I personally like hearing stories of when other people were growing up and there parents would take the boat out . Or when was the first time you actually got bit by the boat bug and you thought to yourself "I want one of those !" Then comes the time when you hit a lake or a part of the river that you never want to leave .

When I was growing up , my dad had a green metal flake outboard  17-18'er or so and it had this bitchen mural on the front of a beach with a wave coming in and two palm trees on either side and in the sand closer to you there was an old wooden sign that read "franks land" . Now my fathers name is not frank , thats just the way it came but I always thought to myself how fockin cool and calming and easy going that mural made me feel .

My dad would take me out every weekend of every summer for like 5 years and most of the time we would go to silverwood lake and in order to get in early , you had to be waiting on the side of the road at like 2:30 - 3:00 otherwise it would be full and you'd be on the side of the road till like noon . I dont know how many times I woke up in my dads 70's ford pick up alone waiting for him to come back so he could tell me how many people were in front of us . We did alot of hangin out there , a little fishing and a few hot laps as fast as the old 125 merc egg beater would take us .  Just being there in my shorts and the sun on my back was the coolest thing on earth .

My first boat was a jet boat and the first place I took it was silverwood and I was out there on the side of the raod at 2:30 waiting for my turn and even though the starter went out around 10:00 on my way back from the crappers I still had a blast . When I was on the ramp some kid comes up to me and asked me if I need help his dad would help me . That man should be the spokesperson for jet boating and the jet boating community . Super helpful and offered me everything and asked for nothing in return .

I have only gone to silverwood a handfull of times with my boat and everytime it is spectacular there and it has always been a great experience and I have always run into great people there. Well I done cryin    . Where's your favorite place . Lurkers , that means you . 

-beerjet-

Well, my involvement goes back to before I was born. I know there are family members reading this and they can vouch for some of these stories.....

It all begins with the Wriedt Stinger. This boat was bought new in '69 by a close friend of my cousin's grandfather. His mother?s family got hooked and bought the boat from him that next summer.

Later my aunt and uncle exposed my parents to the boat bug and soon later my dad purchased a Tahiti Tiger (unknown year).... This boat was later sold to a neighbor of ours in Apple Valley after we had purchased a 'Strange Boat' (Eliminator hull copy). This boat was purchased in a partnership with my dad's other brother and was later signed over to my dads brother when we moved to Colorado since we wouldn?t be local to it anymore. I was about 16 at the time and from what I figured, my boating days were over. But from what I have been told. I was basically born with a life vest on. My parents took me to riverland (parker) when I was 2 weeks old.... and going out there every summer for years.

It wasn?t until the summer of '06 my cousin Kyle and now roommate invited me out to Havasu. I had not been out there in 15 years other then to help my grandfather move back to California after my grandmother passed away and that was a very short turn-around trip. I was surprised that Kyle still had the good ol' wriedt stinger. I guess it had been sold back n forth within the family and he had finally got it back. I really just thought it was going to be a trip where I would go out to reminisce and go home and be over it. We got out there at midnight on a Friday night and drank till 6am sharing stories of us growing up on the river. We got on the water that Saturday morning at 7am and blasted out to the middle of the lake and he cut the motor. Kyle turned to me and said "this is the best part", then jumped in the lake. Words cannot describe the feeling of jumping into the lake when its over 100F at 7am. There?s that first 2 feet that luke warm, then you hit that blast of cold water under the surface. At that point, I had realized what I was missing in life and I was hooked again. I told Kyle at that point I knew it and that it was my goal to get a boat once again.

At home I had 3 VW's. Within the next couple of weeks, I sold them all. I was over wrenching on cars and now my love is all for boats.

So since that trip, Kyle has moved in and we decided to restore the boat that started it all. It's coming along quite well but we have hit a roadblock (funds for gel coat) and we are nervous that we aren?t going to have it completed for this summer. I don?t think I can go a summer with no boat while I hear about all of you having great times. I hope it all comes together in the end.

My future goal is to get a boat for myself. Currently with Kyle's boat in the garage, I don?t have anywhere to store a project of my own, plus I don?t need 2 projects if I cant afford to finish the first one. The motivation is there, just not the money.

I have been telling myself to go back up to Apple Valley and see if my neighbor still has our old Tahiti Tiger. When he bought the boat, he modded the hell out of the original olds that was in it and blew it the first time he took it out. When we moved, it was still sitting on the side of his house untouched.

That would be cool to buy that boat and Kyle and I would be carrying on the torch that started it all.

My dad had this 16' Glaspar outboard with a 65 horse Merc, "shut up damnit yer scaring the fish away"... then his buddy came down for the weekend and we hopped in his (long time ago???) jet boat that did 70 mph. They didn't tell me it did 70 mph in the air and 60 mph in the water and 70 mph in the air and 60 mph in the water and 70... you get the idea, I didn't know whether I was going to die or crap my pants or both (I was a little young). On retrospect, it might have been a flat bottom V-Drive, 'cause I've never ridden in a boat like that rough ridin' piece of crap since...
Otherwise, I've got friends in low places that have jet boats, places like... ah crap, I think the beers talkin' again.

my dad worked a lot when i was a kid. He did get two weeks off each year though and we always went to Black Meadows Landing campground on Lake Havasu. We had the same spot in the middle of the campground across from the lagoon, right next to the ice house every year. I loved that place because it had an arcade and a store that sold ice cream, which was the most important things in my world besides begging all day long to drive my parent's 18-foot Rogers Cyclone.
Back then, everyone would rent a boat slip and leave their jet boats and flat bottoms in the slips at night and we used to stroll the docks checking out the bitchin' metal flake gel coats and tuck n' roll upholstery. It was kick ass 20 foot or shorter glass as far as the eye could see and every time a boat fired up, you could hear it across the campground because everyone had a loud exhaust. We spent our days on the water at this cove on the california side of the lake, across from the campground, that someone had made their own floating dock at. The cove was perfect for dropping off skiers and one one side of it, there as a 10-foot high rock ledge to jump off of. Those were the days. We spent hours in the water and we'd take one day to drive all the way to London Bridge to shoot the gun as the shooting gallery and buy more ice cream. We used to park the boat under the bridge, eating lunch in the shade while the birds circled overhead. My dad used to slalom ski all the way back to the campground while mom towed him. OUr boat wasn't fast but it seemed like it to a kid like me. Man those really were the days.

My buddy has a 74 rogers that is completly redone and the entry on it isn't as deep as that one is . Interesting .

-beerjet-

Roger had a bunch of different models. 18-footer with the deep entry was called the Cyclone. The 18-foot with the shallow entry was called a Super Cyclone and had the same flat deck. The Super Cyclone shared the same bottom as the Bonneville, which had a bubble deck. Then there was the Bonneville TR which was 19-feet long and had dropped outer chines to make it stable at high speeds. Fastest I've ever been in a Cyclone was 70 mph and slowing down was pretty hairy. I've driven the Super Cyclone and Bonneville hulls up to abou 95 mph and they ride pretty good as long as the water is smooth. The Bonneville TR handles high speed the best. I ran mine to a best of 116 mph at the NJBA drags a few years ago. My family has owned one of each. My parents still have a Super Cyclone.

They are great boats.

Got any pics of that project?

So the shallow entry with the bubble deck is a bonneville .

Correct.