The Tickfaw 200 Y'ALL!

[redhotsommer]

So…how often does a great adventure emanate from a single text message? This one certainly did. I actually laughed in a somewhat scoffing manner when I received said text from one Bob Zubik back in March. “Check it out,” I said to my wife, “BZ wants me to go on a Poker Run in Louisiana in May.” To her credit, she responded “I think you should go.” Sometimes I need that little extra push to get me to leave my everyday life, and the more I thought about it, the more plausible it seemed…so after a week or so, I called him up and said I was IN. Our crew went through a couple fluctuations, with people saying yes and backing out, or really wanting to go but not being able to pull it off, but finally settled on BZ, Dennis (Obnoxus), myself (redhotsommer), and, finally, after realizing she still had remaining personal days left for this school year, my lovely wife Michelle.

Logistics were handled, hotel was booked, food and drinks packed and ready, and at 4am on Thursday May 4th, we were rolling south in Den’s dually pulling BZ’s 42 Fountain. It’s always good when a trip like this is uneventful, and this one was exactly such. 14-1/2 hours (and a whole lot of 93 octane) later, we pulled into Hammond, LA and immediately began to sweat. Heat and humidity usually don’t occur until late June or July for us in the Chicago area, and stepping out of the air conditioned truck into 91 degrees and 100 percent humidity was quite the shock to our winter-adjusted systems. We gassed up the boat and dragged it over to the Blood River Landing, where we would leave it for the night and launch in the a.m. With Dennis at the wheel, we pulled into a grassy area to park parallel to a couple other boats…he went to swing around the back of the other trailers and came to an abrupt stop…which was a REALLY good thing, since another 30 feet would have put us into the swamp. When our heart rates finally slowed, we dropped the trailer and headed over to the Funhouse, where we met some of our gracious hosts and organizers, bought three card hands, and had some cocktails to celebrate our long drive. The Funhouse at Blood River Landing is a really cool bar that only opens to the public a couple times per year. The band was excellent, the drinks satisfactory, and we met about 50 new friends ready to have a good time running boats. Then we hit the sack early in anticipation of a big day on the morrow.