Monday, May 23, 2011

20 Hours In The Truck

Dave writes...

We are driving home from the Red River in Shreveport, LA after the 4th FLW Tour Major. I finished 34th in this one, which is good considering I was in 103rd after day one. I’m very happy with the decisions I made on day two and that I got most of my bites into the boat. I was throwing a Rattling Rap and a Clackin Rap all day and working them very fast and erratically. Sometimes those treble hooks allow the fish to get away, it scared me to death every time I got a bite, lol, but it all worked out thank God. I’m now in 10th in the Angler of the Year race with only two tournaments to go. I can’t wait til the next two either; Kentucky and Pickwick Lakes are two of my favorite places to fish in the country. I’m planning on two top tens to close the year.

The whole family is together in the Suburban for our 20 hour drive back home, Anne’s driving for a while. It is so nice to all be together in one truck again, we left from home (Erie, PA) with both the dually and Suburban, but we decided to leave the diesel and 5th wheel down south to save a little money. I’ll be going to the next event on the Potomac River, MD alone and then picking everyone up after that to head south again. This is the start of the busiest part of the season; it’s getting crazy, lots and lots of miles.

We put the dually and camper in storage for about three weeks and will be picking them up on the way to our campground on Kentucky Lake. The gas prices are making it so expensive to travel with two trucks, but we have to do it that way, it’s really the best way to do it. We are getting great gas mileage at least, way better than we did with the Fords three years ago, and believe me after the season’s over it makes a huge difference in our annual expenses.

Someday I need to figure out exactly how much time we actually spend in our vehicles, it would probably surprise even me. We really like these trucks, this is only our second year driving the new Chevys and Anne and I both couldn’t be happier. The seats are so comfortable and for someone who’s always hot like me I couldn’t live without the air-conditioned seats, it’s a must have. The Dually HD has that new brake system too which I just can’t say enough about. It stops like I’m not towing anything at all, it’s nuts.

We are so packed down right now, much more than normal because we had to take a lot of stuff out of the camper to bring home. We folded down the third row seats and piled everything in, no problem. We have second row captain’s chairs for Mitchell and Macy which works out perfectly for putting the dog’s crate between them. Isabella runs all over the truck like she owns it, but sometimes she needs to be put away or she will drive you crazy. We got us a high strung puppy.

Well, I’m going to straighten this seat out and take a little nap before it’s my turn to drive. I’ll talk to after the next one!

Anne writes...

Hi everybody, we're on our way home from our 10 day stay at the Red River South Marina. It got off to a rocky start when we found out our pipes must have frozen while we were home. We had to go without water for the first 3 days, which would have been OK if Dave, Macy, and Mitchell hadn't have come down with the flu, talk about a big mess.We want to put a big shout out to Barb and Bob, the owners of the Marina and one of their employees, Cowboy for fixing our water for us. They went over and beyond what they had to to help us out and we really appreciate their help.

Once all that passed we had a great time with our friends. The highlight of the tournament was when Dave came back from a rough start and finished 34th.The kids and I had fun watching the nightly cornhole tournaments. We walked to the office to get our daily slushies and rode our bikes alot. School took most of our time as we are trying to finish up the year as soon as we can, Mitchell is so smart and such a good boy most of the time. lol

The weather was absolutely beautiful. Behind our camper there was a fenced in area that had three horses. The kids and I got to feed apples to them and it was funny how they came over to investigate Isabella. I think they had something special going on between them, it was strange. On Sunday we went to the FLW Expo, the kids love riding the Chevy boat simulator. Mitchell's actually becoming quite the little boat driver. He scored the maximum amount of points in the game by clearing all the gates. I talked to Bob, the guy who runs the simulator, while the kids were in the boat. Make it a point to say hi to him if you go to one of the Expos.

It was a nice week and more convenient than normal. We were able to walk to the weigh-ins every day to watch the guys on stage. I definitely wouldn't mind going back there sometime, I just wish it wasn't so far away.

Hope you are all doing well, we'll see you down the road!