Cool as ice

Sometimes my job is really cool. There are times when I am on an assignment, and I marvel at the fact that I actually get paid to do this stuff. Friday night I was at work at the paper and a guy called to say he and the rest of the Gull Lake Ice Yacht Club would be having races Saturday and Sunday out on the lake for the first time in 8 years. I vaguely knew what ice yachting was, and it sounded like it could be cool, so I called the guy back for more info. When he promised to give me a ride in his boat, I was sold, even though I wasn't supposed to be working Saturday. So the next morning I layered up, put on my warmest socks, and ventured out onto the ice. Now, as you know from my previous post, I am totally done with winter, but apparently winter isn't done with me. It was about 12 degrees, and the wind was blowing somewhere around 15 miles an hour, which put the wind chill at about -5. These boat guys didn't seem to care, they were bundled up from head to toe, then they hunkered down in these tiny sailboats with runners on the bottom and zipped along the ice at about 60 miles an hour. Click here for a photo gallery of pics from the races. Randy, the very nice guy who called the paper, had just finished telling me and the reporter all about all these injuries he'd had and how people have drowned doing this, when he said, "Okay, who's going first?" To his credit, he did not push the boat to 60, and we didn't even come close to leaning over onto one runner like some of the racers, which was probably good, since I was holding a brand-new, corporately purchased HD video camera. But it was REALLY cool. And when would I ever have gotten the chance to do something like that? That's why I like my job. It opens doors, gives me a glimpse into the lives of people I would otherwise never know, and a chance to do things like go speeding across the ice on a cold (but sunny!) March morning in Michigan. Here's a little clip of my ride:




And if you want more, here is the video I put together for Mlive.com, the Kalamazoo Gazette's website.

Ice Yachting on Gull Lake