Satellite AV Contest - GEOSATpro microHD - Enter to Win - Drawing on 6/11/2012

[handymantoo]

I remember climbing into the family 54 green Chevy and heading to my aunts beach house on Cape Cod for a weekend at the beach.

 

[dwingel]

We went to Camp Pioneer on Lake Erie in upstate New York. lots of fun outdoor activities and swimming in the lake every day.

Cheers,
Dale

 

[rapidawn]

I remember my grade-school summers spending way too much time playing video games with my brothers on an old Commodore SX64:

insert 5.25" floppy disk
LOAD "*",8,1
READY.
RUN

Loved the spooky music (Forbidden Forest, Wizard of Wor) and I think we busted a couple joystick controllers playing Epyx Summer Games. My brothers and I almost ruined our eyesight while fixated on that built-in 5" display - glad my father ended up purchasing a bigger monitor.

good times. I can't remember whatever happened to that heavy thing!

 

[brex2001]

Fondly remembering summer hobbies, activities, and shenanigans:

Digging a cave in the back yard in the summer of '64(having seen The Great Escape I think influenced that one.) Later my folks put in a pool. We neighbor kids moved our "dirt forts" to the vacant lots on the block. Dirt clod wars!

Learning to make fireworks starting a age 12 & the evanescent pleasure of watching them on the 4th of July with my family & neighbors. Going to the public library to study the Chemical Formulary reference for fireworks formulas & each year they got better - fountains, flares, skyrockets, roman candles. The police knew but let it go because they watched too. I still have all ten digits by the way.
(This was made a felony in 1986 so, no, I don't do that anymore.)

Building a crystal radio from galena, old TV deflection winding copper wire for the inductor & wax paper/tinfoil condenser. Finally getting a audible signal over at my uncle's house with the help of an amplifier. Later building a Heathkit SW receiver(all miniature tube set). He was a great influence for my electronics hobby. He used to work for JPL in the telemetry lab for Pioneer & other missions.

Going on vacation trips to Lake Arrowhead, June Lake, Wallowa Lake, White Mountain Apache Reservation. We'd load up the Rambler station wagon to the 'gills', put a mattress pad in the back for kiddie "quiet time". Tying leaders & hooks, baiting hooks and mostly just untangling lines for my brother & sisters. Never seemed to fail: they always caught more than me. Don't know why.

My childhood home was sold just a year ago this month to a young family. Both my parents passed away within 3 months of each other early in 2011. Cleaning out the home of 53 years evoked a lot of fond childhood memories whether it was touching the hutch in the front hallway, or the wooden workbench Dad built. We had moved into that house in 1958.

 

[avenger]

In the early 70's, we used to live in Long Beach, California and made it a habit of going to Bear Lake for the first two weks of July. We spent those two weeks swimming, fishing, and mostly skiing. Those were the good old fun days for the whole family.

Then in July of 1977 my immediate family came to the New Orleans, Loiusiana area to support the Space Shuttle Program.

Man, do we miss those wonderful days. Relatives in California died soon right after we came to Louisiana, and never been back since. Sad but true.

 

[concord]

I remember that my brother and I had Tonka Semi-Tractor Trailers and couldn't wait to play and ride them down the hill! They were well-built, all solid metal, back in the 60's. Looking around the internet, I wish I had kept it (and kept it in good shape)...worth more than GEOSATpro microHD .

Someone is selling one on fleabay: Vintage Tonka Green Giant Tractor & Trailer | eBay

 

[iammike]

My Dad used to take me to visit with my Granddad on Sunday afternoons. We'd pick up some ice cream on the way and then have lunch followed by ice cream sundaes at Granddad's place. Afterwards we'd sit in the living room and visit for a while. It sure seemed boring as a kid, but somehow it doesn't seem that way looking back on it.

 

[big_hemi]

Childhood memories.....

My cousins would come out for the summer, we would play Atari, swim in those rubber 10' round pools, ride on the swingset (always had 1 leg that thumped when you swung high because it wasn't set in concrete), play in the woods and inevitably get poison ivy everywhere, then lay in the house for a week and play Atari until the itching went away.

 

[Dishman Dan]

One good memory that still makes me laugh...

We used to play hide and seek outside for hours and in the dark at my cousins house. He was way to proud to be found on his home turf. One night he was hiding in the ditch and even after whizzing on him he still would not admit to being found!!!...

 

[b54so]

My favorite summer activity would have to be grabbing my bike and going to meet up with friends in the city center. We would always stop by the ice cream/candy store and then bike over to the rail line and watch trains go by. The cool trains were the ones that had nothing but John Deere tractors on the flatcars, it was like a ribbon of green flying by!

