ION 2013 - Part 1

Hey fellow ballers it's the Noob, back and at'em again with a new (late...) post about my big trip Skirmish for their annual Invasion of Normandy scenario!

You might have gathered it from the title but just to be clear, yes, this IS going to be a multi-release article as there was simply WAY too much that went on over the weekend for me to cover it in one post. I hope you'll tune in for this piece's entirety because the trip was really something special to me. Anyways, enough with the banter, on with the balling!

Magic Bus:

Visibly perturbed, my mother dropped me off at the Oshawa GO station and watched as I boarded the train on my first, solo, out-of-country journey ever... Yes, EVER. I felt bad for her since she's overprotective on a normal day but after this I figure she'll find things a lot easier when I head out on these trips. I was hauling a RIDICULOUS amount of weight in my gear bag and folks, if you're going to make a trip like this just take ONE piece of advice from me? Buy as much as you can on-site rather than trying to haul it with you. Food and water weigh a tonne and most transportation systems have a weight limitation both to charge you extra for "overweight baggage" but also to protect their baggage handlers and your safety.

Now if you can imagine, this gear bag's roughly 4' long, ~1.5-2' wide, and a foot and a half deep but it bulges out to well more than those dimensions. I had it packed with an assload of Gatorade and honestly, that was plain idiotic. Sure, it gave me something to drink, but after seeing the sort of supplies available in the US's Dollar Generals? Man, just buy on location... Trust me. You're hauling enough weight with your tent, clothing, gear etc to bother with bringing along items just as easily purchased wherever you're going. Now, things like toiletries and sunscreen (DON'T forget sunscreen... You'll see why later) you can bring along because they're not typically too heavy but food and water type materials? Don't bother hauling'em.

So I spent 13hrs in transit from Toronto to Scranton... Not exactly a quick trip. I'm trying to organize a chartered bus trip down next year but that's a piece for another post. My trip involved a stop-over in Binghamton, NY where I got to feast on a MASSIVE platter of pancakes at Chris's Diner which is located literally across the back lot from the Binghamton Greyhound terminal (actually a well-built and attractive building surprisingly). They've got great staff, the customers were all very chatty and seemed like a large portion of them were more habitual than just 'regulars' and the staff treat everyone like family. The prices? Dirt cheap, and it's a shock considering for like 5$ and change I had more hash browns, eggs and pancakes in front of me than I could've HOPED to eat. Just take my word for it, you might not realize it but when you're looking at that menu, your eyes are bigger than your stomach and NOTHING is as portioned as it seems... Shoot low. Great food though, can't stress that enough.

Besides the Binghamton stopover things flowed pretty quick. Lots of snoozing on the bus, playing on my PSP and on top of the relative peacefulness of the trip, I managed to plunk myself down beside some pretty awesome busmates.

Touchdown in Pennsylvania:

Rolled into a rather dated bus station in Scranton, PA to await pickup by my friend and ballin' buddy Sabria 'Valkyrie' McLaughlin a short 4hrs later. I took a stroll to The Mall at Steamtown to browse around but to be honest... There really wasn't much going on there. The short walk of Scranton that I experienced was a lackluster affair and if I were to make this trip again I'd be making sure to schedule myself to arrive as close because there's just NOTHING to do while you're waiting, especially while hauling so much gear with you.

A short drive later after Sabria picked me up and we were at her place where I was able to shower (thank god!) and get ready to head out to Skirmish. 

Now to give you folks an idea of what I was hauling just in the way of paintball gear and camping necessities I've included this little pic of my stuff all laid out piece-by-piece. Note, my sleeping bag is absent from the pic as are my CADPAT pants and shirt (never leave home without'em).

The Friday evening at the park was all about the social aspect of the weekend. Everyone making introduction as best they could amidst the relative chaos of 3700-something players. There was registration of course and a lot of glad-handing with your teammates, browsing the vendor row setup, and oh don't forget the beer tasting put on by Three Guys and a Beer'd Brewing Co. I have to say, their beer tasting pretty much made my night as not only was the beer fantastic but it was probably the most efficient way to gather the most players around for me to get my introductions done.

Spent the majority of the night drinking, laughing and mingling and having on HELLUVA good time. If anything the trip was worth it just to chill with all the ballers, hanging out with old friends and getting to make new ones.

Catching Some Zzz's:

It worked out fine for me...

But my campsite bud Sabria? Yeah, not so much. Folks, if you're out camping just try to remember one very important thing about planning for inclement weather... Either shield your tent's door or angle it away from the rain because if you don't? You could roll over the next morning into a half-flooded tent and trust me, or you can take Valkyrie's word for it, you do NOT want to wake up to that after sleeping on the floor of your tent without so much as an air mattress.

Me? Is stayed warm and dry (still feel kind of guilty for my luck) and woke up the next day ready to hit the beach... Or so I thought. Trust me folks, your first time out? You're NEVER ready for the beach... It's just too much in too many ways for you to possibly prepare yourself but I'll cover the beach assault -you guessed it- in my next installment of the ION 2013

Until next time my fellow ballers, keep calm and throw paint!

Joshua J. Taylor - The 'Noob' Baller