kickingfrog

Start with a budget, ballpark it at least to narrow it down. Do you wear glasses? Contacts? What do you plan on doing with them? Hiking, fishing, hunting, star gazing or watching birds from your back window? Are you rough on stuff? Do you want them to be water proof?

It is hard to make a rainbow trout ugly. So I guess congratulations are in order. Just because something can be done, does not mean it should be done.

Twist the knife a little why don't cha. Nice to see you squeeze every last bit out of the season.

Too bad this board doesn't have the time change worked out. Yes, I have DST checked in my controls; yes, I have reloaded the board index, but the time is wrong. I have real issues with time.

One rod can not be all things to all conditions. At least that's what I tell my wife when I go tackle shoppin'.

That's a great day!

Terry's got you headed in the right direction, and I'll assume the videos are useful. You'll hear a lot about an educated thumb. The top end reels can be easier to use and require less "education", but nothing replaces practise. Practise does not make perfect, perfect practise makes perfect. As you get better, you will have less and less birdsnests, but you will still get one every now and again to to keep you from getting too smug.

Eight thirty Newfoundland! Neat video. That man has enough fishing memories for all of our lifetimes.

Anybody else have a mental picture of MJL standing 14 feet away from a hole in the ice? I like the idea of adding "eyes" on the ice jigs.

MY EYES!!! One can not unsee what has been seen. :closedeyes:

I need something in the photo for scale gbfisher. I'd like to see those through the stages as well.

FYI gang. Shoppers drugmart is selling the Fugi z33 wp for $150. I assume they are getting ready for the new version Dave mentioned. Looks like neon lime is the only colour if that matters to you.

Good idea! I think I'll use a lifejacket.

Maybe I'll give it a shot in word and then copy and paste it. It might be an even better story without the facts from my lost journal.

I've seen floating pliers at a few stores. My suspicion is that they may not work for snot, but I don't know for sure. I have not yet lost a pair over board, but there is always a first time. Experiences?

Done. http://www.ofncommunity.com/forums/index.p...c=41414&hl=

I was too afraid to bring a fly rod, and I've been kicking myself for 12 years about it. The lower river was unfishable due to the suspended particles. That delta didn't form overnight. If I was a better writer (and faster typist) I would tell the story of the "Grizzly that didn't know we where right there". One of the other great sites was twice watching gyrfalcons capturing other birds in flight. The speeds where incredible to see in person.

WWII Archive project: http://www.ontarioveteranarchive.ca/ On the news tonight they had a story about a project to get stories and photos from Ontario WWII vets. They also mentioned that right now about 500 WWII vets die every week in Canada. Lest we forget.

The family that the liver came from would have to give the ok, as would yours to them.

Thanks for the comments gang. It was a very memorable trip. I did keep a journal, but I can't find it after 12 years and 4 house moves. The photos made it very easy to remember the majority of the trip, but I'm sure there are some stories that are lost until I can find that journal. All try to answer some of the questions: YES!!! Very buggy! We had a dinning tent to allow us to try to eat our food without ingesting mosquitoes with every bit , it even worked sometimes. The tight weave nylon pants and shirts did a lot to thwart the bugs and bug jackets were used as well. On the river wasn't too bad even if there wasn't much of a breeze. Even the rocky banks/shore areas weren't too bad either. The big issue was if you started walking in the low scrub areas away from the river. You would basically kick-up tens of thousands of mosquitoes as you went. There is a picture of me somewhere, my upper back, shoulders and hood of my rain jacket looks like fur. At these times there was a constant hum of mosquitoes wings. The 24 hours of daylight lead to some unexpected issues for me. I never had a problem with sleeping in "daylight", although it took me a number of days to adjust back to darkness, although sleeping in a bed after 5 weeks, may have had something to do with it as well. The advantage was that any mosquito in the tent at night was easy to locate. I did developed some bad camping habits though, because you could put anything down and find it easily at night because it was not dark, that first trip back to Algonquin was a rude awakening. For all the fish, that one picture is the only one. We were just fishing for food most of the time and the cameras were packed away. The pike and lake trout were very ordinary, but I really wish I had a photo of one of the Arctic chars, because I may never catch another.

So when are we goin' fishin'?

