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| Commodore |
Can it really be July already? It seems like we just had the spring Club opening work party. The Club is looking great. Thanks to Harbormaster Bob Hickok, his assistant Mike Gray, Bob Bodish, and all of the volunteers for their hard work. Also, thanks to Bob H. and crew for having our lower well pump replaced. We’d be lost without the pressure sprayer. We had perfect weather for Father’s Day, and many lucky Dads took advantage of the nice breeze to show off their sailing skills to their families. Who can say no to a Dad on “His” Day? Thanks to Dick Lowe and helpers for a great event. Upcoming Events:
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| Social |
We had wonderful weather and a great turnout for the Memorial Day Cookout. Jack and Karen Hale, veteran hosts for this event, pulled it all together again with the help of Tom & Carol Moore, Larry, Pauline, & Brian January, and Bob, Blayen, & Jason Glenn. Everyone who attended certainly appreciated the weather and delicious food! The Father’s Day Brunch also couldn’t have been any nicer. It is always so nice to see all the dads with their families. Dick Lowe and Harriett Gamble brought in a repeat crew from last year - Ron & Janet Gasko, Randy & Patty Beatty, and Dick’s sons’ families - Jeff & Jennifer Lowe, Christo & Tinamarie Lowe along with Dick’s beautiful 7-month old granddaughter came out to help their dad prepare the father’s day feast. Thanks Dick and crew! Be sure to be at the Club on July 4th by 5:00pm for the Pig Roast (and don’t forget your covered dish). The Club will be providing the pig roasted on a spit along with burgers and dogs. Fran and Ed Rice will be hosting the July 4th Pig Roast this year and are looking for volunteers to help with this event. If you don’t have your work credits this year, be sure to give them a call. The summer calendars are filling up fast, so don’t forget to volunteer to help out with a sailing or social event before the sailing season is over.
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| Harbormaster |
Water, Water Hope everyone is getting out and sailing...the summer is here and the water is still above normal pool. We've been busy cleaning up from downed trees (right) and fixing broken well pumps and water heaters. Just normal harbormaster stuff.
Dry Parking
Work to Do
CanMan UnCaptured That's all for now, enjoy the summer!
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| Racing |
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The next regatta is the ECSC Regatta on July 9th &10th. Regatta chairman Is Charlie Brehob. Registration closes at 10:30am Saturday the 9th. 1st Warning flag falls at 12:30pm, and the beach party begins at 6:30pm with a live band starting at 7:30pm. Sunday racing begins at 9:30am with the awards to follow after racing. Mark your calendar now and plan to participate or come and dance on our own beach.
The final races in the Spring Series are: Wednesday’s July 13th and Sunday’s July 17th. Spring Awards Party and Cookout will be Saturday, August 6th. I’m looking for someone to help plan and set up the party. If interested, let me know. The Fall Series begins on the following Wednesday and Sunday respectively. Smooth Sailing......
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| Safety & Education |
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Junior Sailing Week Rick and I wish to "thank" and "a job well done" to the following Club members for their help during the Junior Sailing Week: Katie & Evan Williams, Jim Grant, Tony Hubbard, and Ki Hickok. We had 24 junior sailors for 3 days of sailing and fun. Check out the pictures on the Club website.
Current Juniors
Tyler and Ki are training for the Junior Bay Week at Put-In-Bay in July...hard racing in open waters! Good luck guys…... Note: Picture is of a log that appears to be fixed in the lake. Note the light attached to it. It is located a couple hundred yards directly south of the round water inlet on the causeway.
ECSC Regatta
Cowan Regatta
Our Hats Are Off To…. Have a teenager that will be just staying home and playing the video games this summer? Let us help .... Junior program open to ages 13 - 18, m/f...
Calendar
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| Membership |
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Please welcome the return of Barb Drew and Tony Wright to our Club. Membership Count: 254
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| Tag Article |
John and Marsha tagged Bonnie and me to tell a story, so here it goes. We are original Michiganders before we became Hoosiers. Bonnie grew up on Lake Erie (a real beach bum) and I grew up in the Ann Arbor area which is close to the Irish Hills that has about a hundred inland lakes a little bigger than Eagle Ocean. So, I did my share of power boating and water skiing. I bought my first sailboat, a 28’ Tanzer, as a bank repo in September 1983. Sailing was going to be a new and exciting adventure for us. Lake Erie is shallow in comparison to the other Great Lakes and is noted for rapidly forming storms. We have sailed Lake Erie for the past 20-some years. Over that time, I think everything broke at least once. We also have experienced all the problems that go along with sailing. We ran aground a couple of times, ran the batteries down listening to music all day and night and then the motor wouldn’t start and no wind. We were out another time when the fog came in and didn’t know how close shore was much less how to find it. Now we have GPS and can’t get lost. One time I was motoring into the slip, hit reverse to slow the boat down, and the motor died...hit my car with the boat! We have also had some close calls due to storms...some of which we hope to never experience again.
