The Great Salt Race 3

This past week has again been an eventful one. Progress has been made in two major area which I'll outline below.

Paddle Prep

This past week has been a big one for paddle preparations. Putting in at both Willard bay and Pine-view reservoir, the paddle practice count now stands at 22 miles. The weather has not been very cooperative with a lot of wind and waves, but I figure prepping under these conditions probably is a good thing so we're ready for anything. The goal for paddle practice is to hit 600 miles before the actual event in August, so here's hoping that the weather brightens up a bit.

This weekend will be the first endurance test on the Great Salt lake. Our route will take us from the northern tip of Antelope Island to the northern tip of  Fremont Island and back which will log another 20+ miles to our paddle count. It will be a good gauge of what it will take to set and keep rhythm and how to regulate calorie intakes to keep up with the stroke count. It'll be a fun and very telling weekend.

Boat Build

 Significant progress has also been made on the building of our Canoe. What once was two blank sheets of particle board have now been transformed into a serviceable Strong Back which is the table on which a canoe is built. The strong back is critical not only in that it holds the work up, but it is also how you determine your center lines and how you set up your canoe forms. What all this means is that if you have a crooked strong back you'll have an equally crooked canoe...not good. So, much time has been spent prepping, squaring, and truing up and now the foundation has been laid!

The materials for the canoe itself are scheduled to arrive this coming Monday which will be a very very exiting day. With the Strong back securely in place, once the material arrives canoe building will begin in full! 

Once again I want to give a shout out to my employer - Marketstar without whom this build would not be possible. Thank You!

To any one interested in learning more about a company who is this invested in helping their employee realize their dreams follow the link below. you'll be glad you did.


https://www.marketstar.com/

A Bonus Short Story

As I have been working on the Strong Back construction, I found myself thinking a lot about my Grandfather. Among many other admirable qualities my Grandpa was an extremely gifted woodworker. He built many gorgeous furniture items and was always very generous with his talents in helping others and allowing people to use his impressive array of tools. 

Once when I was about 12 or 13 years old, I was spending a week at my Grandparents house and rather than just lounging around all week my Grandfather asked if I'd be interested in building something out in the wood shop. To this point I hadn't really had any woodworking interest, but I had really been wanting a bookshelf/nightstand for my room and I asked if that was something we could make. He agreed and we set off for the hardware store. Now I don't know what I expecting, but I distinctly remember thinking that my Grandfather had misunderstood what I had described because when we checked out all we had was a single piece of particle board and a few screws. In my 12 year old brain I just couldn't figure how this could ever become what I had envisioned. With a deep patience and a studied hand my Grandfather reached beyond my limited vision and we began making cut after cut until a new bookshelf gradually began to form.  When we completed the project I had learned many valuable wood working techniques, but the most valuable lesson I took away from that amazing week was the understanding that with patience, practice, vision and a bit of skill a seemingly unorganized, unrelated pile of materials can be transformed into something quite beautiful.

The shelf pictured above is the shelf built with my Grandfather. It has served many purposes over the years and has now found a permanent home in my wood shop serving not only as a make shift miter saw table, but as a constant reminder of the lessons I was blessed to learn from such an amazing man!