I know it's late, but it was a LONG way!!

[Alan Baracco]

Cheers, from California, Linda and I just this morning returned home from a fabulous (and somewhat circuitious) trip to Columbia Lakes for all the festivities. It was even better than Harvey's pictures show. A huge thanks to "Team Texas" for all the hard work. Ton E. even extended Texas hospitality to loaning me a nice Heddon bamboo casting rod for the tournament (sorry I "broke" it, Tom!).

Our trip started on April 24, spent time in Southern California, hopped our way across Arizona, New Mexico and west Texas seeing the sites (no bad weather on that route). Next stop was "Summerlin Farm", an oasis in the beautiful area north of Houston. My wife fell in love with the place, due in no small part to gracious host Robyn Summerlin, his 2 acre pond stocked with fish, his ATV's and the great food. I had to explain for the rest of the trip that I was NOT getting a bunch of cows and buying a farm, no matter how much fun Robyn made it out to be.

As all of the other posts have shown, Columbia Lakes was the best. The long distance casting of Brian and Lew was awesome, all the displays were top notch, the food was great and the visits with old and new friends created many new memories. Jack, I hope you enjoyed the cigar, I know I enjoyed the Brandy. Oh, yeah, and there were REELS!

From Tom's post about the weather right after the show, it sounds like beating feet north on Saturday was a wise move, we had great weather all the rest of our trip, which included Whitney Lake and Cave Rock Canyons State Parks in Texas, Mesa Verde National Park in Colorado, Arches National Park and Canyonland National Park in Utah and the capper (for me), Berlin Ichthyosaur State Park near Gabbs Nevada. Let me tell you it was a tough sell on Linda that we "only" had 53 miles of dirt road to get there, but how often do you get to see fossils of a 50 foot long creature!

It was 5,345 miles in all and worth every turn of the wheel. Now, could someone let me know how far is it to the 2006 meeting, I better start selling Linda on it right away!

Cheers, Alan

[reels4me, member]

Of course NOT in that order, Alan it was a pleasure meeting you and your wife, charming people. Enjoyed talking Steelhead, the Russian, wine
country, cigars et al. A real pleasure to say the least. Hope we both can
attend the NY state Nat`l. I`ll see if I can dredge up a couple of Partagas. Have a nice `05/`06---Jack

[Harvey]

Alan & Linda.
I second Jack in saying what a plaeure to put a face with a name and meet Linda. As for the next show, if my yard stick isn't shortened, it measured 2,858.7 miles. That is a snap compared te what you just drove.
And I vote to you buying Linda a farm with some cows. I did the same thing you did only I did it Saturday. What a blast riding thru the woods while Robyn was my tour guide. Guy knows every tree and bush on his beautiful hunk of land. Watched Hummingbirds, Bluebirds and others dart around with out a care in the world. He has got 'Livin'" down pat.
Take care
"H"

[RonLewis]

Please don't forget my offer of Salmon fishing in San Francisco whenever you visit. We could also "play reels". Again nice meeting you and your wife. Same offer goes for any other ORCA member traveling this way.