Hey Artie, did the Baja come from sandcastle marine by chance?

Sure did!

at least im 99% sure... was a long time ago, and I was quite young. I do remember going up to the factory when it was being built, and I remember a sandcastle T-shirt

Who can post a pic for me? I have a great one to show how it started for me.

The entire season in the white gator skin case may or may not live on my boat

Hah, that's where my Dad's jet came from. I have many fond memories visiting that place. First, you never knew what you would see there! There was always something cool. I remember seeing a Miami Vice Scarab there. I always loved the one V-drive "the roach" they once had. Every time we would visit there would be a truck load of boats coming in. They had to have sold the most Bajas in those years. Can't forget all the Mariner outboards and those ugly painted Cris Crafts. They were two tone painted with a ugly dark tan and either bright blue or bright red stripe. The other memory was all the snacks they had out. They seamed to always have donuts and Conns potato chips out. The icing on the cake was al the flys landing on the snacks.

One cool memory was when my dad took the jet out for a test drive before purchasing it. It was a cold Feb day in 82/83.... Ice still on the lake in areas... Hank put the boat in down from where Charlie lived. The boat sounded great from what I can remember, however my dad was not happy with the performance. At that point he did not want it. The boat barely broke 60mph. My dad was not to happy. At that time his current boat was a 17' Kona w/ a 125 or 150 hp Merc power tower was running as fast or a little faster... Hank was not happy either. He pretty much said "well, I guess it's time to take the boat back to the shop and shave the hull". They pretty much did that and some pump work. The performance was night and day. Needless to say he went with the jet.

specialtyautowerks at g m a i l (dot) com

Had just gotten married, and decided was time to buy my first boat. Shopped around, and ended up at a dealership that carried Wellcraft. I drooled over 38 Scarab, but my budget only allowed for a 196 Eclipse (which I ended up buying). After a couple of seasons in SoCal lakes, decided a camping/boating vacation at Lake Havasu was in order. My first time there.

So day 1 of our vacation we launch late in the afternoon, at Sand Point Marina where we were camping -- looking forward to catching a beautiful sunset. I was blown away at the desert beauty of the lake. So there we are, floating in the middle of the lake all by ourselves, watching this awesome sunset -- when along come two big boats, one a cat another a v, screaming along side by side, glass water, at sunset, at Havasu. That's all it took to push up my trade-in schedule.

I2D

For me it started when I was either 5 or 6 years old. Sitting on my Dad's lap steering the boat. The first boat my Dad had was a 1964 15' Carver wooden boat with an Evinrude 60 hp top speed 32 mph. That was the first boat I rode in. The next boat was a 16' 1991 Starcraft Mercury 115 top speed 52 mph. The first boat I skied behind and learned to use the throttle and driving it. The next boat my Dad got was a 18' 1996 Checkmate with a 175hp Evinrude top speed 60 mph. That boat got me into the go fast boats. The first boat to go on solo runs with. This is how everything evolved for me. My Dad has always had a boat.