Timbol Mosquito Family Have The Ride of Their Life (so far)
On a perfect sunny spring day in Boston, Greg, Julie, Keane and Cole took off on a very exciting adventure of a different kind. It is not every day you get to ride in a big black Peterbilt called “The Grumpy Pete”. 
The Timbol family won a ride in the truck at the Acton Boxborough Youth Hockey Mosquito annual end-of-season tournament– aka ‘The Caldwell Cup’ held in Biddeford ME every year.
The ride lasted a couple of hours and began on Rt 111 West before a very quick run up 495 North to Rt 2. The acceleration of the big C-15 CAT caught Greg by surprise – zero to 60 mph in under 10 seconds is pretty good for a big rig!
Once on Rt 2, we traveled all the way into Lexington before heading south to Waltham via 95 South. From there we took Rt 111 for an ice-cream pit stop at The Dairy Joy. Because it was a wonderfully sunny day, the line of people was at least a half hour long. A quick vote for a change of ice cream venue and we were off to the local Timbol haunt at Erikson’s in Maynard. En-route we stopped for some family snap shots in front of the Peterbilt. At Erikson’s parking was interesting to say the least, there’s no lines or rules so you basically park wherever you can, which meant on departure we had some tricky maneuvering to squeeze our way out.
During the ride, Cole, Keane, Julie and Greg all got to ride up front and experience what it is like to change 13 gears and keep a big rig rolling along. Cole and Keene mastered the gear changing quite well and later proclaimed they were ‘naturally gifted truckers”. Keane was curious as to why The Grumpy Pete had “an elf” for a hood ornament – obviously not a Snow White & The Seven Dwarfs fan!
When the Timbol’s were not riding up front, there was plenty to do with movies on demand and lounging around in one of the two beds complete with “CARS” bedding. Cool drinks were also on hand from TGP’s mini refrigerator, however, the new 12-volt popcorn maker refused to ‘pop’ the corn — back to the drawing board for a more powerful corn popper.
For the Timbol’s there was lots of fun and memories and an ideal way to end another successful Mosquito hockey season.