Be Brave Not Safe

Last week, Cindy and I acquired a number of horses.

260 to be exact.

They came packaged in the form of 2 Seadoos, each powered by 130 horse engines.

So far we’ve had about 8 hours of running them on the lake.

The result: my shoulders are killing me from the vicious beating I’ve given mine over the last few days. Advil only helps a little 🙂

But oh, what fun. Below is a picture of my Mom and I on mine, over Memorial Day Weekend.

Cindy has the identical twin…

As you might imagine, horses take a lot of hay (in this case gasoline). Especially when ridden for long periods of time with the throttle to the handle; achieving a top speed of 56 mph (so far). They say ours will “approach” 60 when fully broken in.

Our new friends and neighbors have one that will do 75 mph. We are more than fine with ours 🙂

What we didn’t previously realize is the HUGE difference in the price of gas at a marina vs. what can be acquired at the local roadside filling station. In our case, a difference of 85 cents per gallon.

Consider the following:

• Since each of our units take almost 16 gallons of gas we will pay over $27 more at a marina than if we filled them with fuel purchased at a gas station.
• In less than a week we’ve had to fill them 3 times which “would have” amounted to an excess fuel charge of around $80.

The only “trouble” (or inconvenience) involves buying a few extra 5-gallon gas tanks (costing around $13 apiece at Walmart), filling them and carting them home for the horses.

Given the above, we more than paid for the extra fuel tanks at around 1.5 refills, and are now running “in the black.”

That said, it isn’t that we will never fill up at a marina. We are on a large lake (connected to other bodies of water) and could easily find ourselves so far from homeport, and want to remain out there, that we’d naturally have to take advantage of the “convenience factor” of one of the many marinas.

However, for normal, planned refills we shall take the do-it-yourself approach.

Well, the horses are again kicking at the barn door. Cindy and I will take them out shortly for a picnic somewhere on the lake.

Happy (belated) Memorial Day

p.s. – A very, very special THANK YOU goes out to those who gave the ultimate sacrifice (their very lives) resulting in the MANY freedoms that we now enjoy in our country. Let’s NOT take that for granted. Instead, let’s get out there and DO SOMETHING!