We are at
the Casino Queen RV Park in East St. Louis for a couple of days.
Desira is
representing the state of Indiana in the Ladies 1 division (under 55 years of
age) in the Champion of Champions shoot.
She is shooting against other women from all of the United States,
Canadian providences and even some of the South American countries at the Grand
American.
The location
of the Grand American is the World Shooting and Recreational Complex in Sparta,
Illinois. We are staying a little over
an hour away in East St. Louis because that is the closest thing we could find.
The Events
Center is where all of the administration/registration happens. It also includes a restaurant and bar. And, it is air conditioned – really important
on days like today when the heat and humidity were almost overwhelming. I don’t know how the shooters were able to
see anything through all the sweat that was dripping in their eyes.
The
Trapshooting Museum is a new addition this year.
One of the
exhibits showed that the Indianapolis Gun Club hosted the trapshooting
championships in 1906.
I like this
exhibit, glass ball targets. These were
used before the clay targets they now shoot became popular. They would be filled with feathers so that
when they were hit it would look more like the shooter was actually hitting a
bird.
I tried to
talk Desira into letting me duplicate this outfit for her – that received a
resounding “NO WAY”. This was worn many
years ago by a lady named Punkin Fisk and was a way of showing off all of the
badges and awards she won, which apparently were abundant.
This
facility is huge, I forget all of the statistics on how many traps they have,
but I think I remember that it is well over three miles long.
When Desira
was competing in the Indiana state shoot her gun broke in the middle of
competition and she finished up using Dan’s gun which she had never shot
previously. She had to send her gun in
for repairs so she hasn’t had it available for practice. She picked it up late yesterday and was able
to shoot 25 practice targets.
She is ready
this morning.
Headed out
with part of the squad she will be shooting with this morning. The group she is shooting with represents
some of the best shooters from the Midwest.
I know the shooters representing Kentucky and Michigan are also in this
group.
On the line
thinking about her next shot.
Action!!
Deep in
concentration while she moves to the next trap.
The squad
when they were finished. She shot 95 of
100 targets today – proud mama moment!!
Unfortunately, that wasn’t quite good enough to qualify for a trophy –
that would have required at least 98 out of 100. I thought she represented the state of
Indiana very well.
On our way
back to the motor coach we stopped at Eckert’s a farm to market grocery and
restaurant.
Lots of
goodies for sale inside the grocery. The
pies looked absolutely delicious. I
didn’t even stay in front of the pie case long enough to take a picture, I was
afraid I would be tempted to buy one. We
certainly don’t need that. We were down
40 pounds each when we got to Indiana – we are now down only about 35 pounds
(we are enjoying our time here a little too much).
There are
several antique farm implements on display like this 1927 John Deere horse
drawn corn binder.
This is the
bounty from our shopping trip: corn on
the cob, green tomatoes, peaches, peach salsa and some Boars Head Lacy Swiss
cheese.
