doubleheader

I have a 07 Ridgeline. I think it is essentailly the same as the new ones. I think you'll be very satisfied.

Looking forward to meeting you Rich. Looks like we better increase our beer purchase at the duty free eh?

If you have a 4wd atv I think you should put them on all 4 wheels, 2wd just the rear might be better.

Thank you all very much. Now I'm really pumped for our trip.

Hi everyone Doubleheader here from Pennsylvania. I've never had the opportunity to meet you folks but as luck has it we are booked for 2 weeks at Lakair starting June 27th. This is our normal 2 week vacation at Lakair and I'll be there with my wife Amy and our good friends Gary and Ellen Hubbard. I hope to get the chance to meet you all and share a cocktail or two. Please forgive my ignorance, but as an annual get together of OFC friends, do you have a friendly tournament? I have been on this board for a few years and always wished I could meet everyone, looks like this is my chance. we'll be in cottage #11- please fell welcome to stop in for a cold one.

Hi all. I've enjoyed reading these opinions and even got a few chuckles. I myself have a Honda Ridgeline, and while it does what I need it to do I don't consider it a real truck. That's fine by me, like i said it does what I need it to do and in comfort. It pulls my boat, carries my 4 wheeler, gets me to work, camp, and home, and never goes back to the shop. I really could relate to the Silverado horror story, because I have a similiar feeling about Ford. I had a Ford F150, and in 2004 (I think) I qualified for the Cabelas National Team Championship in Dubuque Iowa, a trip of some 1200 miles each way. I'm going to give you the short version of the story, not because I'm trying to hide anything but because the long version would take pages. Anyhow, 3 days before the tournament I had a fuse problem. Dumb me did not bring any tools, but thinking it was no big deal went to the Ford dealership in Dubuque just 2 miles from our hotel. To make a long story even shorter, by the end of the tournament week I had paid the Ford dealer over $500.00 for 2 fuses; actually 4 fuses because they replaced them twice. At the time I was pretty sick about it, but I was focused on the tournament. When I got home the problem occurred again, and that's when I pulled out my invoice copies and looked at what they had actually done. I replaced the 2 fuses for the 3rd time and then determined the root cause, which was my trailer lights were intermittently shorting out and causing the fuses to blow. Anyhow, while it certainly wasn't the dealerships responsibility to fix the trailer, in my opinion they certainly took advantage of me. I wrote Ford and I wrote the dealership and I never got any satisfaction. I sold the truck within 3 months and will never in a million years buy another Ford anything until I receive a fair compensation for being ripped off. Anyone who believes that it's people like me that are contributing to the economic collapse in the U.S. are sadly misinformed. I've spent my life in manufacturing, I've worked since I was 15, I'm a veteran, and I pay taxes...a lot of taxes. Anyhow, like I said, I've enjoyed reading these posts.

I can't speak for Canada but I can guarantee you this, the optimistic outlook for the US is the market goes nowhere in 2009. Pay your mortage and you eliminate the interest you would have paid. It's a no brainer.

Okay, went to you tube, watched a video of some guy interviewing another guy, I assume Mr. Mackie, using a poor imitation of an italian accent. What's that all about? I still don't understand why he's in trouble. I admit after a few minutes with no explanation I gave up. All I know is that governments big enough to provide are big enough to take away. I just wish people could get that before it's too late (speaking about the US gov't here). It appears Mr. Mackie is the latest victim of the government, in this case your government, "looking out for you" I assume the guy with the fake accent is trying to avoid prosecution or harrassment?

I guess I don't understand why he has been summoned, but reading between the line I assume there is some ordinance against releasing an arrow in his community? Before I add more, which would be nothing but a rant on big government anyhow, I better request a clarification.

