She's Back

Her name is Abbie (but recently there has been a problem with that name.

So after two months off the road.............  My truck is back!  Let me just say I have nothing against not having a car but having my truck back is great.  There is something about knowing if I need to do anything I can get in my truck and go do it.

There is an Abbie at church and her sister Kella is feeling left out so.  Now her name is Abbie Kella.

She was showing signs of neglect after getting back on the road.  So after changing the oil, putting some additives in the oil and fuel, and a cleaning the truck was looking and running much better.  I got a new tool box from a church member who was just storing this one.  I made some dividers and put a couple tools in the box but I left a large space for fishing other gear.

My new box!

I love stickers but sometimes cars covered in them looks bad so I put these in my box.

I have had a chance to do a little more fishing now that I have my own wheels.  This also means I can do some more side work or drive to potential places of employment.  I also think Sarah likes having the truck back because take trash day with her car was starting to smell.  Well with my truck back on the road I am hoping to get more material to write blog posts about.

I staged this shot but I normally have at least one rod in it.  It would have 4 or 5 like this if I was going on a long trip.

-Bruce





  

Where it all happens

I had a busy week and the fact that I had a busy week coupled with the fact that I did not take my computer to New York City with me in the middle of the week means my blog suffered.  With great hopes of updating my wish list and putting up three new posts last week, but what I did is just sad. In an effort to start this week out right I am doing another OBN prompt.  This time it is a photo prompt so here is the photo tour of where I write my blog.  Since I am letting pictures do the talking (and the captions) I will let you know that this week I plan to do better then last.

This is my desk, where I can write, tie flies, and a lot of other things.  There is a window facing the woods on my right, and the room has all my rods, guns, knives, and anything else outdoor related.  

 

 

 

This is a better shot of everything right after I set it up for the first time.  

-Bruce

NEW ROD AND REEL

As a Christmas present this year my mom and dad got me a new rod and reel.  It is almost the same as the one I put on my wish list a while back.  My parents gave it to me in sections, mom handed me a rod tube that said Redington in white letters.  After I had put it together and started waving it around mom tossed me a box.  It felt like a reel box and when I took the wrapping paper off, it was the reel I was planning on pairing with this very rod.  So there it was the basic rod and reel I wanted for months now.

If you go the the wish list and look at what I wanted I also had a fly line picked out.  The same day I got the rod and reel my brother, dad and I went to Bass Pro where I used some Christmas gift card money to get the exact line I had been reading about.  In one afternoon I went from having a self built combo on paper, to actually having it in my hands.  There is nothing like getting a new rod and reel, it is an amazing feeling to hold a new outfit and dream of all the trout it will land.   This combo will be landing many wild and native trout because it is a 3wt, and will stay on smaller waters most of the time.

Now the day after all this excitement I took it on a little test fishing trip.  The waters were all cold and aside from a couple skittish brook trout and some suckers they had no fish in them.  I really just wanted to test the line and rod as a pair.  The cast was very smooth, and the line lifted off the water very easy.  These two worked amazing together for all kinds of casts, false casts, roll casts, and even a shot cast I use in tight spots.

The rod is a Redington Pursuit 3wt.  The rod I was looking at in my wish list was an 8 footer, but this one is a 7 foot 6 inch which in hind sight is probably better because of how many small streams I tend to fish.  Also the shorter one is a 4 piece where the 8 footer is a 2 piece rod.  The 4 piece rod is better because most of these small streams are back country and require a hike.  Now about these 4 pieces, when they are not put together casting and catching fish they are tucked away in a smartly made rod tube.  This tube has a built in divider which keeps all 4 pieces from rubbing and hitting each other.  The whole thing is a nice little package and it will travel very well in all kinds of traveling situations. 

Now for why Redington, well it is a simple story and it only took 8 or 9 years till I owned my own.  Somewhere around 8 or 9 years ago in upstate PA my family was on vacation with my uncle and aunt.  We were spending a morning fishing a lake  that my uncle said had been stocked with trout earlier in the week.  I took my fly rod, and fished all morning with not so much as a missed hook set.  Sitting on the bank I watched only one person land any trout, and it was an old man who was fly fishing.  I went to the truck for a snack and he was at his van with his fly rod.  Much like I would now I went up to him and started a conversation.  He drove an old Chevy van that he took the back seat out of and replaced it with a couple drawers.  He opened the bottom drawer and he had six fly rods lined up in it, and then showed me the 5 drawers above it and all were lined with rods.  Among these rods was a Redington he spoke very highly of, comparing it to some of his bamboo rods.  He let me cast that rod and I missed a fish or two on a swimming nymph pattern he later gave me.  Ever since that day I have been reading about the company and its products.  I am thrilled to now have my own and I am excited to land that first trout on it.

