Episode 85: What's Up With Willy?

Step into the icy realms of Northern Ontario as we share tales of adventure, survival, and reflection in our latest podcast episode. Our journey begins with a heart-pounding story of getting trapped on an ice-covered island, accompanied by children and dogs. As we manoeuvre through thick ice and treacherous conditions, we reveal the lessons learned about ice safety and the thrill of exploration. With extended discussions that weave through personal anecdotes and insights garnered from years of experience, this episode paints a vivid image of life amidst the severe cold.

Throughout the conversation, you'll hear lighthearted and serious tales that dive into the community's incredible resilience when facing extreme conditions. We bridge stories about winter’s grip on daily routines with the unforgettable moments created when embracing adventure in nature's beauty. Homeowners, adventurers, and anyone who has felt winter's wrath will connect deeply with the stories of mishaps, laughter, and solidarity shared throughout our discussion. 

As we reflect on the physical and emotional challenges of winter living, we point towards the essence of survival spirit nourished during the cold, urging listeners to cherish every memory made amid the frozen beauty of winter. Embrace the adventure and share a laugh or two with us amidst the tales told—don’t forget to tune in for jack-of-all-trades, wisdom from lodge ownership to daring icy escapades, and wonderful lessons along the way. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe, share it with friends, and let us know your thoughts!

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:05):
We got stuck in the backside of the island because
there was nowhere where thehoneycomb With the girls.
Yeah, with Timmy Boy and Maddieand Violet, and I couldn't back
up.
We were, because there wasn'tenough room to get spun around.
We couldn't get out of the boatbecause the ice wasn't safe.
And I'm like, oh my God, scotty, we could't get out of the boat

(00:26):
because the ice wasn't safe.
And I'm like, oh my God, scotty, and at one point, oh, we had
the dogs, we had my dogs with ustoo.
And at one point I'm like ohyeah, I'm like gee Scotty.
I don't know, we might end upout here for the night in the
boat.

Speaker 3 (00:43):
This week on the Outdoor Journal, radio Podcast
Networks, diaries of a LodgeOwner.
Stories of the North.

Speaker 1 (00:51):
It's just Willie and I today On this show.
We talk about the winter we arein and tell some great, really
cold winter stories and sprinklein a spring story or two just
to remind us.

Speaker 3 (01:06):
yes, spring is coming , we find out what's up with
Willie and so much more.

Speaker 1 (01:13):
So grab those parkas mitts and boots, baby Curl up
and try to stay warm becausethere are some awesome frozen
stories of the North in this one.

Speaker 3 (01:27):
Here's our conversation.

Speaker 1 (01:31):
Good morning folks, and welcome to another episode
of Diaries of a Lodge Owner, andafternoon and evening as well,
because you just never know whenyou're listening to us.
Dandy, fine fellas, and againwelcome to the show.
My co-host, willie, is sittingright here with me.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
Hello folks, Hello.

Speaker 1 (01:55):
Yeah, and Willie, it's been a small minute since
we've talked, so I'm reallyexcited about sitting down and
finding out what is going on inthe Great White North.

Speaker 2 (02:12):
Yeah, buddy, yeah, it's good to see your face on
here, man, it's been a bit.
You've been busy with your lifeand there's been a lot going on
up here.
And there's been lots going onup here For one.
It was like when I got backfrom Dominican it was like minus
four.
When you guys were having allthat snow down in Toronto and

(02:33):
Southern Ontario, it was minus30 to minus 38 here for like 12
days.
So, like you know, everyone'sexperienced that.
Where it gets that cold here inCanada, you know once or twice,
but like when it gets that coldfor that long, you're on
lockdown.
You know what I mean.
Like my buddy Tristan that doesall the plumbing, like it's

(02:54):
constantly.
He has three or four freezingpipe calls a day.
You know, the town, the city ofKenora, has been fighting shit
left, right and center, so wepretty much go into like
hibernation my shoulder's toast,I'm waiting for surgery.
I had to go this week and Iregot my surgery date to go into
Dryden there, so I'm going tohave that rebuilt here right

(03:16):
away.

Speaker 1 (03:17):
Well, at least it's the winter, right, you're in
hibernation like a big old bear.

Speaker 2 (03:22):
Well, at least I can do that, yeah.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yeah, like I mean minus 38.
I living in Shelburne, likethere have been years,
especially when I was a kid,where it would always, you know,
go back 25 years before that wewould hit minus 30, I'm not
going to say on a regular basis,but at least for one period

(03:49):
over the winter Could be acouple of days, could be three
days, could be a week, and likeI mean minus 30, I remember
being a kid and walking outsidethe house and as soon as you
walk outside and take that firstbreath, it near, takes the
breath away.
Like I mean the snot freezesright in your nose.

Speaker 2 (04:12):
Well, it's different down your way too, bud, like
remember I grew up down your waydown by Oshawa-Colberg, right?
So like when the air up here isa lot drier because we're not
right on the Great Lakes likeyou, like you're humid.
Up here is a lot drier becausewe're not right on the great
lakes like you, like you'rehumid.
So like minus 30 here it's okay.
So like minus 20 here is likereally normal and you can just
like you can, walk around in ahoodie.

(04:34):
You know it really, once youclimatize to it, it's not bad.
Minus 30 here, that's.
You know that's when it startsgetting cold.
Past that right, but I meanit's minus 30 there I find is a
lot colder because of thedampness.
Yeah, and the humidity in yourair.
You know like minus 30 on thecoast out in New Brunswick and
shit.
I couldn't even imagine that.
That would be fucking cold.

Speaker 1 (04:55):
Yeah, no, really cold For sure, like I mean, but
still like you get into thatminus 35 and well, like I mean,
let's talk a little bit aboutthe cold from your drilling days
, like at what point I know outin Fort Mac my buddy, mark Fleer

(05:15):
he worked there for years andonce they hit minus 40, they'd
stop because they'd startbreaking equipment Like steel
would start to break, becausethey'd start breaking equipment
Like steel would start to breakthe blades and the cutters and
the rippers on the bulldozersand shit would start to snap

(05:35):
because of the cold.
Did you run into that?

Speaker 2 (05:37):
Tons.
So, yeah, so we had like.
So every company has differentpolicies, right.
But, like, I'll give you one,one story and one example.
This is this is the coldestI've ever seen and the biggest
incident I've ever seen.
In the cold um, we weredrilling for crescent point
energy down on the border ofnorth dakota, uh, and southern

(06:01):
saskatchewan, um place calledColgate.
It was called Colgate thetoothpaste and we had a stretch
come in where it was minus 45,the temperature and the wind
chill hit 62 one night.
So it was like 58 for twonights and then it hit 62.
So our policies, like I say,every company has different

(06:25):
policies.
Our policy at that time withCrescent Point was minus 40,.
Just like you're saying, youknow we pick up off bottom and
we'd circulate because you can'tpull the.
I mean, you can't really pullthe string, right, because if at
that point you're putting everymechanical piece of equipment
on the rig in at risk becauseright at risk, right, because

(06:47):
you're like you're saying so.
We usually just sit there andcirculate, you know, uh, pump
mud products, we'll just makesure mud's in really good shape.
The boys will clean some insideof the buildings and then
everyone will just kind of hangout at steam heater.
The boiler is the big one,right, because you down at minus
40, minus 50 on a drilling rig,with all that blood in your