Hi Peter,

Doubleheader here from Warren, PA. I don't post much but your story isn't the typical one often read and I thought I'd add my 2 cents to what is really great feedback from the OFC community. I have 4 grown girls, almost positive they are heterosexual, but I suppose one never knows for sure, so I've never experienced what you're experiencing. I do, however, know and work with gay people, and I really think the world is pretty knotted up about what should be a personal matter. Sounds like you get that, and are a great dad. More importantly it sounds like your son trusts you. It doesn't get much better than that. I am almost 57, and I am not perfect in my own acceptance of these things for just like you I don't care to watch gay men or women kiss. I hope that's only natural given my generation, and I certainly don't think you should feel guilty. My only recommendation for you is to continue on, keep the communication lines open, have honest discussion with your boy, always make sure he know you love him, and if things start to go the wrong way in your relationship seek expert help. We need more understanding and tolerance in this crazy world. If there were more parents like you it would be a far better place. Best of luck to you both.

Well, here's what I do. Mind you my boat is stored cold:

Boat: Make sure all compartments are thoroughly dry. Blow out livewell water lines, pull boat plug and tilt high enough to insure everything is empty, pull batteries, remove bow mount motor, top off gas, add Stabil to fuel and run so that it thru the entire system, pull prop clean, lub, and reinstall.

Main 4 stroke Motor: Change lower unit lub, motor oil and filter, pull plugs and spray fogger product into cylinder, turn motor over, reinstall plugs

Aux. motor: Pretty much same as above.

Store motors in vertical position to insure no water is entrapped.

Okay, above, in the first reply to this post I said I'd never buy another Ford. I won't, but not because of quality, because of the way Ford tries to rip people off. Here's how I became a Honda owner. Started off with an outboard I bought in 1997. Around 2001 the flywheel came apart, a couple years out of warranty. Honda covered the parts and labor 100%. Around a year later the paint on the cowling started to peel. Honda covered it 100%. My wife bought an Accord in 1998, put 100K miles on it and never bought anything but tires and brakes, not rotors, just brakes. I bought a Pilot in 2004, after 3 years with zero problems I decided I wanted to trade it for a Ridgeline. After Dealer incentives and rebates, Honda gave me $26,000 trade-in (paid 31K new) on the Pilot that had 47K miles. My wife now drives a Civic around 70 miles round- trip to work each day. She has 60K on the Civic, no issues, gets 38 mpg except in the winter. Although current outboard is a Mercury Verado I even own a Honda mower. Honda makes great products and stands behind them. They understand that it's far more easy to retain customers than find new ones. As a result they establish business policies that align with that objective.

No offense but that's nothing. Let me tell you a real Ford nightmare. In 2004 my partner and I qualified for the Cabelas Team Walleye Championship to be held in Dubuque Iowa. We took my boat and drove my F150. Before I left I had a short in my trailer which I had fixed. We arrived a week early to pre-fish. Two days before the tourney while returning to the hotel we stopped for a pizza. Returning to the truck I noticed my headlights were on; soon I also noticed I had no taillights and no dash lights. We took it to the Ford garage up the street from our hotel. The garage got us in the next morning. 4 hours later I was presented with a bill for $350.00. That day everything worked, but the morning of the tourney I didn't even get out of the lot before the same thing occurred. We took a chance and drove to the launch anyhow. The tourney director gave me permission to use my phone on the water to call the garage. The garage picked up both my boat and trailer, took it back to the garage (5 miles away), did some work about which they were unspecific, and presented me with another $150.00 bill at the end of the day. After the tourney I drove home to PA without event. That weekend the same thing happened a 3rd time. I took it upon myself to check things out and low and behold found it was a fuse issue all along, which I fixed for under $2.00. So I had $500.00 into this plus all the aggrevation over a fuse. I contacted both the dealership and Ford Motor and never got any satisfaction. I traded the truck in within a month. I will never own another Ford for the rest of my life. Sorry if I sound bitter, it's probably because I still feel I was robbed.

I literally have no idea but I'm sure between my spinning, fly, casting, trolling, and noodle I'm close to 50. Of those probably 10 get 85% of the use.

