Riding Zray on the St. Croix River

Riding Zray on the St. Croix River

Todd Swank's Diary Entry for August 18, 2012

On Saturday afternoon, we drove to Wisconsin to hang out with our old friends, Karl and Tina Zitzewitz, on the St. Croix River.  They're such pleasant people to be around.

They also have this really cool boat they call Z Ray.  How they came up with that name is a really long story.  The short version is that it's brand name is Sea Ray.  Their last name starts with Z.  And if you put those two together, you come up with Z Ray.  I guess it's not that long of a story.

This photo would have been a lot funnier had I taken the time to photo shop the hose out of the picture.  But that seemed like it would be a lot of work.  So please imagine this picture as if there was no hose seen.  And then giggle.

Before we went out on the boat, Aaron wanted to give the boys a ride on their Jet Ski.  Luke was excited to ride on the back when they left, but had somehow moved to the middle seat before they returned.  Apparently he thought he wasn't going to be able to hold on for the ride.  Which could have been kind of funny had Tina worn her life-jacket that reads on the back " If you can read this, that means Luke fell off!"

Avery patiently waited for them to return so he could have a turn.  He didn't have much of a choice because we weren't going to let him yank Luke off the water craft like he wanted to do at first.

Before we knew it, we were on the water and Captain Karl was ready to take us someplace to have fun.  

The boys were having a little too much fun.  I think they were harassing other boaters as we drove past them.  At least that's where I expect these smiles were being generated.  There had to be some kind of mischief behind them.

The River seems like a big party 24/7.  Which pretty much makes it my kind of place.

After we dropped anchor, Karl suddenly turned to me and asked if I wanted to see his Dingy.  I was so relieved when he pulled out this boat off the back.

I asked Miss Sheri if she wanted to ride Karl's dingy with me, but she just said no.

At the end of the day, when we came back to the dock.  We discovered this monster spider.  We captured him to get some pictures and then decided to let him go.  We were quite impressed with his ability to run across the top of the water.  You can see it for yourself here: