Wow! What a pleasant weekend spent in Soldotna, Alaska with a group of wonderful patriots. Weather was sunny on Saturday and mostly cloudy, but dry, on Sunday. They say there are two seasons in Alaska: winter and almost winter. At this time of year, it could go either way and this weekend we won the coin toss.
Thank you, Joe and Brenda, for the use of your range. Providing the covered area with tables and chairs was very welcome. Hopefully our events will help the community become more aware of what you have to offer.
Shooters - All of you were all excellent to work with. You were persistent and everyone had a teachable attitude.
Congratulations, Greg, for earning your patch and confirming it with multiple rifleman scores. Well done! O0
Hannah - work on your dry practice. You demonstrated each of the fundamentals, now you need to practice more to put them all together.
Dave, it was a pleasure having you and your family on the line. I was impressed with Alex's patience with his rifle. He was drilling the target once we had his sights dialed in. Trysten, thank you for coming Saturday. We missed you on Sunday, but we understand you had previous commitments.
Bailey - there is a rifleman inside of you waiting to get out. You were the quickest to get a well placed shot off on the timed stages of the AQT. Keep practicing. I can't wait to read about how you earned your patch. Garrett, you shot well also. I appreciate your enthusiasm and positive attitude.
Daniel, Josh, and Trey - you guys were great. Your shooting improved throughout the day and you were more confident.
James - you are a trooper. You were teachable and you started to master your single-shot, bolt-action rifle. Practice what you learned and continue to have fun shooting. I appreciate how you worked at the transitions, even though you are young. At the end of the day, I was impressed how you asked us to remove the sandbags.
fisherdawg and DirtDiver, you both were a pleasure to work with (and camp with). I hope we get more opportunities in the future. Congratulations, fisherdawg, for running a fun and safe shoot. DirtDiver, you have a bright future in the program. You got down in the dirt and you could see the difference it made in the shooters' marksmanship.
Hawkhavn, ItsanSKS, Nero, and American Amazon, thank you for making the long drive down to help us on Sunday afternoon and to help us get that shiny, new green hat on fisherdawg. I'm sure he appreciated having you there.
Finally, there is only one more shoot on the calendar for 2013 in Alaska. It is the shoot in a couple weeks, October 12-13 in Chugiak. Help us spread the word, this shoot is 2/3rds sold out with only 11 spots left on the firing line. Here is the registration link you can share with your friends: http://www.eventbrite.com/event/5869504847
Thank you, everyone, for your wonderful, Alaskan hospitality.
ShadowMan
PS: I will be posting some pictures soon. Please stay tuned...
Project Appleseed's Second Ever Rifle Marksmanship and American Heritage Event on the Kenai Peninsula --
---- Was A Resounding Success ----
Why?
Because of the Great American Patriots Who Joined Us on the Line!
HUZZAH
What a great crew of marksmen we had at the Majority Arms Range just outside of Sterling this past weekend.
Dave
Trystan
Alex
Sam
Greg
Daniel
Josh
Trey
James
Garrett
Bailey
Hannah
All of you displayed a teachable attitude, persistence, and good humor as you worked through cold morning temperatures - 35 - or thereabout, gnats, wind, fatigue and muscles that had to learn new contortions. You are the worthy Posterity that our Founders sacrificed for on April 19th, 1775 and through the Revolutionary War that followed. You displayed the Ordinary Courage that Joseph Plumb Martin tells was the quality that allowed the Continentals to win through. (hint, check out the book of the same title ;))
As for your marksmanship, I'll say +++1 on ShadowMan's comments above. Greg, I've been looking forward to handing you a Rifleman patch since July. You exceeded my expectations. All of you have it in you to become Riflemen & Riflewomen. I have Patches waiting for you. ;D
Fawn
Robin
Stuart
Mark
All the families that pitched in the help the Instructors -- THANK YOU! O0
It's an honor to serve your families.
To our Hosts Brenda & Joe Trefren of Majority Arms, LLC:
We appreciate your support and your warm welcome to your very nice Range. I look forward to being there again soon at future Appleseeds. Best Wishes! :)
To Scheer9632, thank you for the very comfortable accomodations. It's no small thing to be willing to go the trouble you do on behalf of the Instructors & Appleseed. O0
ShadowMan & DirtDiver, wow, my words will fall far short of the appreciation, respect and admiration my heart holds for you both. See you on the Trail. ;D
To The Dream Team -- Itsansks, Hawkhaven, Nero, and American Amazon. You made Sunday afternoon something extraordinary for our shooters. The Spirit of '76, as they called it, showed through all you did on the line in Soldotna. Thanks for coming! ^:)^
For Liberty!
fisherdawg
I wouldn't have missed it for anything! It was great seeing another fine bunch of Americans getting together to work on a skill, have some fun and learn some history. I enjoyed working with all of you (as always!).
HH
Here are the pictures that I have. Please feel free to post additional pictures. I know someone got pictures of fisherdawg getting his green hat.
Here is are target line before it got all shot up.
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Morning safety briefing.
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Teaching inches, minutes, and clicks.
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All ready on the left?
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All ready on the right?
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A young shooter patiently waiting for his target to get scored by DirtDiver.
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Prepping magazines.
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Look at the smiles on the faces of those young patriots. They were awesome and had wonderful attitudes all weekend.
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Congratulations, Greg, on earning your patch. Good shooting (with iron sights to boot!).
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We had some special guests Sunday afternoon. Pictured are Nero, Hawkhavn, myself, and American Amazon. ItsanSKS was somewhere close by as well.
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One other thing I forgot to mention - the vast improvement in marksmanship. Saturday morning, we started the day with redcoat targets. Only 1 of our shooters qualified on the target and didn't get the bayonet. On Saturday afternoon, everyone qualified for some distance except 1 and Greg cleared his redcoat target. Well done, shooters! Huzzah!
Indeed, ItsanSKS was *very* close by, as it's the back of *him* that's in the foreground. It's Nero who was missing from this shot. I'm in the background, using my green/teal gloves to push my glasses up my nose. %) Once we sort through our photos, I'll ask Nero if he has any good shots of the *front* of anyone. ;)
Nero and I had an Alaska weekend that was an Epic Saga, but we're glad Soldotna was part of it, so we could meet fisherdawg, Dirt Diver, and ShadowMan!
Some more pix from Sunday afternoon:
ItsanSKS doing some marksmanship review
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Attention to instruction
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ShadowMan scoring
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Dirt Diver clearing the line
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Posterity!
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(That's me in the background, the only pic AFAIK. Eric kindly loaned me his AR, so I spent a bit of time down on the firing line.)
Greg turned in an awesome 232 score!
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Congratulations to the new shoot boss!
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The following is for denizens of the Lower 48 who are checking out the AAR. Here's a bit of the scenery we had to suffer through while driving down from Anchorage. This might make Eric and Wally's job easier the next time they need to recruit some instructors from outside:
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Yes that's a glacier up there.
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Looks like a great event. I was in Soldotna in 1997 on vacation during Alaska's very brief summer. Congratulations to all the shooters and thanks to my fellow instructors for stepping up. I'd love to do a shoot in Alaska in the future but I'd need a week to drive there since I don't fly any longer. ;D
May Liberty increase.
'Wreck
Ramblinwreck,
Come on up!
fisherdawg