(07:09):
lifeline of your rig, right,like it's minutes until it
freezes in some areas, right,and then it's going to be a
nightmare to unthaw a wholedrilling rig.
Like I've seen it happen before, man, where like a boiler will
go down and then a backup unitwill go down and you know, by
the time it all freezes up, likeyou're like two weeks to thaw

(07:31):
it out, man, like you got to getinto every crevice, like just
imagine the town, the city ofShelburne, when they have a pipe
that freezes underground.
They go in with a little halfinch tube spray, get it going
through with a nozzle, ahigh-pressure nozzle, and then
it just works its way out, youknow that right, and it just
opens up with the water justlike a creek.
So you have to do that timeslike 4,000 lines that are

(07:56):
running all over the drillingrig, right.
So there's like it's adifferent thing right, and
there's hydraulic everything'sfucking splitting.
And so this one time we're downColgate drilling, like I say it
hit 62.
And I'm so.
We prepared for it.
I was on day shift, I was thesenior guy at the time, so we

(08:18):
kind of had a couple of meetingswith Calgary.
We prepared for it.
The boys were, because it hadalready been so cold.
We were already up circulatingup top.
We were actually in our buildsection, we call it so like we
were only drilling at like meterand a half, two meters an hour.
So we during the day we wouldslide and do do some slow
drilling.
You know we might make like onepipe in a whole shift and the

(08:38):
nighttime we would circulate inthe whole shift.
In the nighttime we wouldcirculate.
But the only reason we did thatis because it's still time, is
money, right.
So like, still, if I can showCalgary that I'm making at least
a pipe, you know, and it's moretime in the bank for them, you

(09:00):
know that makes my operationlook better to the boys and if I
go down in the middle of theday there's a good chance I have
the part to fix it, there's agood chance that somebody can
hot shot me one from Estevan orRegina or Moose Jaw, right?
So anyways.
So we were circulating away.
I go to bed at like I crewchange it.
So we worked like seven toseven, so it was like eight

(09:21):
o'clock, I was watching thehockey game with the boys and
bullshit about my day, and I goback over to my shack, so my
sleeper shack is right behind mywork office, so I go over there
and have a shower and hop intobed and you know it was fucking
cold in the shack that night.
I remember like these are likesteel sea cans, like I say right
, but they're like condos builtinto construction cabins.

Speaker 1 (09:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (09:43):
But they're fucking cold when it's fucking minus 62
at the wind chill right.
So I'm sleeping in full clothes.
I have my coveralls on actuallymy thermal underwear, my
coveralls over top and then inmy blankets just to be safe and
at any point I could hop out.
Usually, you know, if somethinggoes bad at minus 60, like if
somebody falls and breaks a legor gets hurt, yeah, you goes bad

(10:05):
at minus 60, like if somebodyfalls and breaks a leg or gets
hurt, you know, or or even falls.
Just imagine somebody up theDerrick and you have to do a
high angle rescue at minus 60.
No, that would be prettyintense, right.
Like when you can't evenbreathe but you got to save the
guy's life.
That's 40 feet above, right?
Yeah, so, anyway, so I'msleeping away and I think I

(10:31):
can't remember exactly, but Ithink it was like two in the
morning, something like that andI fucking shook out of my bed.
Like I felt this like I'm a bigdude, right, and I fucking
rumbled, I probably hopped upoff my bed probably a half an
inch is how high I fucking went.
Like I moved, fucking, whackedmy head on the side of the bed
frame and I fucking come backand I'm like what the fuck?
And I'm like I look and all thelights all of a sudden go out

(10:53):
and I'm like, fuck, somethinghappened, right.
So I immediately dip my fuckingboots on, grab my hard hat and
I run outside and there's chaoseverywhere, like there's like 25
people running around in thedark, right.
So we run over to, Iimmediately run over to the
backup generator, get it fuckingfired up.
The motor hand was over therealready, my crew guy, so he was

(11:17):
on on the job already.
So we got it fired up, gotlights back on within like 25,
30 seconds it that quick.
And then all of a sudden youlook over at the drilling rig,
now that we have lights andthere's okay.
So on this drilling rig there'stwo styles.
I mean there's a ton of styles,but there's two normal styles.
There's a conventional drillingrig where it's a Kelly right.

(11:40):
So it's like it's old schooltechnology right, it's just a
conventional technology.

Speaker 1 (11:45):
And then there's like and a kelly is what.

Speaker 2 (11:48):
Like a spinning.
Yeah, it's the part that spinsup top and then Clamps onto your
pipe.
That's great, and so that'sright.
So there's like you controleverything by giant wrenches,
basically, and giant arms, andit's all mechanical.
Conventionally, if you have anADR rig, that's an automatic

(12:14):
drilling rig, an ADR rig.
So it's like basically the guysits in a chair or he has a
joystick console, it's likevideo gaming.
He'll sit in a console andhe'll just work like this and
maneuver, so he's doingeverything.
With two joints, you knowthere's only one person on the
floor and everything ismechanical.
That comes down and breaks thejoints apart and the wrenches
are all automatic and blah, blah, blah, right so.

(12:37):
But this one was one of thoseADR rigs.
This was when they firststarted to come out, like I
would say, 2005, 2006.
Yeah and yeah, it was Enzyme.
So Enzyme was the drillingcompany and I remember Enzyme is
one of the biggest drillingcompanies in North America.
They're right up there with,like P precision drilling.

(13:00):
And so this was Enzyme 651 wasthe rig.
And so we're looking at thisthing and we're like, holy fuck.
So the pipe arm on this biggiant automatic drilling rig, it
basically comes from underneathand it grabs the pipe right,

(13:20):
clamps onto it and then itbrings it up and then it sits it
there and then it unspins fromthe kelly.
You spin into it with the tooljoint up top, pick it up and go
down right.
So just basically, you're,instead of the joint being broke
at the bottom on the kelly rig,you break it at the top on a

(13:41):
top drive on an automatic rig.
That's the only difference.
So the guys had actually theyweren't drilling, they were
circulating, but they just wentto do like a rig service to
function.
This giant pipe, this giantpipe arm, so it's like 40 feet
long and it has three giantgrabbers on it.
That grab, you know, like, likeyou see, like people like
grabbing the cars and crushingthem.

(14:02):
They're like.
It's like something like that.

Speaker 1 (14:04):
Yeah, if like you see , like people like grabbing the
cars and crushing them.

Speaker 2 (14:06):
They're like, it's like something like that.
Yeah, if you want to imagine it.
So they were just functioningit to be able to, like you know,
service it, grease it, work thefucking hydraulics, check the
pressure on it, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, check the bearings
out.
So when they went up tovertically it was so cold the
hydraulic Ram is like.
So when the hydraulic ram wasprobably, I would say, 20 to 24

(14:27):
inches wide around and itfucking sheared in half Wow, in
half.
Yeah, man, you can.
Yeah, it was insane.
I have pictures of it Like itwas sheared like on a 40, 45
degree angle, just like this,and it so it free fell from,
like, like I say, these thingsare like 40, 45 feet long and it

(14:49):
free fell and it crashedthrough the catwalk, the
manifold shaft.
So like the manifold is theThrough the catwalk, the
manifold shack.
So like the manifold is thestation where we control the
blowout preventer.
So like if you took a kick, ifthe gas was coming back up the
hole and we had to divert it tothe flare stack to burn it off.

