Thanks for the comments from everyone on my last post. I'm getting the ball rolling on charting but i still a long ways to go. Ive been planning and getting things together, and talking to other charter captins (blah blah for you guys lol) its coming down to a letter from the doctor saying i'm able, (for two licenses i need) and finding a job with a schedule. My old man is trying to talk me into laying it all out and chartering full time in the summer and finding winter work. I'll have to get that approved with the wife lol. I have a few boats on my wish list, but first things first. When i get the legal stuff out of the way i will get excited. I'm hoping next spring /summer i'll be set up if it all works out. Well tight lines everyone! keep in touch.
Ben

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well it's been a while since i checked in. We lost a few great people on here, but we should celebrate that by being ourselves and sharing our lives. I'm still working hard and fishing harder. I'm going back to the doc in a few weeks, so we will see what comes out of it. anyway here is what i have been up to.

I've been fishing hard with the old man, and trying to get the wife out few times. I'm planning on getting my us coast guard liscence so i can charter. It $700 so i figure if it never comes together it's not a whole lot lost. Getting paid to fish ahs got to be the best job in the world so we will see. Things otherwise have been good. For those who knew me from before the puppies are all grown up and really lazy (lol). The wife is still in school, and will be done in the spring. She is going into social work. things age good, but i'm definatly feeling the strain. I just plan to keep on keepin on. hope everyone is doing well.
Ben

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The red cross puts on a decent tournament in the fingerlakes here in upstate NY. This is my third tournament this year, and I finally placed. I caught the second place rainbow trout that weighed 6.18 lbs, and won me $1075. WOOHOO! The last couple tournaments ahave been nothing but headaches and bad luck. It's all worth it now. heres some pictures.



getting the check


the leader board.
Great weekend!!!!!!!

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Edited: 07/13/2009 at 11:07 AM by icefisherman

Well my last post was icefishing, so i guess it's been 5 or 6 months since my last post. Things have been ok, i've been fishing lots of tournaments for trout/salmon lately. No money fish yet, hopefully this weekend. The job thing i posted about was kinda fueled by a bad day, but was re-enforced recently when my old boss passed away. He had worked for my company for over 30 years. When i moved up north for a different job he called me up and asked what it would take to get me back. He looked out for all of his employees, put in his time, he passes away, and the guys that have worked there forever(and were good friends with him) couldn't get tim off for his funeral. Work has always been #1 for me. The economy is fueling this regression of workers rights. it all boils down to $$ in the end. The days of company men, and workers pride seem to be slipping away. all that matters is the bottom line. Printing is a dying trade anyway. things have been making it worse.
I guess that is life, it's never fair but in the end its all we have. But then again it wouldn't be fair for me to win the lotto, buy a 30' sport fishing boat and live on lake Onterio fishing for salmon year round (HINT, HINT, KARMA!) LOL ok i'm done. Hope everyone is well!
Get well soon Mel!
Ben

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It's been almost a year since my last blog. Our old computer crapped out on us and we got a new one for christmas. Anyway it's the most wondeful time of the year. Theres ice on the lakes, work is slow, and i'm fishing more than sleeping or working lol. Gotta love it! Here is a tiger musky i caught last week.




Everything else is good, wife is good, dogs are good, fishin's good. lol sounds like the makings of a country song, but i guess that would need ex-wives lol. anyway hope everyone is well.
Ben

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Edited: 01/16/2009 at 10:52 AM by icefisherman

Finnally i got to have a full day of icefishing, either i have been working or the ice on the big lakes wasn't safe. I took a guy i work with out for the first time. We got out on the ice at sunrise and there was standing water all over the ice, this made for some hard walking. After almost falling on our @$$es a few dozen times we got out to our spot, and got all our gear set up. There was only two other people on this end of the lake when we got out there. The next people that came out set up right next to us, litterally. To give you an idea, the lake is about 1 1/2 miles wide at this end, there is us and two other guys spaced out a long ways, and these guys drilled a hole about 20ft away from our last tip-up. I don't have a problem with this if they would just ask. UGG, we had to listen to them yelling at thier kids all day and just being real a-holes. The guy i work with was new to ice fishing and he lost two walleyes at the hole on tip-ups. I caught a perch, ling, and a walleye, and then we got another flag on our tip-up. The guy i work with was running out to it, and our neighbors yell out to him"your not going to catch it anyway". Well he did catch it, it was his first walleye, and hit first fish caught hand over hand on a tip-up. It was a slow day but wasn't too bad, untill the walk back. It was windy all day and we noticed the water was dissapearing from the ice. It hade been running down our iceholes so we figured that was why. we got near shore and there was the water, it started out 2" then 4" then 6" then it was over a foot of water on the ice. water went over the top of our boots, our sled with our gear started to sink, there was tipp-ups floating around, and the best part. My buddies first walley got out and made a run for it. he started swimming away twards me and i grabbed him lol. wegot everything onto shore, went back and got all my floating tip-ups. We didn't lose anything so we did ok. Our feet were soaked, so we drove home barefoot (about a two hour drive) We got back around 8:30 pm, and he still had a big grin on his face from his catch. I guess it was a good day, and a good adventure.
So that was my presidents day.
Ben

