Steve and Paul even designed an elaborate point system to determine an overall "Best Gamer" and also had a wooden plaque ordered to award to the one of us who won the most games / points (aka, the biggest geek). For his part Paul pre-made a number of really nice meals and on Saturday evening barbecued us a 10 pound salmon fillet (it was HUGE!)
So, all 7 of us arrived on Friday morning and the gaming began. On Friday, from 9am to 3am I played: Thurn and Taxis, Liberte, Santiago, Power Grid (using the Italy board), Acquire, Around the World in 80 Days and Modern Art. On Saturday from 8am to midnight there was: Puerto Rico, Struggle of Empires, Modern Art and Santiago. Finally, on Sunday from 8am to 2pm we played: Ticket to Ride Europe, Hoity Toity, For Sale and two games of Diamant.
One of the best parts of the weekend was that our cottage was on a bluff directly over looking Lake Huron. This meant that we could play a couple of games and run down to the lake to go swimming for a while before coming back up and starting another game. And, to top it all off, the weather was so nice that Paul and I slept out on the grass, under the stars both Friday and Saturday nights. Also, it turned out that this weekend was the Perseid meteor showers, so I woke up periodically each night to watch shooting stars zinging across the sky over my head.
The only downside to the weekend was Saturday's 8 hour Struggle of Empires game. SoE is a pretty aggressive game anyway, but after that long sitting around a table everyone's nerve's were fried and we were all getting pretty uptight, if not downright hostile to one another. I know I sure did my share of ranting and raving. I'm no big fan of area-influence games anyway, and Paul promised it would only last 3 hours, so after 4 or 5 hours with no end in sight, I was getting pretty edgy. I was especially embarrassed about my bitching and moaning since I ended up winning the damned thing in the end anyway. I hate getting pissed off during a game, but we all do it. However, we're used to this sort of thing happening from time to time, so afterwards we all just laughed about it, went swimming and started up a new game. At least we didn't play Mare Nostrum or Illuminati.
In the end over 130 beers were consumed (3 of which were mine... I'm more of a rum guy) and Jake took home the grand prize, has bragging rights and gets to keep the plaque until the retreat next year. I have to congratulate him again. He completely dominated the weekend with the sheer quantity of 1st and 2nd placed finishes. You da man, Jake!But, the plaque Steve picked out has 11 more blank name-plates on it. That means at least 11 more summers of 3-day board gaming extravaganzas to look forward to! Aint nothin' finer!
