before the Schooner, there was this makeshift run-about. I say makeshift because I didn't have time to do anything else. Our granddaughter was on her way from California and wanted to go to Red River. I hurriedly
devised a contraption that could take the place of the 4-wheeler and we were ready to go. Delisha, our other granddaughter who lives nearby, joined us. Our plans were to spend the Fourth of July camped out on a Red River sandbar.
There were only a few things wrong with this rig. First the big Mercury motor was too much for the canoes. She flew! Water gushed up into the boat between the makeshift deck and the hull of the canoes, before I could get them planed off. That was only a minor hindrance; a really well built deck would solve that problem. Yes the canoes would plane off. Last, was the fact that the motor's shaft kept grounding out in the sand when we got into shallow water. I had a solution for all those minor faults, though.
Even though my hurriedly improvised run-about was a good idea gone bad we didn't let it spoil our outing. I delighted in running around just below plane-off speed and drenching Ashley and Delisha. The canoes would get no more than an inch of water in them until they would start screaming for us to stop and dip the water out.
Ashley and Delisha thought that granddad's boat "Was cool."