Back in 1998 I had an opportunity to go on a 6 week canoe trip down the Horton River in the NWT. The trip would take the 6 of us, 2 kids’ ages 8 and 10, their parents, me and another adult downstream 650 kms to the Arctic Ocean. The husband and wife are both teachers and often spend their summers on long canoe trips that they meticulously plan and research. The intent is to film the trip and sell the footage either as a feature nature show or at the least sell shorter clips to the various nature shows. They offered me a spot. It was a once in a lifetime chance that I could not pass up. The Horton River starts north of Great Bear Lake and empties into the Beaufort Sea at Franklin Bay (No Franklin expedition like stories here). We left Toronto at the end of June and returned in the middle of August. 24 hours of sunlight every day of the trip. We landed in Edmonton in the middle of the night and tried to sleep for a few hours before our flight in the morning. The flight the next day took us from Edmonton to Inuvik had stops in Yellowknife, Norman Wells and one other place that 12 years on I can’t remember. From Inuvik we would take a 500km flight on a float plane to the River. We had built in a few buffer days on either side of our trip in case of weather or what ever else that can happen on a trip of this nature. As it turned out we would need those days at the start of our trip. In 1998 there were a number of fires burning in the north. None near us, but the float planes were being used to fly in fuel and other supplies to the crews working the fires. We spent a few nights sleeping in the camp grounds on the outskirts on Inuvik and then after having to unload the plane because of an emergency call we spent a night in the small parking lot of the float plane base. Campground in Inuvik, Mackenzie River delta in background Float plane base We brought with us all the gear and food we would need for the entire trip with us. Most meals were homemade dehydrated, vacuum sealed food, which we supplemented with fresh fish. The canoes we had were pakboats (brand name) basically these canoes have a frame that is bungee corded aluminum poles with a heavy vinyl covering. The advantage is that these canoes when broken down fit in a large duffel bag and meant that all six of us, our gear, food, camera equipment canoes and pilot would only have to make one trip in and one trip out, saving a lot of money. The down side is the canoes paddle like a... well... like a folding canoe. Now the photos: in 98 I had my father’s 25 year old manual camera. What a tank, it is now over 35 years old and still works flawlessly. I brought about 20 rolls of 36 exposure film, and used most of them. The scans are not the best. We unload our gear and prepare for our journey. We had a satellite phone with us for emergencies, but other than that we would not have any contact until the pilot came back to get us in 5 weeks at the mouth of the river. It rained the first day after we had set up camp. After the rain the sun came back out and we were treated to this... And the trip of a lifetime had truly begun. The upper river held lots of grayling, basically you made a cast and if you caught a grayling you would be able to catch a fish on every cast. If you didn’t catch a fish you moved to the next spot. I don’t remember having to move to the second spot ever on the upper river. So for the first 3-4 weeks we had fish whenever we wanted. We also caught the odd pike, lake trout and Arctic char, but grayling was the staple. As you’ll see in the photos the river changes quite a bit as you near the Ocean. The expectation was we would come across one of the large caribou herds as they moved from their summer grounds to their wintering areas. This would also mean wolves, a classic predator prey relationship. We did not have a set schedule. The intention was to meet the pilot at the Ocean in 5 weeks, although the satellite phone would allow us to change plans if necessary. We paddled most days and took lots of hiking trips away from the river to explore and find signs of wildlife. There were a few places where there was a great spot for the tents and places to shoot. One of our early camp sites up a ways from the river. This stretch was very much canyon like with few good/ safe landing areas and less camp spots. The other 5 people had traveled the Thelon River before (yes the 8 year old had more experience than I did, I could still carry more then he could though). I discovered something that the others had already experienced We called it Ridgeitious. With the rolling nature of the plateaus above the river basin you would walk up a small rise thinking that you would have a great vista once you got there, only to find another small rise obscuring your imagined view. Walk up the next rise and experience it all over again. No one rise was high enough to allow you to see as far as you would think, but the terrain was not “flat” enough to see either. Very frustrating. Caribou antlers Lots of snow/ice in the more protected valleys. This was a warmer than normal summer for the north (remember the fires) Most “days” it was high 20’s and the water was wonderful to cool off in. A midnight dip to cool off after a day of paddling. Some of the wildlife: Wolf prints Grizzly Bear print Golden Eagle chicks Caribou We never did find the big herds and never saw or heard wolves. Muskoxen this was one of our most dangerous encounters. A lone male, he bluff charged us a few times but we backed away and he went on his way. Many days after the lone male we came across this heard of Muskoxen I think there were about 21 of them in total. We did see a few Grizzly bears. This was the only photo I got though, the other times they were either too far away for a good shot or they were too close and we were too busy trying to figure out who would get eaten first. The river changed quite a bit as we went downstream much wider and slower with larger and larger meanders. There was less vegetation as well so the rain we got in the 3rd week really muddied the water. You’ll see at the Ocean there is quite the delta from all of the runoff. Never did find out what the blue stuff was. About 40 kms from the river mouth we were at a meander that took us less than a kilometre from the Ocean. We spent 2 days there and hiked up and over twice to see the ocean and the shore. River on the left, Arctic Ocean on the right. River meanders from the plane on the way out. This was my first live view of any salt water in my life. Franklin Bay on the Beaufort Sea. One of the other highlights of the trip was the Smoking Hills. As I remember it this is an area of high sulfur and as it oxidizes it “smokes”. I will leave the science up to the experts or just look it up yourself. There was no beach but the shore was covered in these pumis like stones. Smartie beach On both of these trips to the sea we saw wildlife only once we were walking back up the hill. A seal The other time it was a group of beluga whales. I cannot find the photo though. Group shot. I was very fit before the trip and never felt like I was starving, but I still lost 23 pounds, 13 pounds of which was muscle. Can you see them? Ptarmigan River delta in the background And from the plane That's all, there are some more photos somewhare, if I ever find them I'll post them too.

Man. I thought the lake was for sale.

Personally, I have used many combinations of lines for many fishing situations. The one I haven't used and don't plan on is....... all 100% flouro. All lines have pros and cons, our task is to find the right line, or line combination, to suit the conditions. 100% Flouro behaves poorly as a main line and its biggest benefit, which is less visibility for a given diameter, is not needed for all the line on the spool. Flouro has a lot of memory and is very springy and while it may stretch more than braid, it won't stretch as much as mono. Good luck with what ever you decide, and please let us know how it goes.