We pioneered a new luge run in the neighborhood in the wake of the freak March thundersleet storm.
Abby got it into her head several months ago that she wanted to go to the beach. I think she heard Gina and me talking about our past adventures in the Redneck Riviera. Then we were talking one night in early June about taking a summer vacation and I asked Abby her thoughts on the matter. “I’d like to go to the beach, IF SOMEONE WOULD TAKE ME (emphasis hers),” she replied testily. Since she generally gets her way, we started making plans to drive to Destin, Fla. We knew it was short notice and it might be hard to find a decent place to stay, but Gina called the condo in Miramar Beach where we had stayed five years ago and a room was available. It being such short notice they agreed to give us the room at a slight discount from the normal rate. You can never tell if Abby is going to like something that is obviously fun to the rest of the world, so we were prepared to see her balk at going into the ocean. But she ran right in and acted like it was the greatest thing in the world.
The surf was up pretty decently (the red flags were out) and on our second day we went and bought a couple of wave boards and Abby jumped on hers and started belly surfing like she’d been doing it her whole life.
I went on a crazed hunt for a sled on Tuesday in anticipation of the epic snowmageddon headed our way. This is not an exaggeration, I called every sled purveyor in Central Arkansas, we’re talking Little Rock, Conway, Cabot, Bryant, Benton, East End, etc. No joy anywhere. I finally came across Hum’s Hardware in North Little Rock and they had one sled left and they agreed to hold it for 20 minutes. I made it there in exactly 20 minutes and now I’m able to present you with these fine clips of the only thing a snowstorm is good for.
Abby’s school put on its end-of-the-year program last week. They practiced for about three months for thing and it went off with just a few hitches. It was Abby’s debut performance in front of an audience. All the rags gave her a good review.
… like an old man trying to send back soup in a deli.
I had been to Longpool Falls in Pope County north of Russellville back in January, but I didn’t get any photos worth looking at. So when a huge deluge hit that part of the state on Friday I decided to go back and see it when it had something to show. When I got up at 7:30 a.m. Saturday the rain had made it to Little Rock, but it was still raining in Pope County. I drove through torrential rain all the way there and the rain the didn’t stop. The top photo is a two-frame panorama of Longpool Falls and the ravine downstream.
The river was angry that day my friends — like an old man trying to send back soup in a deli.
One of the guys on the Yampa float trip shot some video of some of the boats running Warm Springs Rapid. As is generally the case, the video and the pictures don’t do this place justice. It doesn’t look like a whole lot on film, but that big hole was scary. I just watched the video again and it looks scary as hell to me. Consider that the boat it flipped was 16 feet long and God knows how heavy. Also note the hail coming down. Dave Rich of Fairbanks, Alaska, shot the video with his Fuji E-900 digital camera. The video is used here with his permission.
The next clip is my Uncle Dale. It doesn’t even look like he’s trying and he missed the hole completely.
That big hole out there is named Maytag after the washing machine company. The river was running 23,000 cfs, a 20-year high.