bigbuck

Nice pics, Kastoria (Kostur) is the area I'm from. It is definitely beautiful country there. It's been 20 years since I've been back to the land of my parents. Supposedly, there are some pretty big pike in Lake Kastoria along with trout, I'll have to check that out in a few years when my kids are old enough to go there. I still have some family in some of the villages but most were forced out because they were Macedonian. It's a long sad story and it is true, Macedonians (esp. from Northern Greece) and Greeks don't get along politically, but that said, some of my best friends are Greek and I grew up on the Danforth.

Greece, where the men are men and the sheep are scared!!!

OPA!

Great report and I'll just bet that fish fry will be a huge hit!!!

I'm green with envy!!!

Matt, you get my cheque yet??

Come everyone, buy some tickets!! Big Jim is a really good guy, he's one of the most approachable fishing gurus out there and is willing to share his knowledge to anyone.

I guess you caught yourselves a whole whack of fish!!!

Awesome!!!

NICE FISH Lew!!! she sure is purty!!!

I hope all had a great time up at Lakair, maybe next year for me.

NICE!!!

You lucky buggers!! I'd give my eye teeth to be up at Lakair with you guys!!! Mind you, don't feel too bad for me, I'm off to play golf up at Bigwin Island today (work thing you understand).

AWESOME!!! He's a cutie!!! Start him young, a rod in his hands from the time he's 6 months old and he'll kick KVD's butt on the Pro Bass circuit!!!

Lew, call Brian at JB's, I know they sell the Walleye-1 (???) deep cycles, he might be able to hook you up.

Lew, great report, especially the part about having daddy's day brekkie on the dock (BTW, it's the greatest day of the year).

I hope you slay the toothy critters this year my friend.

Nice boat, great wife, don't toss her back in, she's a keeper!!!

Use the new boat in good health.

A client who is in the process of getting divorced after 25+ years of marriage had 4 words of wisdom when it comes to marriage............BE TRUE TO YOURSELF.

I wish you the best of luck but this sounds like it was doomed from the start, if the two of you did not have anything registered as joint, I don't know what to say.

Save up and buy something of a higher quality that you'll have for years as opposed to buying cheaper rods and replacing them every couple of months.

Yup, I'm 37 and I'm getting lost when I hear my teenaged nephew and his buds talking. I used to think I wasn't a dinosaur but.................

I for one enjoy Jen's posts. It's great to see young lads out fishing and doing the things boys are supposed to do instead of spending hours on end watching the tube or playing video games.

Fishmaster is a regular poster here and his posts are great, he's not shamelessly shilling his charter service or store here.

I think everyone needs to spend more time fishing and less time on their computers.

Good on you Sinker for getting Cliff's motor going!!!

The fishing gods were kind to you, Kawartha walleye, and a few of them!! I'm still trying to hook into one!!! I've caught everything else the Kawartha's have to offer but no 'eyes!!!

From what I've read, tying the leaders or crimping does not matter as long as you are using high quality terminal tackle (swivels, etc...).

For tying high lb test fluoro, use a canoe knot, you can google it to learn how to do it.

Good luck.

DEVASTATING NEWS!!!

My condolences to the father who survived.

To those out there who question the wisdom of the Operator's Card, this is why the government is doing it. Common sense does not prevail in many people (and that is what the bulk of the test is). I hope the person who was operating the boat that roared by knows what he/she did and suffers for the rest of his/her life knowing what they did.

I am both saddened and enraged by this tragic event. I have a young family and I would probably never recover if anything happened to my girls.

I'm going to be in for some tix as well. I spent some time talking to Big Jim and he's one heck of a great guy. I sure hope he beats this.

Just remember to take it all with a grain of salt. Always read the message boards to see what everyone is saying about a particular item. Most of the magazines get their equipment for free in exchange for constant plugs.

I can't wait to test drive my new Calcutta TE400 spooled with 80lb PP. That was my first E-Bay purchase and it was well worth it, I saved about $150-200 on it depending where you shop.

Now I need to save up for a St Croix Legend muskie rod to pair it with.

You can't go wrong with a Calcutta, that seems to be the consensus. As for Daiwa, I've heard some bad stories about their service. Abu makes a decent reel but for everyday use, they tend to wear quickly. For a weekend warrior, they are fine. Like Lew says, "Abus are like a Chevy". They work fine but are not fancy. Penn reels are tough to find here and what do you do for service?? St Croix reels are made by Daiwa so they are essentially a Luna that has been changed a bit.

As for rods, they are all pretty good, St Croix, Shimano, Thorne Bros (I've heard some great stuff but once again, service......???), Daiwa, Quantum, Fenwick, etc.... I'll stick to what I can buy locally because at least at a local store, you can always exchange or have them send out broken rods/reels for service.

Actually, what looks interesting is the Okuma line of muskie rods, they start at under a $100 and look to be quite stout and are very, very light. I'd like to hear what folks have to say about them.

Fishing lines are all in the eye of the beholder, there are good ones and even they have the odd bad batch and there are those that just plain suck. Either a good braid (PP or TuflineXP for me) or Trilene XL mono, that's all for me.

Shaun,

Please tell me that you had a chance to wet a line, the walleye fishing right now should be fantastic along with the big pike fishing. I don't think the 'eyes have moved out of the secluded bays yet.

The Canadian Tire in Kenora for those of you who have not had the opportunity to visit has an incredible sporting goods department. They sell St Croix and top end Shimano including the reels. There is even a halfway decent selection of Muskie baits for those bitten by that bug.

The hunting section has a bigger gun selection than Lebaron's (which is very very good in it's own right).

I remember when the store was by the lake, you could dock your boat and go shopping there and the nearby Safeway for your groceries.

Shimano Sahara for under a hundred bucks would be a good choice. A comparable Daiwa or Quantum reel in the same price range would also be good choices. 2500 size would be perfect spooled with 6lb test.

Real Inflation is much higher than the gov't cares to reveal, go grocery shopping and actually look at the prices of EVERYTHING. Many economists estimate it to be running at over 10%. That is scary, wages have not risen that much to compensate.

I reiterate an earlier post, Re-evaluate your debt load and decrease it as much as possible, sell off STUFF if you need to but don't carry too much debt or you will sink. Save till it hurts and then save some more. Oil probably will not come down in price very much, the era of cheap energy is over. Get ready for $200/barrel and $2/litre for gas.

We are in a bigger mess then our elected leaders care to admit. My personal belief is to be conservative with your investments (I am a financial advisor) and don't make a lot of big ticket purchases unless they are a necessity and are bought with cash, not credit. There is a recession looming that could very easily become a depression. Our high dollar and high cost of fuel is choking the Canadian economy, raw commodities command high prices but our manufacturing sector is dying quickly. They are fine out west but here in Ontario, we are hurting and the federal government is watching with glee. It sickens me to see how Canadians (yes I said Canadians) out west hate us from Ontario. I saw it in Vancouver a few years ago and I was amazed at just how pervasive it really was. I guess PM Harper is finally getting to build his fence around Alberta like he's always wanted.

That's enough ranting, I could go on for days.

NICE!!! A free cot, now you have the $100 that you were going to spend on the cot burning a hole in your pocket - dinner with the colonel or a few brand new muskie baits - hmmmmmmmmmmmmm......................