 

[TRG]

Going fishing, crabbing and claming on my Dad's boat. We would get up early, pick up bait, sandwiches, coffee cakes and hot chocolate at the local dockside deli. Then motor out in the boat to our favorite fishing spots. We would fish all morning and well into the afternoon. When it got too hot to fish we'd jump in the water and my dad would pull us around on water skies for a while until we cooled off. Then my dad would let me take the wheel for a slow ride home while he cleaned the fish we caught. When we got home my Mom would take the our bounty and cook up a feast that we would eat on our backyard picknick table. We frequently invited some of our neighbors who didn't have much money and were down on their luck. We had plenty of food to go around so nobody ever went to bed hungry. Those were some of the best times of my life.

Brian, thanks again for another very generous offer. And thanks for prompting the joyous memories.

 

[stonecold]

I take the off stance and say mowing the lawn was a all time treat during the summer. Why it was simple as a 8 year old the riding lawn mower was the closest thing to driving a car my parents would let me do. While always warm down here in the sunshine state it was the summer with the rains that had me mowing once a week some times even twice a week. I dont it not a pool story or family vacation story but till this day I still like mowing my grass and I am not sure everyone can say that.

 

[shimma]

"Frog Bopping." Yes, we little monsters were surrounded by little frogs at the summer cottage. We captured them and then stomped them just because we could.

 

[bswanson]

I grew up in the country, so summertime meant swimming in the creek, playing baseball, hanging out in the basement when it was too hot outside, and going on camping trips with my family. Those trips were filled with hiking and sightseeing. We were poor, but the important things were taken care of.

 

[Kraven]

Tough call.. If I had to pick one summer memory, it would be spending the summers at my grandmother's cottage with my cousins. Swimming, water skiing, fishing and being bored during the day... at night we'd cook marshmellows and hotdogs on the outdoor fire while staying up late listening to a rock station from northern maine, going local drive-in on our bikes, watching movies on the gazibo, fireworks. Seems back then, there was at least 1 person having a party by the lake each weekend (first time I got *drunk* was on some cheap beer from Quebec... O'Keefe). When thinking back, it was an awesome way to spend my summers as a teen.

Cheers, K

 

[Dishman-n-nc]

My parents every summer would take us to a local county 4th of July festival. One year at about the age of 12, I sat beside Andre the Giant and ate watermelon with him. Man he was a monster!

 

[sethwell]

Kirkwood Swimming Hole

There is a swimming hole around here that my friends and I use to go camping at during spring breaks and summers. It is fed by a spring that runs down a short creek and empties into large rocky hole. the hole is about 15-20 yards wide and who knows how deep cause no one has ever gotten down to bottom. trust me, we all tried and failed to find the bottom. the water is crystal clear and cold, very very cold, even in august. lol, actually it is even colder in march, as a spring break tradition we all would take a polar bear plunge into it and see who could last the longest, they got to drink for free for the week!

man i miss those fun and carefree days of my youth. wish i had a picture of it, maybe i'll take a road trip tomorrow for old times sake and check it out.

edit: wow, i do love this world wide web of ours. i found a pic a guy took of Kirkwood, and it looks like it is larger than i had remembered. we use to jump off that big rock between the two falls. learned to do backflips off it!!

 

[ParaclipseCKu]

My favorite summertime activity was going on road trips with my parents. Two that stand out are my first visit to the Kennedy Space Center some 30+ years ago and a trip through the south enroute to Houston Texas in the early seventies. Went through some real southern towns on small two lane roads. Memories I will never forget!

 

[comollitd]

I can vividly recall doing my first show as a DJ on a local radio station. I learned early on to respect the power of the media and the ability of media to affect a community. Pretty great learning for a 13 year old.
Of course, I can also remember the looming revelations that there was a difference between boys and girls--something the nuns at school had kept hidden from us as long as possible! I can also remember a group of friends sitting in our makeshift "fort" and reading out loud the Playboy Advisor column from a tattered magazine pilfered from one of the guy's dads. Ah youth....Ah..to go back to those simpler times.

 

[Fizbi]

How to enter:
Reply to this thread and tell us about your favorite childhood summer past-time or activity. Did you have a favorite swimming hole, go fishing with grandpa, enjoy community festivals, watermelon eating contests? What made your summers fun as a young kid?

Camping!

Going into any national park as a kid in a popup tent trailer. Nothing beats it hands down. I miss going camping as a kid cause some one else always made the camp, made the food, cleaned up, and drove me around. Surprise visits in the middle of the night by bears looking for snacks made for great fun.