We heard the Caribbean was nice to sail. Bonnie and I chartered a boat in Tortola. It just happened to be the winter of El Nino. The wind was so strong, with 25’ swells, that you could not see the masts on boats in front of us. We would not cruise like everyone else, but, we were determined to sail so we did. We hung on for the whole trip. Bonnie said if we survived, she was going to kill me when we got home. Over the years, we have watched races on Lake Erie and never had the desire to race...I thought it was boring. Then about four years ago, we met Joe & Barb Traub and Roger & Julie Black. Roger needed a crew, so I crewed with him on his J24. This started my racing career.
So, off to Michigan Joe and I went to pick up the boat. The marina lowered the boat down onto the trailer and away we went. The boat trailer ran pretty good. I was in the U Haul truck. Joe was following me. I saw Joe weaving all over the road...lights blinking...honking the horn. I pulled over. Joe said I lost a wheel to the trailer about a mile back the road. Just a minor inconvenience.
We really enjoy being members of the ECSC and the new friends we have met have been wonderful. We can’t believe we lived in Indy for 15 years, owned a sailboat, but just recently became a member.
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| The Lease |
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As you may or may not know, our Club leases our current land from the Indianapolis Parks Department...as it has ever since our inception in 1969. Lately, each lease covers a ten year period. All improvements at the Club (shelterhouses, docks, etc) have been paid for by our membership. For the past year and a half, our Club has been attempting to negotiate a new lease agreement with Indy Parks. Our present lease was automatically extended at the end of the last ten year period. However, the amount of the lease payment has to be negotiated. In the last ten year period, the lease amount increased each year necessitating an annual increase in the fees our members paid.
Even though our rent will go up substantially, it will not increase every year as it has in the past. This should allow for a more stable foundation upon which the Club can plan for the future and help stabilize our annual fees. This year’s payment has been made and accepted by Indy Parks. We are still in the process of finalizing the formal lease documents for signature by both parties. The Officers and Directors of the Club did everything possible to negotiate the best possible agreement to assure the future success of the Club. Obviously, the real estate we occupy and enjoy at our Club becomes more valuable with each passing year. So, enjoy the experience and the facility. Your dues will go up a bit next year to cover the increased cost, but the increase should not be nearly as dramatic as the increase has been over the past ten years.
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| Club Committees |
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Our Club is made up of individual members drawn together to share in the costs (both financial and sweat) required to enjoy the sport of sailing...including both sailboat racing as well as just cruising. Currently, we have just over 250 family memberships amounting to somewhere around 500 total members (including spouses & kids). As you might expect, there are many many tasks required to operate a facility and organization as ours is...and, other than our resident long-time “caretaker,” all this effort is voluntary. Our organizational slate is shown on the next page and although I’d say most of the work is done by the Officers & Committee Heads, that’s totally incorrect. Yes, the “leaders” do their share of fun, but, they also enlist other volunteers to organize and run specific events like the just held Father’s Day Brunch run by Dick & Harriett who in-turn enlisted the help of more volunteers to share in the fun. Also, there are many Club members who are not currently actively organizing Club functions, but still have the same considerable “volunteer” fun required to keep their boats functioning and equipped. Sometimes I wonder what the on-the-water time ratio is for this Club.
These people will need to be replaced. And, whereas there are always members that are known to be potentially available for this, I suspect there are equally as many that are unknown that just might want to start helping with the fun. Each year, we usually announce the potential replacements in the September Board meeting. In the next couple months, if you have any interest in learning what these opening positions are about, ask any Board member or just about anybody alse sitting at a chair party or the Liar’s Tables. Plus, in the last article, Jim Weir just noted that dues will be increasing next year. As a “side benefit,” certain Officer and Committee Head positions do not pay dues. Yeah!
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| Thanks From.... |
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On behalf of my family, I wish to thank the ECSC for letting us host Stan’s memorial celebration at the clubhouse on June 5th. The event was everything I hoped it would be. I am especially grateful to Bill Harrington, Bob Bodish, Evan Williams, and Rick Sprowl for their generous help and support.