(15:10):
We had no ability to do thatnow.
Now we were like fucking fourkilometers in the earth, at
minus 60, with no, we had no wayto back our rig up.
Right, so it was a nightmare,right so we're on that.
Thank God no one got hurt.
I couldn't believe that nobodygot hurt, so that was.
The giant rattle that rattledme out of bed was this was this

(15:32):
35 ton pipe arm free fallingfrom almost 50 feet in the air
vertically?
the whole arm sheared right offyeah, because it just they just
functioned.
It brought it up and as soon asit hit the max point it was at
its weakest, when the piston'sat its max point, right.
So as soon as it got vertical,it just it was like the cleanest

(15:53):
cut you'd ever seen in yourlife and it was all it just
shattered it ended up we had ametal metal, metal, metallurgy
is that how you say that word?
Metalurgy, metal.
Okay, you would know you're ametal guy.
So the metal I learned that onoak island we had that pipe
tested and and or the tubular onthe um piston and it was good

(16:23):
and they, they enzyme and thecssd uh, who's like the safety
commission for the drilling rigs?
They basically cut it down toman.
It was so fucking cold that theproduct couldn't take it and it
just sheared in half, like it,just like it couldn't.
It was just like freezing itwith what's it called and

(16:44):
smashing something with a hammer.
You see that shit on movies, onTV.

Speaker 1 (16:47):
Yeah Well, unfortunately it's real Right.

Speaker 2 (16:50):
So yeah, but that was the craziest one, man.
It was like no one got hurt,but it was wild like to feel
that thump, it was like afucking earthquake in in la, and
then to see everyone runningaround in the dark and then,
when the lights came on and tolook over and be like because it
was a mess, like it was.
We were 12 days.
We had cranes there pickingshit up.

(17:12):
You know like wow, because youcan only pick up so much and you
got to be careful.
Yeah, not to do any more damage.
Correct, right, because, likeevery time you pick something up
and it bends and breaks and thefucking holes, it's just more
money and more time and more.
You know you got to wait.
Well, you're still sitting downthe whole drilling or
circulating, right, calgary's onthe other end with a bunch of

(17:35):
people going what the fuck isgoing on out there?
You're costing us money, yeah,so, and they don't care that
it's minus 60.
Right, so yeah.

Speaker 1 (17:44):
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (17:45):
That was my.
That was the coldest I've everseen it, man.
And it's those days suck outthere.
Those days suck Like it's evenminus 40, man, like everything
is steam right, everything yougot to keep going with steam and
and.
Steve.
You know, steve, you workedwith steam lots.
Steam is the worst Cause you're.
If you breathe it in, it sucks.

(18:06):
It's like a fire extinguisher.
You can't you lose your breathif you breathe in too much steam
, if you, uh, if you get tooclose to it, it fucking burns
you.
If you get too far away from it, you fucking freeze.
Yeah, it's still one of theworst and it's damp, so you're,
as soon as you get away from it,you're froze anyway.
Right, yeah, it's one of thosethings yeah, that's uh.

Speaker 1 (18:29):
Wow, that's a crazy story yeah yeah 651.

Speaker 2 (18:34):
I actually have the drill and rig, the the tag from
that drill and rig.
They actually gave it to mewhen I left that rig.
That was the rig we set therecords on.
So the tool push on the rig atthe time peeled off the fucking
rig sticker and he gave it to me.
I have it mounted on my toolboxright here Nice.

Speaker 1 (18:53):
Yeah, nice, right on.

Speaker 2 (18:57):
What do you got Tell me?
You must have some crazystories, from some bush stories.
You got to have some frozenstories.

Speaker 1 (19:06):
Frozen stories.
Wow, I mean, for me, I don'twant to say I am a fair weather
fisherman, but being the ownerof uh of Chaudière, we shut her
down.
Uh, we shut her down fairly, um, fairly quickly, um, in the in

(19:28):
the fall, like, uh, it wasThanksgiving and and then, uh,
after Thanksgiving, depending onthe weather, um, that was the
time to try and get someinfrastructure improvement done
and poured a lot of concretethere.

Speaker 2 (19:41):
Uh, in the fall, um, but you musky fish right up
until like freeze up though,right like we were gonna go on
that trip this year with you,like that's crazy you must wear
survival suits or the guys musthave them up there, right?
Or like yeah like there's extrasafety that goes into that for
you, eh?

Speaker 1 (19:58):
yeah, oh for sure.
Like I mean um, um, but that'sall personal stuff, which is
fine.
There's.
There's one um, uh, one year.
This goes back to um, when my,um, my buddy, omer, um, uh, he
was an israeli soldier and hewould come and he stayed with me

(20:20):
at the lodge the first time Imet Omer Kaddash.
And Omer, I love you buddy.
He's over fighting with theIsraelis.

Speaker 2 (20:33):
No way.

Speaker 1 (20:34):
Yeah, patrolling the Gaza Strip, so he's right in the
heart of it.

Speaker 2 (20:39):
That's crazy man.

Speaker 1 (20:41):
Yeah, I've tried to organize to get him on the show
a few times but, as you guys canimagine, the comms and the
organization and trying to keephim like he's busy, he's either
sleeping or patrolling.
Um, he's either sleeping orpatrolling, but, um, um, in
Israel, all of the all of themen, uh, when they turn 18, they

(21:05):
would have to do a three yearmandatory conscription into the
army, and the women had to dotwo years.
So when Mario, or Mario, whenOmer finished his mandatory
conscription, he had an unclethat lived in Toronto and all he

(21:27):
wanted for his present we'llcall it for finishing the
mandatory conscription was tocome to Canada and go to a
fishing lodge.
So his uncle reached out to meand set this whole trip up for

(21:47):
Omer and I really didn't haveany idea about the backstory or
anything like that and I hadthis young fella come by himself
and he stayed in one of thecabins for a week and he'd never
run a boat, never run a motor,that's awesome.

(22:10):
The boys got him into one of thecedar strips and he went out
fishing every day.
Didn't catch anything.
Cedar strips and he went outfishing every day, didn't catch
anything, like I mean, he triedbut he had an absolutely great
time and at the end of his stayhe took it for what we take it
for granted for.
Yeah, well, yeah.

(22:31):
At the end of his stay he comeup and he said Steve, you know,
sometimes people come on holidayand they stay.
Maybe help a little bit, stay.
And I said, omer, are yousaying that you want to stay

(22:56):
here for free?
But you'll help?
Yeah, I'll sleep in the tent.
And I said, no man, like I meanyou help out.
He was a great guy right andand I said, no man, you help out
and you can stay out in thestaff quarters.
I had an empty staff room andhe stayed for the rest of that
year and then come back thefollowing year and helped out a

(23:18):
little bit when we wererepairing the dock, stayed for
half the year and then hooked upwith my buddy, jason Lilly, and
he ended up just travelingaround with Little Dog and

(23:39):
living at his house for a bit.

Speaker 2 (23:41):
But anyway, that nomadic, true nomadic lifestyle
right there, brother.
Oh yeah, that's awesome.

