Here we are starting another snowmobile season
and if the Farmer's Almanac has predicted accurately, it promises to
be a great season for us.
Hope everyone had a safe and happy summer - now
it's time to get in "snowmobile" mode - get those sleds out, polish
them up and hope for an early winter.
By the way, if any of you are interested in
selling your snowmobiles or any other equipment related to the sport,
we have a classified section on our web page that is reserved for RLSC
members only. Just contact the webmaster and he will put the
information on the page for you. Also, if you would like something
listed on this newsletter, just let me know either through the web
page or by regular mail and I would be happy to add it on at the end
of the newsletter.
We held our annual Election of Officers in June
and the officers are: President - Clark Allen; Vice-President - Don
Dumont; Secretary/Treasurer - club secretary. Members on the Board of
Directors are: Clark Allen, Don Dumont, club secretary, Vince Banaitis,
Marshall Swain, Steve Swain, Tim Lyons, Alan Whitford, Matt Kennedy,
Christian Raymond, Jim Quimby.
The RLSC is raffling off a 2004 Polaris
Classic this year. You will find a photo
and specifications on this sled enclosed along with raffle
tickets. We ask that each member buy or sell three tickets. This is
a beautiful sled! If you need more tickets, just let me know. It's
important that we make money on this raffle. This sled was donated in
part by Oquossoc Marine and Polaris Industries.
The MSA Super Raffle Tickets will be sent to you
with the October newsletter.
Our meetings will be held on the second Saturday
of each month with a social hour at 5:30, dinner at 6:30 and the
meeting to follow dinner. Our club meetings for September, October
and November will be held at the Rangeley Guides and Sportsman's
Building in Oquossoc. We are hoping that by changing the location of
our meetings, more people will be encouraged to attend. Alcoholic
beverages are permitted in this building. Meeting dates are included
in this package on the Calendar of Events sheet.
Again last year the RLSC was awarded the trophy
for the largest club in the State of Maine. The runner up was
Greenville and they were not far behind us in numbers. We have to
work hard this year to get new members and I encourage everyone who
knows people who ride in the Rangeley area to entice them to join the
club. The dues we receive through memberships is spent directly on
maintaining and grooming the trails. If two of you are included on a
family membership you might think about sending in two individual
memberships. This would keep our number of members up. We had 353
members last year and we're going to push for 400 this year.
Most of you already know that Peoples Choice
Restaurant has been closed. The building has been sold to Aubuchon
Hardware and our first concern was the trail that runs through the
parking lot, however, Aubuchon has given us permission to keep the
trail in place.
SNODEO
will be held on January 22, 23, 24, 2004. Headquarters will be
at the Rangeley Inn. We have had our first Snodeo Committee meeting
and Dave Schinas at the Rangeley Inn has assured us that he would do
whatever may be necessary to help us hold our usual events for
Snodeo. All events we have held in the past during Snodeo will take
place as usual. If you haven't made your reservations for that
weekend, you should do that soon. Rooms will be hard to find the
closer we get to January.
Enclosed with this newsletter is some
information provided by the Maine Snowmobile Association. This is
valuable information that I'm sure some of you were not aware of. For
anyone with a family member heading off to college soon, the
scholarship issue is important. Not many people apply for these
scholarships so if you apply, your chances for award are very good.
Remember, when you join the club, $10 of your
dues money is forwarded to the MSA and you automatically become a MSA
member.
The Rangeley Lakes Snowmobile Club will have a
booth at the Maine Snowmobile Show on October 3, 4 & 5. This show is
held annually at the Augusta Civic Center in Augusta, Maine. We will
also have a booth at the New England Snowmobile Expo at the "Big E"
Fairgrounds in Springfield, Mass on October 18 and 19. If anyone is
interested in manning these booths for a few hours, please let us
know. If you visit the show(s), please drop by and say hello.
As usual, we are looking for volunteers for
several projects throughout the season. A volunteer sign-up sheet is
enclosed. Please consider helping us out. Our meetings are held in
facilities with well-equipped kitchens and help preparing a meal for
one of our meetings would be greatly appreciated. It doesn't have to
be anything fancy or something that takes all day to prepare. We
appreciate any help we can get.
Remember to visit our web page often. Linc
Avery, our webmaster and a member of RLSC, does an excellent job
keeping news posted there for us.
Until next month............