and Enjoying what the Finger Lakes have to offer.

The First Morning on the Lake...














I love to wake up to the gentle sound of water washing over the rocks and the sun coming up over the water.

We of course get plenty of relaxing in...
This is Marika and a not so tired Coralee enjoying the serenity of the cottage and Cayuga Lake.

We did work to wear out our pup though visiting Taughannouck Falls State Park. We hiked up the trail in and out of the water bringing our puppy back to this park for the second time.

This is a filthy puppy at the end of the trail.

I try to bring the pup with us anywhere I can we also brought her to play with my in-laws dog and spent time bringing her in and out of the lake trying to make her believe that swimming really is fun. We also brought her along with us on our visits to the Seneca Lake Wineries.

We visited 4 wineries and brought home 3 cases of wine.

This is a picture looking out at Seneca lake from Fox Run Winery

Here are the winery we visited and if you want to see more check out their sites.

White Springs is a New Winery Near Geneva I liked their Chardonnay not a normal selection for me.
Fox Run has a wonderful red wine called Sable.

Four Chimneys is an organic winery what makes a really interesting Blueberry wine.
Fulkersons is one of our favorites for wines like Diamond and Red Zepplin.




At the end of the week I heard of a interesting exhibition traveling the canals of NY involving a

recreated canal schooner. I took a tour and learned some interesting things about the commerce of the time and got to see this 88 foot schooner. Unfortunately, I did not see it under sail but here is a picture from the web. Click on it learn more about the Lois McClure.

After a sometimes busy and sometimes relaxing week; where I got some time to read, a couple naps and a whole lot a family visiting; we hit the road for our trip back to CT all the while trying to tune into the Live Earth Concert that Marika's Sister was at in Giant Stadium. We got home from our vacation like every vacation exhausted.

This Coralee ready for bed. She is still sleeping most of Monday!

The End of the Beginning

Well, here are the results of the test. I think that I will be continuing to update this blog at least as long as my summer break continues. I am now back from vacation in the Finger Lakes and I am making a new entry.
I have learned about something that is really too much fun and may become a source of random entertainment on this Blog and that is I can post for free (well, I pay for unlimited text and picture messaging) from my cell phone. I could have fun with that. With that said soon I will be updating things from my vacation and putting up some pictures.
I feel the need to make a closing remark since this is the end of the beginning. I have recently been experiencing all of the (useless, entertaining, informational, (you pick the word and fill it in)) variety of websites on the WWW and I am not sure that this blog will ever compete. Maybe, I can hope to become somewhat of an Internet star, but I think that chances of that are quite slim and I am not entirely sure what the purpose would be anyways. But at least this site will be a source of information about a relatively normal middle school science teacher and his life. I will be curious to see how this site evolves. Hope that you will be entertained, and informed with all of the variety of (useless?) information that I post.
Enjoy!