Speaker 1 (23:47):
Yeah well, he was young.
He was like 18, so that's 19,20.
He was like 21, 21, 22.
Good, and he ended up.
We folks I don't know if youguys know, but really good
friends of mine are from theSlobland Muskie YouTube channel,

(24:10):
kyle Garon and Matt O'Brien andMatt he was one of the guides
up there for me and AndrewRaichu and those guys, and this
year Kyle wanted to come up forice or for the last week of the

(24:35):
muskie season and this was oneof the first times that I had
ever fished muskies that late,because on the upper French
River, in Lake Nipissing,muskies close on the last day of
November, so really it'smidnight on December 1st is the
close of the muskie season, andthis was one cold, cold year,

(25:02):
like up there.
We were in Kyle's boat and wefished right till the last day
and the water temperature wasactually below zero.
It was like 30 degrees for fourdays but it didn't freeze
because it was like 30 kilometeran hour, 50, 60 kilometer an

(25:26):
hour winds and it kept the waterchurning to the point where it
hadn't froze.
And we fished from the back ofthe French River and there were
some spots.
The second last night we werethere where the river had frozen

(25:48):
over but where it had neckeddown in the back in Five Mile
Bay and Kyle wanted to getbehind it, where it opened up
and we busted through like aninch and a half of ice where
he'd pull the bow of the boat uponto the ice and the three of
us would go to the front of theboat and jump on the bow and

(26:10):
bust through and he'd driveanother you know however far,
and we'd do the same, but wedrove forever, trolling
obviously, cause you can't dolike.
I mean minus 30, minus 35,that's that's where we were, and
and the water had hit um, uh,30 degrees, like 30, 29 degrees,

(26:33):
like it was cold.
And the last day that I wasthere I left on the night of the
night of the close.
They stayed at Chaudiere, butI'll never forget it.
We come around the corner, andit was probably six or seven

(26:58):
o'clock Well, actually beforethat, about two hours before
that, we had not caught a fishin the whole week.
And then, all of a sudden, wecome around the corner of
Chaudière Island island and, um,the only time that I've been in

(27:25):
the boat where we hit a doubleheader, um ended up hooking up
with one and, as matt wasreeling the, uh, the one rod in
omer had a rod and I wasclearing a rod and matt was
reeling a rod and he got one onthe retrieve as he was reeling
in, and and, uh, we had a doubleheader.
They weren't huge, they werelike 45 inches, but at that time
they're fat, right, yeah, sothose are good fish.

(27:46):
That time you're still I meanlike 45 especially when you go
three or four days and you don'tcatch nothing and you're
fucking freezing.
Yeah, like yeah oh, it was, itwas, it was awesome, but anyway.
So we continued on at thatpoint and it was windy the whole
time it was windy.
Well, we're just kind ofdeciding that it's about time

(28:07):
that I'm, I'm gonna leave likethey're gonna, they're, I'm,
we're gonna grab my, my gearonce we come around the corner
at chaudiere and I'm heading out, yeah, and, and the wind died,
like I mean, it was like mothernature took a big lung full of
air and blew as hard as shecould, right to the end of her

(28:30):
lung capacity and when it wasdone, it was done like I the
water turned flat as piss on aplate and um, and, and it was in
a matter of like my, if mymemory serves me correctly, it
was like 15 minutes.
It went from howling to therewasn't a breath of wind, like it

(28:53):
was, and, and what happened was, as it calmed down, we were
coming around the corner and Icould hear, you know, like ice
on the hull, and I looked overthe side of the boat.

(29:18):
Minutes, we were, we were in, wewere in soft water, and then,
from the point where I heard, Icould see across, cause it was
dark, and then there were the,the moon had come out, like all
of this wind had blowneverything through and it was
clear and it was kind of like Idon't know how many people out

(29:40):
there have experienced a severethunderstorm like a tornado like
I've.
I've had the misfortune orfortune of experiencing
tornadoes twice in my life andand after the storm blows
through.
Both times times the sky wasbaby blue.
Oh yeah, and you just, you knowwhat I mean.
Yeah, and that's basically whathappened here, and as I looked

(30:07):
across the water in themoonlight, I could see you know
how a snowflake looks.
You know all those littleridges and everything.

Speaker 2 (30:14):
Like the crystallization of it too.
The crystals were forming rightin front of my eyes.
Fuck, that's cool, those littleridges and everything.

Speaker 1 (30:17):
It was like the crystallization of it too, and,
yeah, the crystals were formingright in front of my eyes and
that that's what.
That's what um, what um washappening and rubbing up against
the boat and I'm like, holyshit, guys, look at the.
The ice is coming like, likefast and, as I'm saying it, it
froze up to the point where allof our baits popped right out of

(30:40):
the water.
No way, yeah, dude, the baitsrun right up.
That's fucking crazy.
They popped right up out of thewater and they were skipping
across the top of this ice andit happened in a matter of like
five minutes.
But in that five minutes Ireally only noticed the ice,

(31:00):
like I heard it first, and thenI looked out and I saw the ice
just crystallizing in front ofour eyes.
And then, as we're all in awe,we look behind the boat and the
baits that we had running onplaner boards.
They popped up first, and thenthe baits behind us popped up

(31:21):
and we're like, well, I guessthis is it, we're done right.
So we reeled in, got my stuff,they took me across to Wajak
Cottages, which is where I hadparked at that time.
It's the closest place to thelodge and I jumped in my truck

(31:43):
and off I went.
They went back to Chaudiere andthey parked on the dock and
went to sleep.
Well, the next morning I get acall from Omer.
He's like Steve, I almost died.
I'm like Omer, what's going on?
We got frozen in.
We got frozen right in.

(32:04):
I thought I was never going toleave the island.
I'm like Omer, we would havefigured it out.
But what happened was theyparked on the dock and in the
morning there was two and a halfinches of ice in like 12 hours
nine hours, however many.
Like when they went to bed atnine o'clock or parked it at

(32:27):
nine o'clock to when they got upat seven o'clock the next
morning to leave, there was twoand a half inches of ice that
locked Kyle's boat in place atthe end of the dock and again it
took them about.
I don't know, I'd have to askhim, but I'm pretty sure it was
over two, two and a half hoursof blasting the engine to get

(32:51):
enough room broke out behindthem at the back and beating it
with sledgehammers and whatever,and then getting enough room to
again drive the boat up on topof the ice and then jump and
jump and jump and jump and poundon the front of the boat, using

(33:12):
the weight of the boat tofinally cave in that ice.
But they almost the cows like Imean they could walk on the ice
, it was that thick.

Speaker 2 (33:24):
Wow.

Speaker 1 (33:24):
Yeah, and that was overnight and they got out.
Nomar was fine and everythingelse, but it was something that
I'll never forget to to watchice freeze like that and and
have your baits pop right up outof the water when you're

(33:46):
trolling.
Yeah, um, you know, I've seen.
I've seen ice freeze in frontof me and um and picton, when we
used to fish um off the docksfor the walleye Walleyes yeah.
Back in the day, right, we'd goto Picton on Bay of Quinny and
stand out on the typically ourOn the rocks.

(34:08):
Well, we would stand.
Our go-to spot was the PrinceEdward Yacht Club docks.
And there were dirty nights andthose seemed to be the best
nights when you'd catch them.
You can't.
The fish don't come in thereanymore, which is such a shame
because I used to go down therewhen I was a kid too.

Speaker 2 (34:28):
When I was my grandfather I probably was down
there at the same time you werebuddy.
Yeah, at least once.

Speaker 1 (34:34):
It was such a great, I've got great memories there.
But we would have the sameproblem with our small baits is
you just get that skim of icegoing across the water and you
couldn't fish because your baitswould break.
And we would be like, hey, guysin the boat, come here or break
it all up in front so that wecould fish, or we'd, you know,

(34:55):
tie a rock to a rope and throwit out and pull it back.
But it never worked, you know,we just ended up.

Speaker 2 (35:05):
That's fucking hardcore.

Speaker 1 (35:06):
Yeah, when it froze we'd just go back and play poker
.
But yeah, that was anexperience of a lifetime.

