On Saturday, we went sailing on Horsetooth Reservoir!
Our friend (and Whiskey’s vet) Rachel Erickson kindly invited Scott, GJ, and me to sail on her father John Erickson’s boat Besame Mucho. I can’t quite remember all my childhood boat rides on the Elbe River, Germany, but this was probably the first time I’ve gone sailing.
It was amazing and super fun! This was not only due to being on a sailboat on a gorgeous day in the beautiful setting of the Horsetooth Reservoir in the Rocky Mountains Foothills, but mainly because of the very fun, kind and generous company of John, Charleen Wallen, Rachel, her sister Anna Erickson and baby Kali, whose first sailboat ride this was, and sweet dog Queenie (mostly chilling in the cabin).
GJ got to steer most of the time… until he had to rescue my drink in its Wilbur’s koozie (a local addition to my koozie collection). It was an even more dramatic water rescue than it looks in the video since we had been heading away from the floating can (yay, koozies!) and John and GJ had to turn the boat around and then sail it to the exact spot where my drink was bobbing on the waves. Of course, the turning around through the wind (“going about” or “tacking”) was always exciting as the front sail gets flipped from one side to the other.
Sailing under anchor flag, Wyoming flags and Tibetan prayer flags added a special nuance to the outing.
As you can see in the video, John, Charleen and GJ went out one more time without us. Somebody had to get the BBQ ready…
Of course, it was a challenge to cut all the footage down to only one minute – and I’m sad that I couldn’t include more of the people and the views in this version. But for the family at least, I plan to put together a longer version soon.
In a fitting coincidence, Scott and I got our own, much smaller and sail-less, boat yesterday and will take it on its maiden voyage today! This time, Whiskey will get to go as well. Ahoi!
Again, a huge thank you to John and Charleen for taking us along on this fantastic day out!
The song in this video is called “Wheels” and was written and performed by Jason Shaw, who made this song available via the CC BY 3.0 license. Thank you, Jason, for all your great instrumental songs!
