Big Cliff

Same thing here Bernie, lots of slush on many of the lakes. Not fun if you get a sled burried in it. At least with an ATV if you don't get hung up you can chew your way through it. Good on you for towing those poor fools out, kind of stupid for them to venture out without snow tires at least.

It sure is a very worth while cause! Maureen (Motv8tr) started the whole thing some 9 years ago and worked her tail off to put it all together! She rallied the troups, collected donations, aranged for food, washrooms, prizes and people to help with the running of it and getting donations. If it hadn't been for her this wonderful tradition probably would never have started. From there it has grown over the years and Maureen had to back away from it a few years back because it was just too big for her to handle and and keep up with the requirements of her job and life but from those seeds that she planted it has become an event that many look forward too every year. Many of us have had the pleasure of watching Tyler's progress over the years and knowing that our intervention has been a really big help to the family. Tyler's parents have continued where Maureen had to leave off and a wonderful tradition continues. The really big bonus for many of us was the friends we got to meet and the relationships that have formed. For me one of the bonuses has always beeing seeing Joey's beautiful smile! If you haven't had the opportunity to share in this wonderful experience you are really missing out so if you can get involved this year would be a good time to do it!

Joey, I am so sorry to hear about your hard drive failure, ours crashed two years ago and we lost a lot of things that will never be recovered not to mention all the software that I lost. I talked to one of the "data recovery" companies and they told me it would cost about $1800.00 but there was no guarentee they could recover anything. I got a new hard drive installed in our computer and then went to Staples and bought an external hard drive and have set that up so it automatically backs up all my files. With all the tech savey people on this board I hope one of them will be able to help you get all your stuff back!

I'd love to see a video of that!

Sue woke my up at about 4 am wondering what the loud bangs were, I told her it was just the kids down the street throwing snow balls at our house, she went "oh" and rolled over and went back to sleep. Blonds

Some of our laws are so stupid you wonder who wrote them and how much they got paid for doing it. One I always got a chuckle out of is " you can't drag a dead horse down Young St. in Toronto on a Sunday" (any other day of the week is fine I guess).

Nice of you to rub it in -37 here with the wind chill this morning, I have had enough of winter already and it's only just started! Happy New Year to you too and perhaps we can get to fish together this year.

That is a low life move whoever did it! Sorry to hear that! Just makes you want to smack someone along side the head doesn't it!

What a beautifully written report, I really enjoyed reading it! Congratulations!

And I slept right through the whole "ball drop" thing LOL, woke up at 6:00 am and it was already 2014! Happy new Years everyone!

And the count down begins; right after supper I'll set the clock about three hours ahead, when the clock strikes 12, I'll toast in the New Year, I'll get to sleep in tomorrow morning, get up when the clock strikes 9:00 am and still be on the ice by sunrise! Life is good! A very happy New year to each and every one of you and may 2014 bring you health and happiness (and lots of fish).

1) Betty White without a doubt! I think she has an amazing sense of humor! 2) Justin Bieber so I could choke some sense and respect into him. 3) Rick Mercer, straight up honest approach to things and he isn't afraid to have a good laugh at his own expense!

Lew has the ideal setup, it is all automatic, starts itself up once a week and runs diagnostics, lets you know if there is a problem. No heavy fuel cans to lug around in the middle of the night or during a storm. Comes on when needed, goes off when it isn't but they are quite an investment! If you can afford it, it would be my first choice. Bernie is right about the inverter generators, much quieter, good clean power, and they do tend to be a lot more fuel efficient but if it is a wide spread power outage you could have trouble finding a gas station that can pump gas. Good second choice though. The CTC type ones do work, I have a similar one, 6500 watts. I had an electrician wire it into my panel for me with a shutoff so I can disconnect from the grid in case of a power failure (wouldn't want to back feed power into the hydro lines for safety reasons). It works, but it is loud and it can burn through 5 gal of gas pretty quick if you leave it running all the time. It is still better than nothing if you have a prolonged power failure. I guess it really depends on your budget and level of comfort you want.

Things sure have changed over the years, I can remember back in the beginning when I would post GPS lat/lon to a favorite fishing spot because I wanted others to enjoy my good fortune and it was always a pleasure to share it. Today I won't even post about a good catch because as one member put it one time "everyone knows what lake you live on"! In a way I do have to agree though, now if you post a good day of catching and give any details you can be sure that you will have a crowd around you the next time you go and they aren't always ethical fishermen. You are right, it is sad!

Honda generators are excellent but even they won't work worth a darn if you leave fuel sitting in them for a year or two before using them. If you are going to spend the money getting a generator, make sure you service it properly. I have a CTC type one, it is noisy but works just fine (I can put up with a little noise if I need the power). I keep the tank drained when it isn't in use, I change the oil in it every year even if it hasn't been used and I keep the battery on a battery keeper so it is always charged up and ready if I do need it. I've had this thing for about 5 years now and the only time it got any real use was when Beans lost power a couple of years ago and I took it over to his place for him.

Take it to your local fire hall, they might even be able to use it for training purposes or something!

X 2 If it isn't in the green, just toss it and buy a new one, it is probably going to cost you less than having it recharged.

Ran into a friend of mine while fishing on Sturgeon Lake yesterday and we decided to head a little further North today and see if we could find some rainbows. It turned out to be a good choice, there was only about 2" of snow on the lake, no slush, and a good solid 12" of ice! I even got to try my new 20V DeWalt drill out on his 8" auger, boy does that work slick but we could only drill 4 holes per battery. None the less, it still made it one heck of a lot easier than me trying to crank that 8" auger. The fishing was slow, I did manage to catch a nice 17" rainbow and another fellow managed to land two of them. All in all a super day to be out in the fresh air with a good friend!

Man I wish I had known, I had a 6500 watt generator sitting here that I would have been happy to loan to anyone that needed it! Strangly, with all the people suffering without power I only had one person try to contact me and that was Christmas eve. By the time I got their message and got back to them on boxing day they had power. Anyway, glad it all worked out for you and once again OFC comes together to help one another!

Plenty of them around here, we often see them out here on the lake in the winter and there were fresh tracks in our yard last week. Do you use dogs to hunt them?

Ya, somethig not adding up quite right here unless I'm really missing something!

Just got back in off the lake, it was tough getting around even on foot. There is a couple of inches of snow on top of a thin crust, on top of slush in many places. We found a few spots with about 4-6" of slush but a friend just called and he saw a guy just off Pleasent Point stuck in about 14" of slush. Been there before and it wasn't fun and I was 30 years younger then! The areas where we were today had a good 10 - 12" of ice so that part of it is good. Just be careful out there, we were in a sheltered bay.

We tried meal worms, rapalla jigs, minnows, Berkley power maggots, Fin S minnows (all my old go tos and a few other things) the bite was very light, they just didn't seem hungry and even when they did hit a minnow you'd hardly see your rod tip move. Tomorrow I'm going for some rainbows, we'll see how that goes!

Sounds like a steller day of fishing to me!

Ya well exactly as expected when fishing with pikeslayer, one fish caught by his son-in-law and that was it for 4 hours of fishing LOL. Doesn't matter it was still a wonderful visit and we did get out fishing!