Speaker 2 (35:13):
That's crazy man.
That's a crazy one.

Speaker 3 (35:20):
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Speaker 4 (36:04):
As the world gets louder and louder, the lessons
of our natural world becomeharder and harder to hear, but
they are still available tothose who know where to listen.
I'm Jerry Ouellette and I washonoured to serve as Ontario's
Minister of Natural Resources.
However, my journey into thewoods didn't come from politics.

(36:25):
Rather, it came from my time inthe bush and a mushroom.
In 2015, I was introduced tothe birch-hungry fungus known as
chaga, a tree conch withcenturies of medicinal use by
Indigenous peoples all over theglobe.

(36:47):
After nearly a decade of harvestuse, testimonials and research,
my skepticism has faded toobsession and I now spend my
life dedicated to improving thelives of others through natural
means.
But that's not what the show isabout.
My pursuit of the strangemushroom and my passion for the
outdoors has brought me to theplaces and around the people
that are shaped by our naturalworld.
On Outdoor Journal Radio'sUnder the Canopy podcast, I'm

(37:12):
going to take you along with meto see the places, meet the
people.
That will help you find youroutdoor passion and help you
live a life close to nature andunder the canopy.
Find Under the Canopy now onSpotify, apple Podcasts or
wherever else you get yourpodcasts.

Speaker 1 (37:32):
I've got another story on the other end of things
and this one was a bit of adum-dum story when it come to
judgment, but this would havebeen probably in the
neighborhood of 2014, 2013.

(37:57):
And this is an ice outsituation and the ice in that
year on the Upper French Riverwas in so late.
Like I always opened on theFriday before May 2-4, the
Friday before the third Saturdayin May, because that was our

(38:19):
opening day.
Our opening day was the thirdSaturday in May because that's
when our fishing season openedat midnight.
But I would always open theFriday before because it's an
extra day that I could get outof my season and people loved
coming up and having a veryleisurely, you know, get there
whenever they want to get there,whether it's 7, 8, 9, 10, 1

(38:41):
o'clock in the afternoon,whenever 5 o'clock.
So I would be open on that firstday and it turned into a bit of
a tradition because all theguys and girls would come in and
it would be like a party, right, nobody could go fishing, but,
um, everybody had come in.
We'd have a big uh, a bigspecial dinner and uh, and it

(39:06):
was uh, and the season's open,right.
So this one year in particular.
That's right, this one year inparticular and our and our ice
typically goes out any timebetween about the third week of
april.
There was one year when it wentout in march break, but this
year it didn't go out until may9th and I and and I was, and it

(39:30):
was one of those years where thethird saturday fell early, so
it was like the 15th or 14ththat the third Saturday opened.
So it only left me.

Speaker 4 (39:40):
That was this year for me, yep.

Speaker 1 (39:42):
Yeah, it only left me like five days to open and get
ready and get staff in and itwas a nightmare, but anyway.
So, my good buddy Scotty Hamp,we're like we got to get up
there and and ahead of the staffand just get, get, get shit

(40:02):
open and get you know all thepreliminary stuff.

Speaker 2 (40:06):
The water, warm it up , yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (40:09):
Yeah, warm, warm it up, get, get the essentials
running.
And we talked to bud Derekrickat the marina, uh, doquese
marina, where, where we park andI still park to this day and
Shodier uses that marina and uh,bud said, yeah, yeah, like, I
mean the, the ice, um, it's outin the in Doquese Bay, which

(40:32):
typically means that it's outeverywhere else.
But he hadn't been out on thewater and and nobody in in in
Doquese that he knew of anywayknew whether the ice was in or
out.
So Scotty and I are like, okay,let's, let's go.
And, and Scotty, he had his,his one son, timmy boy, in tow

(41:02):
and uh, I had my, um, I think Ihad my two girls, maddie and
Violet, with me and they'relittle, like I mean they were,
uh, you know, five, six yearsold.
So we get them in the boat, weget them in their their um life
jackets and little floater suitsand and everything, and and off
we go.
Well, we get out around thecorner and the way to the lodge,

(41:24):
a big plate of ice had floatedand blocked the, the way, the
typical way that you would go toget to the lodge, and it was
like hard ice, Like I mean itwas.
It was hard, yeah.
So we couldn't go that way andI'm like, well, we didn't really

(41:45):
have any other options becausethere's nowhere to freaking stay
there.
I guess we could have went backand shacked up with Bud on his
couch, but we had, you know,three kids and so I was like,
well, we could try going behindthe island, right?
And Scotty's like yeah, yeah,so we start and we're heading in

(42:05):
behind the island and it'sfairly shallow back there and
like I mean, you kind of reallygot to work your way through,
you can get there, but in thespring the water's low and
anyway we start working back inthere.
And we got ourselves in aposition where you could see the

(42:26):
ice was honeycombing, and whatI mean by that is like you could
be driving through six, eightinches of ice, but it was
melting straight down throughthe ice and you know, like the
cereal, like honeycombs or likea honeycomb in a hive, the ice

(42:46):
actually gets holes where softspots melt faster and there's
like holes and when it breaksapart, it comes apart in these
like long, like, uh, pencilshaped cylinders kind of, and
it's extremely soft.
So we could kind of see whereyou know it looked different,

(43:08):
like you could see black ice,which is hard, but then you
could see this, thishoneycombing ice, and the boat
went through no problem.
Well, we got stuck.
We got stuck in the backside ofthe island because there was
nowhere where the honeycombed.
Yeah, with Timmy Boy and Maddieand Violet and I couldn't back

(43:30):
up.
We were, because there wasn'tenough room to get spun around.
We couldn't get out of the boatbecause the ice wasn't safe.
And and I'm like, oh my God,scotty, we could.
And at one point, oh, we hadthe dogs.
We had my dogs with us too.
And at one point I'm like yeahyeah, I'm like geez, scotty, I

(43:52):
don't know, we might, we mightend up out here for the night in
the boat, right, and I had,like there was no, it was fairly
warm, like I mean, it was sevenor eight degrees, right, and
the kids were warm and I had thesurvival kit in the boat and
everything else.
Like there was no, I was neverreally feeling like we were in

(44:12):
any danger.
It would have sucked bad, butstill, anyway, it took what in
soft water would take about 25minutes to drive.
It took us about three and ahalf four hours to pick our way
through this honeycombed ice andwork our way around and break

(44:38):
through and do the same thinglike drive up on the hard ice
and jump, jump, jump, jump, jump.
I'd have to leave the wheel ofthe boat because the kids have
no weight.
Fucking light, yeah, andScotty's light is a feather too.
Like I mean the guy's about 165pounds soaking wet, but it was
a good thing.

(44:58):
Back in those days I was about260.
So you know, I had a little bitof, I had a bit of a hammer,
the battering ram body, right.
So we were busted through theice and fine, and it was
starting to get dark and I'llnever forget, we come around
that same corner where it frozeon Kyle and Andrew and Matt and

(45:25):
Omer and I and I'm like, oh, Ididn't see the ice and the river
widened in that spot.
So I'm like, oh shit.
I'm like I'm saying to Scotty,it could be solid, like I mean,
but we kind of got close enoughso that worst come to worst.

(45:46):
I think we could have probablyjust broke ice to get to the
side of the island at theshoreline and it would have been
a bit of a hike to to get tothe lodge, but it was on our
island so you know, it wouldhave been maybe, uh, three
quarters of a kilometerkilometer hike how big is
chaudier island?

