A big THANK YOU to the great people of HotBoat.com
Wow! Where do I start....I guess I'll start with a big thank to everyone for making this a very memorable weekend for myself and Kate! I'm glad we were able to make it.
When I originally saw the cruise posted my immediate thought was there is no way in hell I want to spend four hours on a boat with people I've tormented for the better part of ten years. Then Mrs. Daytona was cruising the boards one night and says "why didn't you tell me about this cruise, it sounds like a lot of fun?" In one of my weaker moments I said sure let's do it and I sent the money out to Wendi that night. I woke up the next morning, a little more sober, and realized what I had committed to :yikes:....no backing out now. By the way that was the last night I drank any alcohol until I stepped on the boat for the cruise (3 weeks). I figured I had to stop drinking leading up to the cruise because I tend to run my keyboard/mouth after I've had a few and I didn't want to get banned before the trip.
The trip down literally flew by. It felt like a two hour drive and before we knew it we were at Eliminator Boats "shopping" for a new boat. I say "shopping" not "buying" because the perfect boat would of had to have been there and the Shockwave would have to go away for us to be buyers. I'm sorry if I mislead or disappointed a few of you. We were able to sit in a few 27' Daytonas and realized this WILL be our next boat before next Spring. Also, Bob Leach threw a wrench into things by offering to build us a brand new one for a SMOKING price which we had never considered doing but at the price he offered it makes it very tough not to leave it as an option.
The BBQ at Eliminator was a lot of fun and it was a good opportunity to meet a few people from the board and talk boats! I was really nervous to finally meet someone from the boards but Mr. and Mrs. 28Eliminator were the first people we met and after meeting them I was much more at ease. Very cool people and I thought to myself even if there's only a couple more people like them this trip will be a success. Then Eli walked in....Eli, Eli, Eli..., I don't even know where to start...probably the most memorable person from the entire trip. I will say this...she offered up her bed to Mrs. Daytona and myself after knowing us for about an hour. :yikes:....... ;) It was nice to see a few HotBoat peeps turn out to the BBQ despite the pouring rain. At least HotBoat represented unlike some other websites. By the way, Eliminator Boats posted the picture I took of us on the other website. :hilarious: A really big Thank you to Bob and Cindy for providing the food and beer for the BBQ, they are some of the classiest people I know. And Kenny it's always super cool talking to you.
The cruise was EPIC! I can't put into words how much fun it was which is probably a good thing......What happens on the boat stays on the boat. ;) I will say that leading up to the cruise my nerves were getting the best of me. I'm about to get on a boat with 50 people that want to throw me overboard is what I'm thinking. People are starting to congregate around the boat and I'm hoping I'll just blend in and no one will recognize me. And then it hits me.....I'm going to throw up!.... I dart between the buildings and out to the parking lot just in time to watch my lunch come back up. Just great, I've got splatter on my shoes and puke breath and now the boat is loading. I get to the dock and right away I meet McRib and his wife....very nice and funny people....that goes well! Next I meet She's Mine....really good dude....that goes well! Next was Wendi and WMC....that goes well. I start to chill out and my nausea subsides. The captain comes down to the dock and starts to give us the rules of the boat and they were basically "No drugs and you can have only one shot of hard alcohol" :yikes: I thought he was going to get lynched! At that point I knew this was going to be a party for the ages!(by the way, the one shot rule lasted less than about a minute) Once on the boat I started getting my wine on and meeting people left and right. It was overwhelming at times but in a good way. I've got to be honest I'm bad with names especially when meeting 50 people all at once. I finally was able to meet the man the myth the legend....HoTBoat!.....still no moderator job. Everyone was so friendly.......NGE, Westernaero, SFV2RVR, Goth Alos;), BoatsandBees, 78Southwind, MMA, Unforgiven, Eli, HotBoat, She's Mine, RiverRunner1984, 28Eliminator and of course all the spouses, you guys were a blast to hang out with. I'm sure I'm forgetting a few. I can't believe how many offers we got to stay in either Parker or Havasu....You guys are awesome! I don't want to say too much more about the cruise other than it did not disappoint.....there was plenty of booze, flashing, dancing, chicks making out and even sex on the couch.:thumbup:
The cruise ends and everyone is feeling good and wants to continue the madness. HotBoat offers up his limo to as many people that can fit in it (there were laps involved) so we pile in and off to Hotel we go. It seemed like the entire boat made it over to the hotel bar...the hotel was not too pleased. The shots started flowing....This is where details started to get a little foggy for me. I remember MCRib walking around with a large tray of shots and the next thing I remember from him was his pants were around his ankles. :yikes: They kicked us out of the hotel bar so people start throwing out there room numbers that we can go party in. The first couple rooms we went into the wives were already in bed and not too pleased to see a large group come barging in, so the party pretty much was moved to the parking lot and hallways. More drinks, the shot ski even came out and the party rolled on. On a side note this about the time NGE and Eli disappeared at the same exact time....:hmm . At this point I'm guessing it's close to 1:30 and the manager is getting heated, so we call a cab. Then 28 Eliminator goes Hulk Hogan on said manager and the cops arrive and so does our cab. The only problem is our cab pulls in the parking lot and takes one look at our group and the cops and pulls back out. We eventually shared a cab home with the people that had sex on the boat(I wont mention their screen names) and went to bed about 3 a.m.
The next morning I wake up to my phone ringing at 9 a.m. :grumble: It's WMC and he is calling from the "2nd Floor", a football bar in Huntington Beach. He says everyone is there and we are late. We get ready and I start calling random numbers in my phone from the night before not knowing half the time who is on the other end telling them to get to the 2nd Floor although most were already there. One number I did have programmed in was Joker so I called him and told him to meet us there. We walk in the 2nd Floor and I am promptly greeted with a right hook to the gut. Anyone who uses the saying "hits like a girl" has never been punched by Eli. :boxing8: When she says "you're not going to post that picture are you?" what she really means is "if you post that picture I will lay a can of whoop ass on you". I catch my breath and order a drink. It's Joker and Mrs., Eli, 28Eliminator and Mrs., SFV2RVR and Mrs., Westernaero and Mrs., Wendi, WMC, Mrs Daytona and myself. In comes NGE....he's got a FFG (last word is glow, you can figure the rest) to his face. He gets peppered about why he and Eli didn't just come in the same car. ;) ;) By noon it seems as if nobody is feeling any pain from the night before, so we move on to a bar recommended by Joker. We walk into this place and I was speechless.....I had died and gone to Niner heaven!!! Every tv was on the Niners game and every single person was wearing Niners gear.....except for CarolAnn who is Westernaero's better half, she was wearing a Seattle jersey!!! :yikes: She was a great sport about it....by the way CarolAnn.....what was the score? ;)
I would like to thank Joker and his wife Christine for inviting us over to their house for dinner the following night but after two days of drinking non-stop I was done. Also thank you for your recommendations of the hotel and restaurants, they were perfect. The view from our room was insane! Kate has already mentioned about making another trip down to see you guys.
In closing, I would like to say that there were other great people I met that I'm sure I didn't mention. It's not because you weren't memorable, its because meeting this many people that are this awesome is very overwhelming for my little brain. I wish I could of went into more detail about some of the people I did mention but that would take pages to do. I will say that I think I met some people that I could be life long friends with.
I'm really sorry if I let some people down when you met me because I wasn't wearing a thong or a dress and I didn't have a dildo shoved in my mouth. I figured I would try to leave a better first impression in the hopes that I get invited back to another HotBoat party. I might break out the thong at the next one though. ;)
Thank you everyone at HotBoat for making this one of the most memorable weekends Kate and I have ever had. You guys rock!!!!!!!
Greg and Kate
P.S. I'm curious to see what the NiceGuyEddie and Eli baby will look like.....hhhhhmmmmmmmmm