Now I can not remember what reels this old man had in his van, but reels never really had my attention.  That being said you can not have a rod without a reel.  I have always been a fan of a simple look to my reel.  In a search for something simple but built well and made with quality materials I turned to G Loomis.  G Loomis is known for their rods much like Redington, but both make reel.  Their reels have never been the standout, but from everything I have read they are as high a quality as the rods these companies make.  I looked at Redington, most are mid arbor reels but I wanted this rod to look much more simple.  A couple years back my brother bought a G Loomis Venture 5 it is a simple look, but has some edge to it.  It is a gold reel and looks very simple.  The Venture series is simple in all respects there are three reels in the series.  The Venture 3, 5 and 7 each number corresponds with the line weight it can hold.  So I got the G Loomis Venture 3 and it is a perfect fit to my rod.  The weight and balance of the rod and reel is amazing.

This just leaves the line, and I am not a line tech guy so I went out on a limb with why I picked this one.  Lots of reading and asking questions lead me to Rio Lines, and once I was there I was steered to Rio's Trout TL.  This line is made for "delicate presentations" as their ads says, and all the science talk to back it up.  As I fished the empty waters near my town I decided to put a dry fly on to see if I could see a difference in lifting a dry fly off the water.  These are all things that this line is clammed to do better then the next line, and you know what, it does a wonderful job.  The difference is not something that someone who does not fly fish would notice but I saw it and hope it makes a difference when a finicky trout is checking out the presentation.   





 My new outfit has me very excited and as soon as I get my CT license I will be finding a small stream to fish.  The last picture is one of the rod on its first trip, I hit up two streams and caught no fish.  This trip was a success for the simple reasons that I got a chance to test the rod and line on the water.  Thanks for reading along and check me out again later to see what else I came home with from my parents house.





-Bruce

A Christmas Go To...

 I have been called hard to shop for, and that goes double when you are limited to a budget.  That being said Sarah always does well when it comes to getting me something.  I drop a ton of hints, and sometimes I can be a 'pain in the butt' with all the hints.  With the move I got most of Sarah's big ticket items before leaving Atlanta.  When we hit the week and a half point Sarah looks at me and asks how much I spent on her gifts this year, and continues to tell me she had gotten nothing for me.  I said I did not need anything and that I would be happy with socks because mine are getting old.

A couple days later Sarah was snooping on my computer, and I found out after the fact that she was on my amazon account looking at my wish list.  She said she opened the wish list and saw what she thought was a good gift for me.

I like knives, and have a small collection that is growing.  Sarah got me a really nice knife that I have had my eye on for a while.  I decided today that I would write a post highlighting some of my favorite knives and maybe take a picture of as many of them as I can get in a shot so here goes.

First knife I am highlighting is my multi-tool.  I carry this tool everywhere I am allowed, and also take it fishing with me.  As knives go this has gotten me out of the most pinches weather its pinching barbs in regulated fishing area, or fixing my old bike on the side of the road this is knife has been there.  It is a Gerber 01471 suspension pliers, on it is almost everything I need.  Pliers, wire cutter, saw, two blades, can and bottle opener, and much more.  Sadly the one you see here is my second knife, I lost the first and this was a present from Sarah because she knows how important it can be.

This folding knife has been in my collection for a long time.  It is a Sig Sauer which is better known for their guns, but this tactical knife has been my favorite for years.  I bought this knife, but used some money from a gift card my uncle gave me so it too was a gift.  Most people see knives as weapons or get scared when I say I collect knives, but the truth is I see them as tools.  This knife has been used as a steak knife, spatula, stirring stick, branch cutter, screw driver and countless other things.  It was my survival knife for years, but now I carry it as a back up survival knife. 