Speaker 2 (46:05):
I'm sorry to interrupt you, but how?
I don't know.
I've never seen.

Speaker 1 (46:07):
No, no, that's okay.
It's about uh 85 to 90 acres theisland oh fuck, it's pretty
good size then, okay, okay yeah,it's a it's size island, um,
but we come around that cornerand, um, the sun was just
starting to go down and it wasstill warm, because it's one of
those spring days, like it wasMay 9th, right, so it was warm

(46:31):
and the whole um way toshowaudiere was all this
honeycomb ice and we just glidedthrough this foot of ice that
was breaking up and it wasScotty's got a video of it, like
it was.
The sound was awesome, like itwas like crystals breaking.

Speaker 2 (46:54):
Like it was and the video was awesome.

Speaker 1 (46:55):
Like it was like crystals breaking, like it was,
and and the video was so cool.
But I'll tell you what it it itwas.
The video was so cool, but itcertainly wasn't worth the, the,
the, the anxiety, having thekids and the dogs those kids are
.

Speaker 2 (47:14):
That won't overnight, you're done.

Speaker 1 (47:17):
Oh my God, wow, we would have never told our wives.

Speaker 2 (47:20):
And.

Speaker 3 (47:20):
I would have never told the story.

Speaker 1 (47:23):
The only problem is kids like that.
They squeal Mom.
Guess what?

Speaker 2 (47:30):
We had the sleeping boat.

Speaker 1 (47:33):
Oh my.

Speaker 2 (47:33):
God, you got one that's jumping dirt bikes and
breaking arms.
Fuck, she would have been allover that.

Speaker 1 (47:39):
Oh yeah, well, she was in there.
Oh yeah, we still got shit, youknow.
But anyway we made it.
We made it and I was never sohappy to see the lodge, and it's
a good thing it was.
We had planned on it was like aTuesday or something.

(48:01):
So we were there for three orfour days opening and because
that big plate that blocked usfrom getting to the lodge from
the south side, we parked theboat, got in the dock, got the
cottage the Oriel Cottage is onethat is winterized and it's got

(48:25):
electric heat and everything.
So that was always our go-tocottage, had a full kitchen and
everything.
So we got the cottage fired upand we got the water fired up.
And we got the water fired up,um, to that side of the lodge.
That, uh, one day it was a itand it went great, like I mean,
we had the winterizing system,uh, down pretty good.

(48:46):
So we really on that side wedidn't have that was the our
record year we had one brokenpipe in the whole place, which
was outstanding, especially whenwhen I needed it the most.
But the next morning we woke upand that that plate of ice had
shifted to right in front of thelodge so we could go anywhere,

(49:10):
like we were kind of locked inthere, right, but it mounted.

Speaker 2 (49:13):
You're lucky, you got in there at least, oh yeah, oh
yeah.

Speaker 1 (49:17):
Like I mean, if it had shifted when we were trying
to get to it, like I mean wewould have had to just park half
a kilometer down the shorelineand hike and leave the Alaskan
there and hopefully it doesn'tget drug away, right.
But that was a cold experiencethat I'll never forget nice.

Speaker 2 (49:39):
Well, that's a couple good cold stories.
See, I knew you had a couple inthem.

Speaker 1 (49:42):
Old bones, years yeah well, you know, I just you, you
just got a you had a littlenervous there.
Yeah, I uh.
I got all kinds of stories,it's just that I forget them.
I need need somebody to hit mewith a stick to get them going.

Speaker 2 (49:59):
I know this.
Going back to you, were sayingthat you only had like five days
to open up.
That was us this past year atNordic.
So we had, like we painted 18structures, 19, because we had
to stay in the front of thelodge and this.
So usually it's like I wouldsay, first week of May when the

(50:25):
ice is out.
So my lake is the last tofreeze and the last to go out.
Like going like April, not achance, Like I had, there was
three feet, three and a halffeet of snow there.
So like this year, with thecold that we've had, end of
April will be just the snowcoming off the road up our way.

(50:45):
Yeah, so we took the time topaint, so we painted all these
structures and the ice stillwasn't off.
So what I did was I was like,okay, fuck it.
So it was like you know wheremy main dock system was, Like

(51:05):
down by the bait house on theinside of that little bay.
So the water was out, the icewas out there, but not in the
rest of the bay, around thepoint and that's where it dips
out in the current around downthe waterfall.
So I had Johnny out there withfireworks M80s and he would
light the M80, throw it out onthe ice and boom, it would blow

(51:26):
like a five-yard patch and itwould bust a hole, and then this
giant sheet would like breakoff and go around the fucking
point a couple hours later,right, so?
But it was enough that at leastwe could put some docs in or
have some kind of progression,Right?
So, yeah, we ended up getting Ithink it was, I think it was

(51:46):
the 12th of May this year, and Ihad I had people coming up, I
think Dave and them showed up onthe 16th, so I had four days,
five days, same as you had.
Like, it was just a fucking aretarded stretch to get going,
right?

Speaker 1 (52:04):
Yeah, that's, that's, that's tough.

Speaker 2 (52:07):
Speaking of, I want to, while we're on that topic, I
want to, I want to break out tothe listeners here what some
information that's gone on uphere in the last little while
that myself and Krista and ourfamily have.
It's been a long couple yearsspan for us at Nordic building

(52:29):
to where we got and we've hadsome.
You know I've had a couple ofphysical ailments here and my
family's been had some.
You know I've had a couple ofphysical ailments here and my
family's been busy and and, uh,you know a couple of just things
have changed in life and Ithink that we've decided that,
uh, that it was our turn to stepback from where we were at

(52:49):
Nordic and, uh, I think we justwanted to tell everybody that we
were just kind of, yeah, ourNordic story is coming to an end
here and we had a great ride,but I think it's just, this next
season is going to be turnedback over to, so my partner is
still going to have it andthey're going to bring somebody
else in with them, and I justthink it was a time, that time

(53:14):
for us to to, to, to get back toour family and do our own thing
.
You know it took you about adecade to get to that point.
It only took me two and a halfyears, yeah, but so you sold
your interest and a half years,yeah, so you sold your interest.
That's basically it.
So we sold our interest in thelodge and we're going to step
away and it's been in the worksfor about a month here now, but

(53:34):
we've been wanting to make sureeverything goes smoothly and
it's been a good transition sofar.
And as we go over the next weekhere so far, and as we go over
the next week here we'll, wewill be officially ex partners
of Nordic Point Lodge which willwhich will be great, put a
great ending to our initiallodge story.

(53:57):
And for the next year we'regoing to run Sunset Limousine up
here in Kenora and we're goingto yeah, spend some time with my
family.
We have my shoulder rebuilt.
I'm going to try and fish abunch, stevie.

Speaker 1 (54:10):
Look after yourself.

Speaker 2 (54:12):
Exactly and you know what?
And it's get my shoulder fixed,get my.
I love fishing man, you guysknow that.
And I haven't got to fish whenI had the launch.
You never got to fish with thelaunch man Never, no.
I haven't got to fish when Ihad the lodge.
You never got to fish with thelodge man Never, no.
You know, I live on BlackSturgeon Lake up here, you know,
and it's one of the only lakeswith largemouth in it.
Like I got largemouth, justlike you guys do.
Down there I can go off my dockand catch a large.