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It's been a while since i took a hike, just for the hell of it. I walk a lot hunting, trapping, and fishing, but today i just went for a hike like i did when i lived near the adirondacks(damn i miss the mountains). I decided to take a walk up a seasonal road, which led to a long meandering through the woods. Everything seems to go away when i'm out there alone. My thoughts shift from work and bills to life, but in a good way. Well atleast for me. OT for a sec, but part of the reason i haven't been around much is because my social worker i had for a few months told me that these cf sites are full of negative people, and i thought to myself thats me. Not because i'm negative about life, but because i deal with my cf in a different manner. Anywho, back on topic. I find comfort in nature. Some may find it odd that i hunt and trap, and still find my answers there. In the end, no matter how complex or simple, we all give our part to the cycle of life. I find comfort in that. Every time i go into the woods i see something new, or something i didn't notice before. There are so many things that get passed by everyday that we don't see. not only in nature but in everything. My first job was at a Wendys, I sarted when i was 16 and on my 18th b-day i became a manager. Now you can have you thoughts about fast food service, because i think most of it sucks lol, but we were a benchmark store and trained many managers for other stores. The best thing that My boss ever did (that made a difference in how i live) is there was a book that we would evaluate the previous managers duties in. The first day as manager i got done with my shift and my boss told me to take the book and evaluate myself. Now i could have just checked everything off because i went through the list and did everything, or so i thought. But instead i looked at my work as i would look at someone elses. There were a lot of things i spent a lot of time on that needed work, and otherthings with less time that were ok. Our minds have a way of making effort put into a job equil quality, but thats not always true. things like these we look over everyday. We judge people everyday without really thinking about thier lives. And we put value on material things that really dont do anything but boost are ego. I'm saying this because i do it too, we all do it. there is nothing wrong with doing something because it's fun, we should all do what makes us happy. But every joy comes with a sacrafice. Our life is a canvas, is yours a self portrait or a scenic painting? Neither is wrong, neither is right they are just different. LOL this may seem to be wondering off topic, but this is what my mind does on these hikes. Questions and more questions lol. I like to question myself, and challenge myself. Anyway back to the hike, i would guess about 8 miles. It felt good. cold air, all alone. I just need to get my camera back out again. so i guess if your reading this i might as well ask what you guys find comfort in. Nature is one thing for me, but i grew up racing, and love to push a vehicle to the limits and go fast. Also i shot archery. Many things make me who i am, what makes you who you are?
Ben

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Hey everyone, i'm still here. Just trying to keep busy, not that i really need to try lol. My work has been busy, i'm on 8 hour shifts but we have been working most weekends. They changed our hours at work down to 8 hours, which kinda sucks. I like the 12 hour shifts. I either get lots of days off, or lots of OT. They are talking about going back to 12's when we get a few more people. I have only been out icefishing a few times, but if we get this weedend off you know where i'll be. Wife is good, puppies are good, house is good.........ect.ect. still haven't done much of anything with my camera since i moved. well, that's all i can think of. hope to hear from some of you.
take care
Ben

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this is my basset hound Daisy, she is 8 weeks old and about 10 lbs. I used my wifes digital camera for these, but i'll have some better pics when i get my film developed.


hope everyone is well
Ben

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well i haven't been on much lately. My grandfather passed away last month, that was hard. he passed away the day before fathers day, and we had a bbq planned for my father, and my grandfathers. Needless to say that was called off. he was a great man.
My job has been going well, stressful but well. The puppy is good. My great-grandmother is having her 90th b-day this weekend. She is still sharp as a tack, i have never met enyone of her age who is in as good of shape as her.
I bought two boats, one i have been taking out fishing, and the other needs work, but will make a better boat when i am done. one boat is a 1959 lone star, and the other is a 1963 mfg. both 14ft.
i haven't been taking many pics, but i'm planning on going out this weekend.


hope everyone is well
Ben

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ok, nothing really good, but just things that have happened over the past months. The puppy is Gabe, a jack russel. the blue house is our new house. the cabin is the cabin my parents got this spring, and the snow pics are from my last snowshoe hike up north...... I miss the mountains, but i'll go back.


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heres a few pics from the other day. there is still ice on everything but all the power is back on. we lost power for almost 3 days.



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a few pics from last week.

enjoy!

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Enjoy!

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heres a few of my usual outdoor pics. The first two pics are from my hike up Lower Wolfsjaw mt. the day after my hospital stay, i had to get out lol.

heres a few pics i took screwing around indoors
and my first attempt at a sun pic. I had my camera maxed out for this one f/32 1/1000 sec. exposure on 100ISO film with the darkest filter i had, and it was still overexposed lol.

enjoy!

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Edited: 12/03/2006 at 07:24 PM by icefisherman

a few of you have been asking for pics, so heres a few.