The reason my Sig Sauer knife is now only a back up survival knife is because of this guy.  This is a Gerber LMF II survival knife (22-01400) and it is just that a knife built for survival.  Four of my groomsmen and I bought this knife before my wedding with a couple of symbolic reasons.  We were going to wear it under our tuxes but they are just too big and we thought it might make people mad to wear them on the outside.  At the time of the wedding we had a groomsman in Iraq, and two weeks before the wedding I found out my brother (best man) could not make it because he needed to report to Wisconsin for new coast guard post.  Anyway both of these guys got this same knife as a gift.  Then there was the three groomsmen who bought it as a symbol of the one who could not be there, and this knife is something we all have in common now.  It was build for military use, but makes a very useful survival tool.  The LMF II can be strapped to a leg, belt or molly system, and it has a built in sharpener in the sheath.  There are three holes in the handle so it can be lashed to a stick for self defense, it has a hammer on the end, and a glass punch.  This is my primary belt knife when I hike and yes it is heavy but if I was to be stranded somewhere it would be worth its weight in gold.

So Christmas morning this year, Sarah tosses me a gift.  As I was catching it I knew it was a knife, because a knife in a knife box is something that has a very distinct feel, sound, and shape to it. When the paper came off I saw the box and the letters CRKT, and judging by the size and weight I knew exactly what I was about to see.  It is a CRKT(Columbia River Knife and Tool) M16-14ZSF, which according to my lovely wife was at the top of my amazon wish list.  I have no real review for it as of yet, but it is very sharp out of the box as CRKT tends to be, and that it is well constructed.  It came with an extra pocket clip and the wrench to fit the screws.  

There are a couple reasons this knife was even on my amazon wish list.  First is the look, it just looks cool and as shallow as that seems sometimes a look will do it for me(in the world of knives).  Next is the brand I have read only good things about CRKT and I am starting to understand why.  

As far as looks go this knife has every thing working for it.  From the tan handle with the large holes, to the flat silver tanto blade.  The pocket clip can be put on any one of four different positions, and then there is the part that is both function and style, the flippers.  These two flippers make opening this knife so easy it is not funny, but very serious.  The same flippers that help in the opening of the knife also turn into a hand guard so that you do not slip off the handle if you need to apply force to a forward motion.  

 Lastly the knife have a great locking system, it has an inside lock that only operates when you move this red pin on the top of the knife.  With about a day worth of practice I was able to master the this locking system and even close the knife with one hand.

So once again my wife came through with a great gift, and I think she knows that if she can find nothing else for me at Christmas time she can always go to the "go to gift" and get me a nice knife.   Sorry this has been a lot of reading, and if you are a knife person this really has not been very informative but if you are not I hope my views, passion, and respect for knives and all they can do for us has shown through.  I will leave this post with one last thing, a picture of just part of my collection. These are the knives I wrangled up for the photo shoot, and when I am running short for post ideas in the future I will show off more of my collection. 

 

-Bruce

Outdoors Room

So, after about a day of total work it is basically set up.  I have an outdoors room, and from this room I will write a lot, read a lot, and tie a ton of flies.  The idea is to keep all the outdoor stuff I have gathered over the years together.  As I cleaned and organized the past two days I decided I would hang some stuff from my glory days on the walls, and in the process found myself hanging some from Sarah's things well.  So now the room is an outdoors/trophy room which I think turned out nice.  I want a couple more pictures of outdoor adventures but they will come because my wife does not go anywhere without her camera and we are going to do more outdoors thing here in Connecticut.    So how about I give you the dime picture tour of the outdoors room.

Yes it looks full, but I have been collecting outdoors stuff for a long time.  Plus you need to remember I have a bunch of metals from my wrestling and track days. Sarah got a great old desk from her mom and I got Sarah's desk from Atlanta.

The selves are great and I put some of my things on them, but most important I put some of my reels on the bottom one.     The reel is my favorite part of an outfit and I have always looked for deals on old ones so I have a couple now

Now this I am really jazzed about!  My tools can be in a drawer and they can all have their space.  If it would not be midnight I would tie a couple flies tonight but I am shot.

This is the vice it is well lit by a lamp my father and mother in-law are letting me use.

Remember that large closet I mentioned in the last post?

Well everything fits, but I spent some time in there putting up hooks, and figuring out how I was going to make it work.

That safe is now safely fastened to the fall with guns and rods in it.  I know over kill to lock your rods up but really it is to keep me away from them till I get a CT fishing license and a job. 

So can not wait till this is a very true statement, but when my mom gave me this sign I knew where I wanted to put it. 

 Okay it is late and I spent a ton of time in this room today.  As a reward for a couple days of hard work I think I am going to go for a hike tomorrow(a.k.a in a couple hours).  If that plan happens I will post pictures and a review of where I went how long and hard the hike ended up being but for now I am hitting the hay....