(54:35):
I don't get to do that shitanymore.
And Iic gig was amazing and welove it there and love that
place and what we created.
It's a stamp that I actuallygot a call the other day from a

(54:56):
gentleman who's good friendswith Jamie Bruce and he just
bought a lodge called Ash Rapidsand one of the most prestigious
lodges on Lake of the WoodsBeen around forever, great place
.
And this guy he's been a stapleon the lake for many years here
.
And I got a call from thisgentleman and first of all I

(55:20):
congratulated him and his wife.
They're a young couple like usand they got into buying this
lodge and he basically wastelling me, you know, things
were that we basically put astamp up there, you know you
guys went in and did somethingand that was important to me,
right To leave.

(55:40):
Whenever we were done up there,no matter if it was two years,
five years, 10 years, 20 years,or my kids took it over to make
sure that we left something togo forward for in the future,
right, and we left our stamp.
And it was pretty cool to see aguy, a local guy, in the area
that had been here a lot longerthan I have been, you know, and

(56:01):
Sean McGaugh, he's his name andyou know he's been on that lake
for 30 years.
And for hear him say that youknow he's been on that lake for
30 years, and to hear him saythat you know we put the stamp
on the area again was kind ofcool to hear that.

Speaker 3 (56:13):
you know it was impressive.

Speaker 2 (56:15):
So yeah, so congratulations to Sean and them
for Ash Rapids.
And yeah, if anyone wants toreach out to Willie from here on
out, reach out to info atsunsetlimoca or my personal
email is walleyedrilling atgmailcom.
And yeah, we'll talk somestories, some Nordic stories,

(56:35):
here in the future, but fromhere out she's going to be a
nice, relaxing summer for Willie.
I'm actually going to enjoy it,Stephen.

Speaker 1 (56:42):
Hey well, that's wonderful, buddy, we're going to
enjoy it.
Steven, hey well, that's that'swonderful, buddy.
Um, and and the one thing that,um, that uh, is so important,
um, especially when you're inthe, in the, the trenches of of
lodge ownership, is your healthand, um, that's a, that's a huge

(57:03):
, a huge step for you, like Imean, it is getting healthy and
getting that shoulder rebuiltand you know, like I mean just
getting yourself back in theswing of things, and I'm so
happy for you for that and tohave time with your family and

(57:26):
because I know what it's like.
Yeah, you did it for a decademan.

Speaker 2 (57:30):
I honestly it would have been tough for me to go any
further without the girls thereand without my family, like
with me and Holton just livingon our own in the middle of the
woods fucking.
For you know like I respect youa lot for what you did for a
decade bud.
That would have been tough, youknow, and you guys are close
like you're a close fuckingfamily, right?
So?

Speaker 1 (57:50):
Yeah, yeah, no, it was.
It was not easy, that's that'sfor sure.
But your, your health is, isparamount, because without your
health you have nothing Right.
Oh, that you have nothing right, oh, yeah, for sure.
So that's wonderful.
And speaking of health, I'mgoing to do a behind the rod

(58:15):
here next week and, for those ofyou who don't know, I've
alluded to it and talked alittle bit about it in the past
few episodes, but my 40 day fastis complete and there's a ton
of people interested in what Idid and I would never recommend

(58:41):
that to anybody.
But I'm going to do a behindthe rod on that whole experience
, that's great man.

Speaker 2 (58:53):
I'll be a fan of that one for sure.
That's cool.

Speaker 1 (58:56):
Yeah, yeah, Stay tuned for that.
And in the meantime, you knowwhat?
I've found a new hobby meantimeyou know what I've, I've, I've.

Speaker 2 (59:11):
I've found a new hobby, one that I had forgotten
I'd loved.
Okay, what is this shooting?
Oh my god, is this what the thepost was about?
Yeah, so Krista so we're havingdinner last night.
She goes, she shows me yourFacebook and she goes what does
Nitswanky want with the guns?
I'm like I don't know.
Maybe heitswanky want with theguns.
I'm like I don't know, maybehe's got a, maybe he rebuilds
guns, and I'm not sure.
And sure I figured it wassomething like you were getting

(59:32):
into shooting or getting intorebuilding guns or getting into
something, yeah, rebuilding.
Well, that's great.

Speaker 1 (59:37):
I used to do it when I was young.
I mean, my dad gave me.
Well, he didn't give me, hejust let me use his old Cooey 22
.
He had a Cooey Model 64,semi-automatic 22.
And it was everything I coulddo to keep the gun shooting.

(01:00:02):
And that was my first real gun.
And when I was maybe 8, 10years old we lived on an acre
lot, on my grandparents' 100acres.
So I had the run of 100 acres.
And the very first big purchasethat I made was a telescope
because I was interested in thestars and one of my great uncles

(01:00:26):
that lived in Ottawa and sentthese star charts every month
and I loved looking at the sky.
That's cool.
And then my second big purchase, which took me almost, you know
, two years of special events,birthdays and Christmas and, you
know, first Communion andeverything that you know yeah

(01:00:47):
yeah, and squirreling that moneyaway.
And I bought myself a 177 pelletgun from Home Hardware in Grand
Valley and I had that for along time and I shot the shit
right out of that gun, like Ishot everything from cans to

(01:01:09):
blackbirds, and I was onlyallowed to shoot blackbirds
because the songbirds like Imean I shot one songbird and my
mom saw me shoot.
Wow, the problem was being astupid kid.
My mom had a bird feeder set upright out the back window at
the kitchen window and she wasin doing dishes or some shit and

(01:01:32):
stupid steve come around thecorner and shot a robin.
Oh buddy, I lost that gun forlike near a month so I never did
that again.
Oh yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:01:44):
I get a good bird feeder story when this is when
you're done, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:01:50):
Well, I never did get a what do they call an FAC?
Yeah, to buy guns I went andgot my hunting license right off
the bat back in the early 90sand back then you didn't need an
FAC.
So they grandfathered me inwhen they went to the PAL, which

(01:02:12):
is the possession andacquisition.
But I got a POL but I let thatlapse when, when I had the lodge
, because I was just so busy,because I was just so busy.
So I finally took my PAL andRPAL and I got it in the mail
about a month ago and I've sincebought a few 22s and a nice 22

(01:02:38):
mag and it's just ignited andyou know some of them.
Yeah, I bought dad an oldWinchester Model 77, which is
just a semi-automatic, and gotit home and it jams every time

(01:03:00):
Like it's a pain in the nuts.
So I've had it apart and boughta gun screwdriver kit because
you got to have the right toolsand you know it takes me back to
my day.

Speaker 2 (01:03:14):
So yeah, like you need another hobby If I can make
a buck.

Speaker 1 (01:03:18):
Well, I figure, if I get enough hobbies I might be
able to make enough money tokeep them all going.
I might be able to make enoughmoney to keep them all going.
Co-hosting on the Fish andCanada television show and
Diaries of a Lodge owner and I'mgetting into the micro greens
business and growing microgreens, A little here, a little
there eh.
Oh, buddy.
Well, it's what I.

(01:03:40):
My problem is I don't have onebig thing that I love.
I've got a lot of little thingsand hey, I figure, if I can
make a little bit of moneyfixing guns and flipping them,
why not?
But, Kijiji and Facebook.
They don't like guns.
I put an ad on Kijiji saying,hey, I'll buy your guns, just
like on the Facebook post, andthey kicked it right off.

(01:04:03):
They said they don't they, they, they're, they're.
They don't like guns, anythingto do with guns, even though
everything is legal.
We aren't letting you put thepost up, we're taking it.
They took it right down.
Same with Facebook marketplace.
You can't have those.
Like I mean it's ridiculous.
No, like I mean it's ridiculous, it doesn't make sense.