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The first pic is a bear track I came across. Pretty small as you can see. The rest of the pics are pretty self explanitory. To give you some scale on the pic looking up to the Summit, the summit is about 600ft higher than where i was standing. If you look close there is another hiker about 3/4 of the way up. just looks like a little white spec. The last pic is looking at Mt. Marcy which is NY's highest peak. I climbed that mountain onMay 1st. I'm feeling much better, not very sore anymore. What a great hike!
Ben
here's my last post to keep things simple
I made it back ok. The hike was great. It was by far the hardest I have ever done. I didn't do both peaks as I had planned. the trail to the second one would have been very steep both ways, and after looking at it from the summit of haystack i realized that doing both would be insane. The hike turned out to be 18.2 miles and the summit was 4960ft. the trail head started at 1520ft so that's a 3440' ascent. I had to go over the summit of two other peak before reaching Haystack, both were very steep up and down. The second summit was Little Haystack and the trail from there to Haystack was so steep i decided to leave my pack on Little Haystack before i went on. everything was in the clouds so I didn't have a good view. Mt. Marcy (highest mt. in NY) was right next to it, and i only got to see the summit for about 30 seconds during a break in the clouds. I didn't take many pics, but i'll have them developed soon and will post them. I'll have more for you later.
Ben

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Edited: 08/29/2006 at 05:12 PM by icefisherman

Boys gotta play lol

Anyway the mountain pics were from my drive up Mt. Equinox. The brow covered bridge, and the inside shot of the covered bridge were from a bridge near me. The red bridge was in Vt. This was my last two rolls of film, and i'm happy to be having more keepers enjoy!
Ben

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Here's some picture's of our new Rav 4. We have had it for three weeks now, and love it. I've been keeping here all shined up and purdy. I got this new wax, i think it's called NXT by Meguire's, and OMG i'm in love. The shine this wax puts out is amazing. Some day I'll have a hot rod ('32 ford coupe, with a 427 i hope ) to take pictures of, but this will do for now. enjoy!


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May 1st,

I took the greatest hike of my life today. I woke up at 3:00 and started my two hour drive to the high peaks of the Adirondaks. I had to stop and get film and some drinks and then I was off to the trails. I arrived to the trailhead @5:30am and it was perfect timing. It was just light enough to see. I started on the first trail which was easy walking. I wasn fairly level and smooth. It was 2.8 to the trail that would take me to Mt. Marcy. I had been up this trail before, and made good time. I hit marcy dam at 7:00am, this is where many trails start from. Marcy dam is beautiful, there is a camping area around a lake with great views of the mountains. I headed out on the trail to marcy which was still 5.1 miles away. the light was a lot better eventhough i was on the dark side of the mountians, I started taking pictures but tried to keep a good pace. The trail got steeper, and then i saw it.... snow..... Well i hadn't planned on that(wearing sneakers) but i decided to keep going since i had gone this farI passed to 3500ft marker and thought i was making great time. the snow on the trail was easy to walk on, and not slippery. The snow off to the side was very soft, and i had seen where people had sank in up to thier hips. At about 8:30 I hit the Creek that runs over Indian FallsA hundred yards or so away I saw it. This was one of the most beautiful waterfalls I had seen, and it was so far back in the woods that it just seemed like a hidden treasure.
I was there for almost an hour taking pictures and exploring, then I got back on the trail. It started to get very steep, but in a short time I was seeing my first views of the hike. I passed the 4000ft marker and there it was, my first glimse at Mt. Marcy from the trail. It still towered above me, but i was getting so exited my pace quickened to a speed walk. At about 4500ft the land leveled off and gave me a much needed break from the steep uphill. Before i knew it I had began the final acent to the summit. I was now anove the treeline and had breath taking views(is that dangerous with cf lol). I couldn't take my eyes of the other mountains, but i knew i had to keep going to make good time. the snow was very deep but like before the trail was packed, and the waliking was easy. It was about 60f and the wind was blowing at about 25mph.
At 11:25 I had hit the summit, 7.9 miles 5344ft woohoo!!! I sat down ate my lunch, and enjoyed the views. I got my camera out and took a lot of pictures. I had the place all to myself, and it great.


For atleast an hour I ate explored the summit, I set the timer on the camera for a self photo, and then got packed back up. I started back down the mountain only to realize that the snow had sofened up on the trail. The times i went through up to my waiste, and had to crawl back out. i meet two guys on my way down that were on thier way to the top. I warned them about the snow, and told them how great of a day it was. There wasn't a cloud in the sky, I could see for about 80 miles in all directions. I wonder how they made out in the snow.
The rest of the trail had gone to hell. I kept breaking through and my feet were soaked. The trail was now very slippery and this made the steep parts very hard. In my previous hike up Agonquin(the mountain behind me in my picture) I had bent down and slid on my boots like i was skiing. This time my pack weighed more, and I had my camera so i decided against it. Most of the time the trail decided for me and i would fall on my butt and slide untill i could catch myself. The tip back turned out much harded than i thought, plus my feet had been wet since the summit. It felt like it took forever I was so sore and tired all i could think about was just getting back to the car. Finaly @5:00 pm i reached my car and headed for home. I am still sore, but this hike was more than worth it. I hope you enjoy!
Ben

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Edited: 05/02/2006 at 01:50 PM by icefisherman