Thursday, August 18, 2011

Sailing the day away!

Getting outdoors is so rewarding and doing it as a scout leader is just that much more rewarding.  To see the boys doing something for the first time or something they normally would never do and then afterwards they talk about how much fun it is and how they want to plan another trip to do it again.  I have been posting about camping at the DCYC lately and how nice they were to let our boys use their sun fish sailboats.  They left their bathrooms and showers open for us to use.  We had the run of their campgrounds and also the basketball court which was also a big hit.  You have never experienced campout basketball until you see a bunch of kids play it with flat balls and bad shooting but that didn't slow them down one bit.

At the end of the day the club arranged for a gaggle of us adults to go out on a J105 sailboat.  This brought me back to my high school days were I was in a sailing post for about 8 months and we had a leader that let us sail his J105.  We got out from the bay and of course I had the "OMG" moment realizing all of my testing equipment is on land and I am now in a sailboat 2 hours before dinner.  I had my pod on so that made it just  that much more fun not being able to stop it or slow it down or even give myself an adjustment if I were high.  You can never let your guard down with diabetes.
In the end it all  the diabetes worked out great and the most priceless time was when the boat owner Jay Hoppenstein made my wife steer the boat and I got to be a deck hand running sheets.  My wife had come out for the day because she was interested in watching the boys sail and spending some time with her husband before she starts the school year teaching and coaching.  Jay was an awesome teacher and really made me want a sailboat.  He also teaches the adult sailing class at the club and I am putting those dates on my calendar.

The end of the 2 hour voyage and my wife was a pro with that wheel.  We did all sorts of reach, jibing, and  tacking.  Yes, we did leave adults in charge of the boys while we were out on the high seas of Lake Lewisville.  The wind was low but whenever we had the oportunity my friend Gary and I would sit on the heeling side of the boat just like the pros do.


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