That is one fine walleye. Great, great fish. Congrats

It's always good to have a plan just in case- no doubt. That said, I refuse to watch the news in the U.S. It's all being orchestrated to convince us to vote one way or another. Have a plan but don't let the hype get you down.

I did not contact the OPP and I should have. I had my eye out for one of their patrol boats for 2 weeks with the thought I'd flag them down and never saw one. In retrospect that was a bad approach I should have contacted them that day because I had witnesses and they were also staying at Lakair.

Well Whopper I saw a lot of that near the bridge also as well as some guy pulling his kids on a tube and then doing a u turn right in front of Lakair's dock and almost pasting his kids into the dock. I know here in PA we have the same type issues; lack of common courtesy, showboating, and a failure to recognize that you need to leave room for the unexpected. People do dumb stuff so you can't expect to be safe unless you are ready for the unexpected, and I wasn't the day we were nearly tea-boned. Safety around the water is so important. Over the weekend two young men from Pittsburgh decided to jump off the top of one of our bridges that spans our Allegheny reservoir. It's 75 feet to the water. One boy got hurt and when his brother went to rescue him they both drowned. What a shame.

It's a white hull, and I'm pretty sure it has the black and gold trim exactly like my boat but I have the FishHawk and I think this was the Sportfish. If it isn't brand new it's not older than a 2007. It had that brand new look to it but looking on the Crestliner website I don't think it was a 2008. The decal package disn't look quite the same as this attachment. More black and gold rather than red.

http://www.crestliner.com/boats/boat_model.asp?BID=30

You know whenever you have something really weird happen you always think back about what you should or could have done. I wish I had the presence of mind to snap a pic as he went whizzing by but the better thing we should have done is grap our life jackets. Truth is I stood there with a Duh look on my face. Knowing how we all do about the reefs up there I do hope he hits one and sinks. I wouldn't wish anyone to get hurt...... okay, maybe a small bump on his noggin would be okay. I was really kind of hoping someone on this board might know the boat. There aren't a great number of big Crestliners with Verados on them up there.

I've done a few stupid things in my day when I've let my temper get the best of me. I've tried to learn from those mistakes with the Lord's help. No one would have benefited from a confrontation and our vacation would have been ruined.

Hi all. I just wanted to relate an experience I had recently while on the west arm of Nipissing. It was Sunday, June 29th, and my wife and I were searching for walleyes between the islands a couple hundred yards west of Samoset. If you know the area you know the vast amount of boat traffic moving through this part of the lake passes between those islands, and it has always been a prime walleye spot due to the current moving between the islands. Knowing it was a holiday weekend I was pretty cautious about fishing the area. I stayed out of the channel center and was jigging an edge about 10 yds from shore moving to the shoreline at about .3mpg with my bowmount. It was mid- day, and our first full day of vacation. My wife saw the boat coming at us first, but frankly when I initially looked up I wasn't that concerned as it was still a ways off. Still, I kept the bow mount moving us towards the island and kept an eye on the boat. I could see it was on plane, but pretty quickly and as I anticipated, it came off plane. I asssumed the operator was preparing to come through the islands, and had adjusted his speed accordingly as there was another small fishing boat in the area. The boat was close enough now that I could see it was a new model Crestliner, either a 19' or 20' with a big Verado (maybe 200HP) and it was full of passengers. I remember thinking, "Hey, another Crestliner like mine with a Verado" That thought quickly was erased with panic as this guy brought his boat back on plane and was now bearing down directly on us. I don't remember if I began waving my arms or just froze. All I know is that his boat passed between me and the island and missed my bow by less than a foot and the rock shoreline by maybe 10 ft. (NO Exaggeration). I was completely speechless, and while he probably passed by me at about 25mph, he then opened her up and just about swamped the small fishing boat behind me. Now here is the really weird part. My wife and I were convinced at the time, and the poor guys in the small fishing boat behind me were also convinced that this wasn't an accident. Even afte giving myself 2 weeks to calm down I'm still convinced. This guy had done this on purpose. I may never know why but I'm reasonably certain he was playing the daredevil for his passengers. He never veered at the last 2nd, never slowed down, and never turned around to see if everyone was okay. The only reason my hull didn't scrape him was because his powerwake moved my boat just enough to avoid contact. The operator was a middle-aged male, and he was there at least the entire week as I saw him on other occaisions heading down the lake. I think he has a home or cottage west of 64 bridge as that is the direction he came from in the morning and returned to in the evening. I never got his boat number. So I mention this to everyone in hopes you'll be more aware than I should you ever be faced with a similiar situation. If you don't always wear your life jackets at least keep them at the ready rather than stowed. Never assume anything. It doesn't help to be right if you're dead right.

