July 29th: Oshkosh; Jet Skiing, 29km, 0m climbed

Autor: Tim Goodall

Today was John’s day to show me his farm with the various crops and the farm buildings where he used to live with his parents and then get the jet skis. He has a large shed full of farm machinery together with a pickup truck and a trailer loaded with two jet skis. We hooked up the trailer to the pickup truck and set off to Omro on the Fox River where John could back the trailer down the boat ramp to put the skis in the water.

Now, I’ve never been involved in water sports like John has and I can hardly swim so I was a bit apprehensive about what I was getting involved in. As it turned out, safely wrapped up in a life vest, riding the jet ski was, after getting used to the steering and accelerator, easy and a lot of fun. It took a couple of miles on the river to get comfortable with the thing but then I started to speed up. John was leaving me behind so I started squeezing the accelerator (like a brake lever on the right hand side) and the machine rose up out of the water and took off like a rocket. In no time at at all I was doing 40mph / 64kph and nearly lost the baseball cap John had lent me. I just managed to grab it before it took off and sat on it for the rest of the ride because I found out the jet ski would do 52mph / 84kph and there was no way to keep the cap at that speed. I can thoroughly recommend having a go.

I can’t imagine being able to do it at home because I would probably have to do several courses, spend a couple of thousand Euros to get a licence and then only be allowed to do 10kph on the Rhine. Does anybody know the real facts?

Altogether, a lot of fun and a great experience. After taking the jet skis back to the farm we drove home via the airfield to see some of the planes and aerobatics at the EAA.

Tomorrow we will be back on our bikes.

John’s toy shed
Toys for seeding and….
tilling.
Today’s toys.
Hooked up and ready to go.
Ready to unload
I needed a right hand for the throttle and a right hand for the camera so could never take a picture while we were moving.
There were two eagles but only one was brave enough to stay put.
We had to turn back at the lock.
A game of patience, trying to float the skis back on to the trailer without having to wade too deep.
I think this is the one that flew overhead yesterday.
Whose idea of a vertical take-off plane is this?
We weren’t supposed to be on the airfield but we saw an open gate and took the opportunity to get some pictures and just got this plane looping before we scarpered.

99 Gedanken zu „July 29th: Oshkosh; Jet Skiing, 29km, 0m climbed“

  1. Thomas Kallenbach Antworten

    Tim auf dem Jetski, coole Vorstellung. Tolle Bilder, gute Reise für Euch drei.

    Gruß Thomas

  2. Steven Goodall Antworten

    No Speed Limits on several sections of the Rhine. People pint there Jet Skis and can do up to 160 kp/h.
    But you probably need a license? ‍♂️

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