-Bruce

A little life....

Sorry that my last post was not even me, but Sarah and I were and in many ways still are in the process of moving.  My parents and I got here a week ago today, and I have been almost nonstop since.  We moved from Georgia to Connecticut, but a better way of putting it for me is we move from a city to the country.  Trying to write an outdoor blog in Atlanta was hard because at times I needed to make a stretch in what I called "the wilderness".  Here on the other hand is almost too easy, sadly the past two weeks have been filled with packing, moving, resting(maybe a day of rest), and now unpacking, but I can see a light at the end of this tunnel, and that light is a hike in my near future.

Currently we are in the unpacking and making this house a little more our own stage.  We are much closer to my parents and sister in this house then Atlanta, and we are even that much closer to Sarah's family which is a wonderful change of pace.  Now for some excitement we live a stones throw from a river, and better yet I could get to it and fish in less then ten minutes.  The places I have had luck fishing are more like a half hour away, but even that is better then Atlanta.  A couple of the outfitters that I think are worth visiting are in the area (Backcountry Outfitters and Housatonic River Outfitters) and I am told there are some I have not found in some of these small towns near by.  So now that I am settling here in Connecticut I thought it was time to start blogging again.

Sarah has been hard at work on her blog since the move and if you want details on the move from her eyes check her out are www.thestrengthoffaith.com/.  I am hoping to keep this blog more on the outdoors side, and aside from getting a christmas tree yesterday we have not done a lot of outdoors just yet.  I am not going to post on the tree because Sarah did a very good job.


Before I pack it up and call it a night I want to show off what is basically a room for my outdoor stuff.  I am not a fan of calling it a "man room" because I am trying to encourage Sarah and some of my other friends and family to come join me on an outdoor adventure.  So for now I am going to call it the outdoors room unless someone else out there has a room with a name other then "the man room".

Here is the room now.  I am hoping in a couple days it will be set up a little closer to the way I want it.  Along with suggestions on the name I am also open to suggestions on basic organization and layout.

This is it, the smallest room in the house but I liked the shelves and  what you can see looking out the window.
All my things are basically on the floor at this point, just a couple things in the garage still that will move up here once I start to straighten up.

This is something else I love the closet is big and will hold a lot of the stuff I collected over the years

I am hoping by mid week I will have a finished photo up, and maybe a little feedback will help with the process.  Also I am hoping to go for a hike with Sarah and maybe that will make it on here as well.  Lastly there is a desk in that first picture where I hope to tie a lot of flies and write for my blog so keep your eyes here for some changes because they are coming to most parts of the blog.  Thanks for checking up over the past week even though I have been in hiding and that should not happen again for a while.  

-Bruce

Feeling Like Gilligan

So last week on Wednesday Sarah left for Connecticut she had meeting and things to go to.  I just started a new position at work and felt like asking for time off wouldn't be a great idea.  Wednesday I dropped Sarah off at the MARTA station then headed to work.  Spent most of the day at work learning a new computer system, but at the end of the day I had some free time to play on the internet.  Before long I found myself on one of my favorite sites, goFASTandLIGHT.com.  I found the site a while a go but hadn't bought anything from  them, until now.

The site is great the guy who started this online store has a good story too.  I encourage you to go read the story in their site just click about us and read.  The short version is this man broke his back mountain biking, and once he was rehabbed he wanted to get outdoors again.  He found that everything was really heavy, or expensive.  The site has items that are smart, lightweight, sometimes with multi uses, and the prices can't be beat by anyone.

Back to Wednesday I spend sometime at work looking at each page.  I found maybe a dozen items I liked, but I decided to get one that really interested me.  It is a hammock, a net style hammock.  I was interested because  the web site said it could hold up to 2000 lbs.  2000 lbs thats amazing, Sarah and I and about 1700 lbs could lay on this thing and it would hold us, that just sold it for me.  So it came Friday and I had a chance to take a couple naps on it this past weekend.

It is nice and light weighs about a pound, and small rolls up just a little bigger then a softball.  Comfortable to sleep in, I have one made from parachute material, it is lighter and just as comfortable, but this one holds a hundred times more weight.  Also this one is a net so if you are in a survival situation you could use it as a net, if you are a back packer you can hang your bag in it over night to keep bears and other animals out of your food.  Sleeping in it in the sun this weekend, made me feel like I was on Gilligan's Island, and the style matched the feeling



Well hopefully I'll get out fishing this week sometime.

-Bruce