And just in case the operator of this boat reads this message let me say, "you'll get yours someday pal, because one thing is for sure, what goes around comes around. You are lucky no one was hurt and very fortunate my wife was not injured."

Some years back I was taking up fly fishing and I read a quote by a famous fisherman that went something like this. " I fish not because it is the most critical endeavor a man can do but because so many other things seem trivial by comparision". That about sums it up. I enjoy just about everything about fishing. My buddy and I have this ongoing debate about which is the best pursut, hunting or fishing. I argue that fishing has all the elements of hunting with the intrique of not knowing what you might have hooked or will hook next, and, one needn't kill the animal (don't get me wrong I'm a hunter) in the pursuit of the sport. It's a fabulous past time.

Thanks everyone for your replies. We truly love Canada and particularly our stay at Lakair. Almost like a 2nd home. Forgot to mention that I just added a kicker motor, a Nissan 9.8 HP, just prior to my trip. I run it as a tiller and I was favorably impressed by this motor during our stay. I have never seen it so windy for so long. I was chewing up my bow mount batteries by noon most days until I started running the kicker in conjunction with the bow mount. I'd use the bow mount going into the wind whenever I got blowed off course and on turns and throwing a drift sock out going downwind to maintain speed. The set-up worked quite well and that motor performed very well on my 1850 Fish Hawk Crestliner.

Hi to all OFC'rs

My wife and I along with another couple returned from Lakair on Saturday 7/12 after 2 wonderful weeks. While our walleye totals were significantly less than last year we still managed 109 walleyes between my wife and I and close to 200 between the 4 of us. As is typical the women catch all the big fish. This year it was my wife's turn and she managed a 28", a 27", and a 25" eye. I caught two 24" eyes. Those were our only fish over the slot and they were all returned safely to the water, hopefully to spawn a couple more years. Most of the time we ran bottom bouncers on harnesses. This year we found the fish quite spread out and on both sides of Rt 64 bridge. We picked up a number around islands, humps, and edges of weed beds. I know others were fishing the weed beds with jigs, but we could not find the big fish in the weeds so we fished more rock structure and edges. Early on in our stay the fish were pretty shallow but by the end of our stay most of the fish we caught were 15-20 feet by late morning. We found the best boat speed to be between 1.2 and 1.5 mph, which was significantly faster than last year, and I believe the reason we weere able to catch quite a few more on bottom bouncers than my buddy and his wife was simply due to our soft tip rods. We were using old style Ugly Sticks which really have soft tips, and the fish would simply hang on until you set the hook. My buddy and his wife were using fast action medium wt. jigging rods. We were all using 10 lb line either Power Pro or Fireline. I thought both the Power Pro and Fireline performed pretty well around the rocks. Our hot harnesss this year was a single peg style ornage float between two chartuese beads and a Stamina clown blade. The fish really liked that clown blade better than anything else we tried and I tried about everything I had. So there you have it. I tried to attach a couple pics but seeing as how I'm somewhat of an idiot on computers who knows what you'll see if anything. Best of fishing to all.