Friday at work was torturous. Hot, sunny, very little wind, very blue skies and my boat hooked up to my truck out in the parking lot. Makes for a very long day at work knowing what I’ll be doing at the end of the day.
The evening started off with Sandy, Imhof and myself hitting the bay before the crowd showed up for some good water and some good footing… I started of the night with some laps around the bay. Started off with a run nearly all the way around the bay and then a second run 3/4 of the way around the bay again before finally losing my grip on the handle. Here’s a shot from my one…
Laps around the bay at 40 MPH are nice… very nice in glass water!
Sandy was up next and pretty much did what I was doing… laps around the bay. She started off with a good run and then went out on the whip and was pretty much thrown into a tumble turn before she recovered to foot away.
Sandy’s run around the bay started off nice…
and then she was thrown into a tumble turn…
Imhof was up next. He did some shoe skiing. Here’s a picture of one of his starts, but mainly it is a cool shot of the blue sky.
Awesome picture of the skyline… Imhof is doing a deep water shoe ski start.
And then we went to pick up most of the rest of the crew at the dock. Paul, Joey and Kirk were waiting for us. A couple runs later we picked up Ronée as well and now we had a full boat. And then we did a whole lot of surfing.
Kirk watched Paul go and then gave surfing his first try. Being a pretty experienced wake boarder, he popped right up and soon was throwing the rope back to the boat to really surf.
Kirk tossing the rope to the boat so he can really surf.
Joey also hit the water on the surf board that night as well. And with the number of people in the boat, we had a nice wave to surf on.
We did find out the riding on the back of the boat does have it’s hazards… when you legs are dangling over the back of the boat resting on the ski platform, they are right where they can get hit with the surf board if it goes flying. Sandy learned this the hard way. We also learned the board can draw blood.
Sandy nursing her wound from watching wake surfing.
The minor flesh wound didn’t stop Sandy from re-learning how to surf. She said she had tried it a couple years ago, but hadn’t touched a board since. She was quickly up on top of the water.
Sandy getting up on the board
Sandy getting her surfing feet
She did fall a couple times and that is entertaining too!
Even she was having fun hitting the water in this picture… look at that smile!
Then Ronée took her turn on the board. She’d been out surfing last week and with all the people in the boat, she was able to quickly throw the rope to the boat and do some real surfing!
Ronée did some ropeless surfing!
But would occasionally need the rope back!
And we were sometimes just a second late with the rope!
It wasn’t all surfing though… well really it was, but those that were watching the surfing were having a lot of fun too. We had some ice cold beer on board…
Paul, Ronée and Sandy enjoying a beer on the back of the boat
Ronée and Sandy posing for the camera… this could be an ad for Miller Chill
Imhof took the water next. For a little guy, he managed to make a big splash when he hit the water. I had to be on my toes with the camera to keep it mostly dry.
Here he’s surfing and not really using the rope
Imhof on the board with Ronée and Sandy cheering him on!
And here he is making a big splash!
Then Paul took another turn on the board. He does the start a lot different from everybody else. Everyone else lays their feet on the board, rope comes tight as boat starts to move, board pops up on edge and then the boat takes off. Paul on the other hand just kind of stands on the board with the board under water, tells the boat to go and magically pops up out of the water. Here’s a picture of this in action…
Paul doing is unique start!
And here’s proof that Paul his human and does fall occasionally.
Paul’s asking for the rope back!
And gets it just in time!
Paul demonstrating that he doesn’t need a rope to get up on the surf board behind the boat.
Then I took to the board again. Surprisingly, when I’m not in the boat, the wake to surf on just isn’t as big, but I finally did manage to get comfortable enough to toss the rope to the boat.
Finally, surfing without a rope!
We did hire a helicopter to follow us around and they managed to get a few cool pictures of me!
Another picture from the helicopter!
In reality, Paul just held the camera in a precarious position and took some really good pictures…
Then we have what it the coolest group photo from the night… Everybody but me (because I’m in the water) managed to get in this picture taken using the mirror.
From left to right… Kirk, Paul, Imhof, Joey, Ronée and Sandy
All three of us knew I was about to take a picture, but only two of us decided to actually smile and look at the camera…
not sure what Ronée was doing?
Kirk doing his “I’m a serious boat driver” look
Then the night came to a close as the sun finished setting. We managed to get a cool picture of the Madison skyline…
The State Capitol overlooking Lake Monona
And then as we headed back to the dock to end the evening on the water, I snapped this picture of the sunset.
Lake Monona Sunset
That wasn’t the end of the night though… I dropped off the boat at the house as others did there thing… about 945 I met up with Sandy, Ronée, Paul and Joey at the Stadium Bar for some food and beverages. Paul and Joey had finished their v-ball game while the rest of us were just plain hungry. Sandy and Ronée had ordered some sort of chicken pesto pizza while I ordered a side of cheese curds to share. The curds arrived we all ate them. Then the pizza came and the ladies did a nice job on it, nearly finishing the 16 inch pizza… they did have some help from Paul who stopped by to chat. I did try it, ate one tiny slice, and it was OK, but I think I like marinara sauce on my pizza. A couple drinks later and we all were headed home to make our 7am practice on Saturday morning.
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