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| Publicity |
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As you know, our monthly newsletter (The Telltales) is distributed in both paper and web versions. Right now, about 60 members of the Club have opted to forego the printed version and just exclusively view this web version. This saves in both printing and postage expense. You can see that the web version contains much better information and pictures. Please save the Club some expense and let me take your name off the printed version list. Just reply to the E-Mail message you got announcing this Webtale. Thanks......
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| Eagle Creek Sail Club ECSC Home Page |
July Race Assignments are: Wednesday’s: July 6th – Dolders and Wolfinger; 13th – Arbecker and Maxey; 17th – (We need someone for this spot); 20th – Maxey and crew; -24th Dr. Bob and crew;- 27th Ahrbecker and Leonard; - July 31st Cunningham and crew. Please arrive at the Club by 5:30pm and on the water by 6pm for the first flag at 6:50pm. Sunday’s: July 4th – No Series Racing; 10th – No Series Racing (ECSC Regatta);. If you cannot make your assigned date, please trade with someone and let Chris or Mike know. 
Tyler Andrews
When we first moved to Indy, we talked to some people about bringing our boat down. They said to go out to Geist...it’s real big out there. We went to the marina at Geist and were talking to some guy and asked him where the crane was to put the boat in the water. He said that’s not a problem. But, we were standing on the end of the dock and we asked how far up the channel before the lake opens up. He said this is the lake! I knew I wasn’t bringing the boat to Geist. So, we have been traveling to Michigan almost every weekend during the summer for 15 years. 
Bonnie and I were at the Toledo Beach Marina getting our boat ready to sail. They had stored her that winter near the bone yard. Bonnie spotted a 24’ Allied...didn’t know what it was but thought she had beautiful lines and looked like a baby Hinkley. It was full of water, mud, and leaves. Things were floating inside with water all the way up the steps. We enquired about her and found out she hadn’t been in the water for five years but figured if she holds water, she doesn’t leak. So we bought her. She laid on an old wooden cradle. Joe Traub was going to take his boat up north and he and I had been talking about getting a beer sled to beat around at Eagle Ocean. There went Bonnie’s baby Hinkley into Joe and Jim’s beer sled! We needed to get it back to Indy, so Bonnie and I went down to the boat salvage area and bought a power boat trailer...took some measurements and with Joe’s help, welded a steel cradle on top of it. 
We did make it to ECSC, put it into the water, and sailed that fall. For the day-after-Thanksgiving race, we were the only boat out. The jib sheets were frozen and we put them through the blocks in two foot sections. That winter, Joe and I brought the Allied down to a warehouse at the corner of hood and ghetto, stripped all the hardware off, sanded all the paint off the deck and hull. and patched and painted and put it all back together. We tried racing it that summer...just wasn’t enough wind to make the boat move in the light-air Wednesday night races. What we needed was a faster boat. Bonnie and I found a Highlander behind a barn in Noblesville...another bone yard boat. Back to the warehouse...stripped the hardware, sanded patched and painted, and put it back together. After one of the race meetings, we solicited some help to roll the Highlander back over after we painted it. The boat has so many different ropes and lines, I still don’t know what they all do...but it’s fun. 
Needless to say, we have made many friends at ECSC. We chartered another boat with Joe and Barb and did the BVIs. But, last spring was the ultimate of trips. Charle Brehob, Joyce Ford, Joe & Barb Traub, and Bonnie & I chartered a boat in Tortola and entered it into the world classic Heineken Regatta in St. Marteen in the West Indies. Only one problem, we had to sail her across the Caribbean to St Marteen. To get to the race on time meant we had to also sail at night. The crossing was a success despite some of our shipmates getting sick...Bonnie, Charlie, and I have better sea legs than others. Next year, we are thinking maybe Belize or the Grenadines.
Each lease has called for a new appraisal every ten years to determine the annual lease payment. Indy Parks recently had two independent appraisals made and the Club had one independent appraisal done. When the appraisals were completed, the new lease payment amount was determined by Indy Parks to be increased by 233%. We negotiated with Indy Parks for months, but in the end, the best course of action was to accept this increase and extend our lease for an additional ten year period. While we are not pleased to have to absorb such an increase, the other options acceptable to Indy Parks were not acceptable to the Club.
Now…each year it’s normal for a couple Club Officers and/or Committee Heads to move on and allow other Club members to share in the fun. Such as, if you see them, thank Bob Hickok, R. Tom Moore, and Cheryl Roberts for their efforts over the past few years that each has been helping out in their respective area. And, of course, there’s also Rick Sprowl who will be leaving the one-year-only Commodore position.