(01:04:26):
No, like I mean anyway.
So if you got a few rifles outthere kicking around in your
closet, or grandpa you know hisestate is coming to you and you
don't know what to do with them,give me a call.

Speaker 2 (01:04:38):
Nice, nice Way to go.
That's awesome, hey.

Speaker 1 (01:04:41):
You had a bird feeder story.

Speaker 2 (01:04:43):
I got one.
It's a super funny one.
So you had a bird feeder story.
I got one.
It's a super funny one, one ofmy oldest memories, when I was a
kid.
My dad wasn't a very nice dude,he was a fucking asshole.
He was not a nice person at alland I told you, my grandfather
and my mom pretty much raised me.
But I do remember this one timemy dad was, we were fuck.

(01:05:04):
I was probably like five, maybefour, like I was young, and I
remember my dad had this birdfeeder and it was like this big,
giant red one.
It was huge and it was gaudyand it would sit on the deck and
I'd have to go fill it all thetime.
And even though I was thatlittle, I'd have to go fill this
bird feeder all the time and Iremember the I'd feed it and

(01:05:29):
then the squirrels would come upnot the fucking birds and
they'd empty it and I'd get madbecause I was just a little kid
and I'm because I'm thinking nowI got to go fill this thing
again, right?
So then I'm watching thesquirrels empty it and blah,
blah, blah.
And then I watched my dad getpissed off at the squirrels
getting in, you know, becausethe birds aren't there.
So he's on the phone with hisneighbor and our neighbor at the

(01:05:56):
time was named, was DaveHempstead, and he was a buddy of
my dad's and he was a big gunguy.
My dad, we were never reallygun people, right, he had a
couple shotguns, but whatever,we weren't huge into it.
So he's like hey, dave, I wantyou to shoot them fucking
squirrels when you see them outthere.
So Dave's like, yeah, okay,I'll get them.

(01:06:16):
So he's like I'm going to tryand do the same.
So I remember.
So my dad, he had this littlefucking bullshit, fucking like
177 that you're talking about,right, and he's fucking standing
there and he pulls it up andhe's got it at the bird feeder
right at the side of it, andhe's just about to squeeze and
he fucking and boom, the fuckingbird feeder blows up and he

(01:06:39):
fucking fuck.
He looks at the end of the gun,what the fuck?
And then the neighbor theneighbor is standing there
laughing on his deck because hehad his 12 gauge.
So he saw my dad going to lineup and he just watched his head.
As soon as he went to squeeze,he fucking pulled and the bird
feeder blew up.
It was the funniest shit ever.

(01:07:04):
It was one of my oldestmemories.
I'll never forget that right.
My dad looking at that fucking.22 barrel going or that .188
going holy shit, this ishorrible.
And his buddy over therelaughing yeah, yeah, I mean, you
made a good one this year.
Yeah, nice, oh, too funny.

Speaker 1 (01:07:30):
Too funny.
Oh, that's a on that note,brother, that's uh, that's uh,
that's perfect.
I think, uh, I think that's agreat place to, to, to kind of
sign off till the next one.

Speaker 2 (01:07:39):
Yes, until the next one.

Speaker 1 (01:07:40):
We got some good ones coming up here.

Speaker 2 (01:07:41):
We got some good ones coming up here, we got some
good ones coming up.

Speaker 1 (01:07:44):
Yeah, thank you so much for listening to this point
and I really appreciateeverything you guys are doing
and the support that you'regiving us.
It's outstanding and Icertainly and I know Willie too
we don't take for granted all ofyour support, so we appreciate

(01:08:09):
that wholeheartedly.
And for anybody out therelooking to partner up, we've got
a great deck and, as usual, getover to fishingcanadacom and
get in your votes and yourballots for a bunch of awesome
free stuff.
It's a great opportunity to getsome high-end equipment and

(01:08:36):
Garmin is always there.
Get out there and get themvotes in.
And folks, if you want to reachout with ideas and and comments
, please do.
Uh, you know where to get mesteven at fishandcanadacom.
And uh, uh, willie, you're uh,you're uh at uh info at sunset,

(01:09:00):
limocom.
And uh, dot c or dot ca.
And then uh, dot C or dot CA.
And then, uh, tell us yourother one.

Speaker 2 (01:09:08):
You're really, you're walleye drilling at gmailcom.

Speaker 1 (01:09:13):
Yeah there you go, Willie the oil man, and on that
note, folks.
Thus brings us to theconclusion of another episode of
diaries of a lodge ownerstories of the North.

Speaker 3 (01:09:28):
I of a Lodge Owner.
Stories of the North.
I'm a good old boy, nevermeaning no harm.
I'll be all you ever saw, beenreeling in the hog since the day
I was born, bending my rock,stretching my line.
Someday I might own a lodge andthat'd be fine.

(01:09:51):
I'll be making my way the onlyway I know how, working hard and
sharing the north with all ofmy pals.
Boy, I'm a good old boy.
I bought a lodge and lived mydream.

(01:10:15):
And now I'm here talking abouthow life can be as good as it
seems.
Yeah, hi everybody.
I'm Angelo Viola and I'm PeteBowman.
Now you might know us as thehosts of Canada's favorite
fishing show, but now we'rehosting a podcast.
That's right.

Speaker 2 (01:10:35):
Every Thursday, ang and I will be right here in your
ears, bringing you a brand newepisode of Outdoor Journal.

Speaker 3 (01:10:40):
Radio.
Now, what are we going to talkabout for two hours every week?

Speaker 5 (01:10:46):
Well, you know there's going to be a lot of
fishing.
I knew exactly where those fishwere going to be and how to
catch them, and they were easyto catch.

Speaker 3 (01:10:51):
Yeah, but it's not just a fishing show.
We're going to be talking topeople from all facets of the
outdoors, from athletes, All theother guys would go golfing Me
and Garth and Turk and all theRussians would go fishing.

Speaker 5 (01:11:04):
To scientists, but now that we're reforesting and
laying things free, it's theperfect transmission environment
for life To chefs, If any gameisn't cooked properly marinated,
you will taste it.

Speaker 3 (01:11:17):
And whoever else will pick up the phone Wherever you
are.
Outdoor Journal Radio seeks toanswer the questions and tell
the stories of all those whoenjoy being outside.

Speaker 5 (01:11:26):
Find us on Spotify, apple Podcasts or wherever you
get your podcasts.
Back in 2016, frank and I had avision To amass the single
largest database of muskieangling education material
anywhere in the world.

Speaker 6 (01:11:41):
Our dream was to harness the knowledge of this
amazing community and share itwith passionate anglers just
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Speaker 5 (01:11:48):
Thus the Ugly Pike podcast was born and quickly
grew to become one of the topfishing podcasts in North
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Speaker 6 (01:11:55):
Step into the world of angling adventures and
embrace the thrill of the catchwith the Ugly Pike podcast.
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Speaker 5 (01:12:09):
The Ugly Pike Podcast isn't just about fishing.
It's about creating atight-knit community Of
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Through laughter, throughcamaraderie and an unwavering
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This podcast will bring peopletogether.

Speaker 6 (01:12:23):
Subscribe now and never miss a moment of our
angling adventures.
Tight lines everyone.

Speaker 5 (01:12:29):
Find Ugly Pike now on Spotify, apple Podcasts or
wherever else you get yourpodcasts.