Sunday morning I got up bright and early and went fishing at the Ragged Mountain Reservoir. It's only about 6 or 8 miles from my house.
It's amazing how on the south side of Charlottesville when you leave town you're immediately in BFE. Like the instant you clear the city limits - bam! - Outer Mongolia. It's one of the many things I love about my hometown. Many, many of the perks of a big city with almost none of the drawbacks.
In any event, I got clear of the house by 6 AM and drove out to the reservoir. Just gorgeous. You drive a couple of miles back into a valley and up a ridgeline and then you come to a small parking lot near an old abandoned house. The place looks completely habitable... I think maybe it was once the house for the reservoir attendant. It's probably still maintained by the City and County governments (the reservoir being a joint venture between the two).
I only ran into one group of two guys the whole time I was up there. It was quiet and the lake had a mist rising off of it. Geese and frogs were about the only creatures that broke the near-silence.
The other fishermen were on a john boat with an electric motor, so even they were quiet. There are no combustion motors allowed on the lake. This is probably a good thing, since the Ragged Mountain Reservoir provides a large portion the drinking water in the Charlottesville/Albemarle area. I don't much like the taste of motor oil in my water. Meh, call me a snob, I guess.
It started raining about half an hour after I arrived, but it didn't matter much. The Natural Area around the reservoir is completely undeveloped, so the trees come right up to the shoreline. Side-casting, anyone? The rain came down, but very little fell on me under the trees. I found a really nice spot and settled in.
There was a relatively flat rock next to the shore that I sat on. I set my line with a bobber and some powerbait, cast in, and commenced to relax. After enjoying the sounds of nature for a good thirty minutes I put on my iPod. Pink Floyd's Meddle was on tap - the chillest of the chill. When I need to relax, that album is the Alpha and the Omega.
If anyone wants to hear this album, here's a link: Pink Floyd's Meddle. You'll need the Rhapsody Player - no big deal if you have high speed.
I was looking out over the lake, mist rising, a light rain falling, and geese calling in the pale early morning light and I just felt so calm. The Pink Floyd, playing softly in one ear, added an extra touch of peace. I could have dozed off right there.
As tempting an idea as that was, I decided to switch out to a lure so I'd have to be a bit more active. I think my second cast with the lure I hooked into something. It was a fighter, that was for sure. My cheap-ass Zebco 33 was bent way down and even when I cranked the reel, the line still went out when the fish wanted to run.
I thought I had something huge. I was pretty excited. It took about five minutes to reel him in. I'd pull and crank for a bit and then let him run. Pull and crank, let him run. When I pulled him in I was a bit disappointed with the seven inch or so bluegill all that work had yielded. Disappointed, but with a respect for this tough little bugger. I freed him from the hook and returned him to the water.
I didn't catch anything else, but that was hardly the point. I left the reservoir feeling relaxed and calm.
04 May 2009
28 April 2009
North Cackalacky Visitor
My buddy from North Carolina came up to visit this past weekend. I lived in Raleigh during the dot com boom back around 1999 to 2001. I had my first tech job at that time and through a coworker I was introduced to a whole new crowd of folks. "E", as I'll call him, was one of those folks. He's the only one I still keep in touch with from those days.
In any event, once or twice a year either he'll come up to Virginia for a visit or I'll slide on down North Carolina-way. This time he paid us a visit.
Friday night we made the local brewery beer tasting rounds. We went to Blue Mountain Brewery and had many, many beers. We then swung on down to the South Street Brewery (affectionately known locally as the "Soussed Street Brewery"). After that it was off to Beer Run - not a brewery but a must on the beer Mecca rounds in the central Virginia area.
Saturday we mainly hung out around the house. E and I did some errands - got some lures at Dick's Sporting Goods, picked up a batch of California Common at the Fermentation Trap, dropped off recycling, and then went home. I whipped up the California Common and tossed it in the carboy to ferment.
We had a nice dinner - Apple Ginger glazed chicken on the grill, home made cornbread, and a salad along with multiple whiskey-n-coke drinks. Follow that up with some homebrew Oktoberfest, and then a sampler 12 pack of Victory Brewery beers and we were all lit up like three Christmas trees. Me, E, and the wife that is.
Sunday morning E and I went out to Barboursville to shoot some targets. I brought Hilda (SKS), Cletus (Remington D870 Express), and Harry (Ruger GP100 .357). Here are some pics:
Teh-hut!
In any event, once or twice a year either he'll come up to Virginia for a visit or I'll slide on down North Carolina-way. This time he paid us a visit.
Friday night we made the local brewery beer tasting rounds. We went to Blue Mountain Brewery and had many, many beers. We then swung on down to the South Street Brewery (affectionately known locally as the "Soussed Street Brewery"). After that it was off to Beer Run - not a brewery but a must on the beer Mecca rounds in the central Virginia area.
Saturday we mainly hung out around the house. E and I did some errands - got some lures at Dick's Sporting Goods, picked up a batch of California Common at the Fermentation Trap, dropped off recycling, and then went home. I whipped up the California Common and tossed it in the carboy to ferment.
We had a nice dinner - Apple Ginger glazed chicken on the grill, home made cornbread, and a salad along with multiple whiskey-n-coke drinks. Follow that up with some homebrew Oktoberfest, and then a sampler 12 pack of Victory Brewery beers and we were all lit up like three Christmas trees. Me, E, and the wife that is.
Sunday morning E and I went out to Barboursville to shoot some targets. I brought Hilda (SKS), Cletus (Remington D870 Express), and Harry (Ruger GP100 .357). Here are some pics:
Teh-hut!
09 April 2009
A Weekend with the Conway River, pt 3
Sunday, 05 April 2009
I slept like crap Saturday night. I dragged my arse out of bed at about seven-thirty. Coffee and camp slop. Mountain Dew (Electric Hillbilly Piss). In short order I was bright eyed and bushy tailed. Amazing how brisk air right off the bat along with massive doses of caffeine will utterly eradicate the effects of a bad night's sleep.
As I broke down my tent and gear I discovered my camera. It was in the foot of my sleeping bag. Who the hell knows how it got there? The only thing I could figure is that I must have bent over in the tent to pick something up and the camera fell out onto the sleeping bag. I must have then inadvertantly kicked it into the foot of the sleeping bag.
We had only two cigarettes left and those were gone in short order. So after breaking camp we headed out. At the entrance to the RWMA, we pulled over and Earl turned on his cell phone. Beep! Beep! Blip, beep!
Civilization had officially reestablished its noose on our necks.
<HAL>"Dave, you were away, Dave. Where did you go? I missed you. You should never leave me like that, Dave."</HAL>
Can I get a what, what from my sci-fi nerds? In the house with a 2001, A Space Odyssey reference! Oh yeah, and toss in an HTML reference for good measure. Dork-tastic!
We went for the first store we saw, needing nicotine by this point. Wolftown Mercantile Country Store to the rescue! It seemed like a cool little Mom and Pop operation. There was a large iron firestove in the middle of the room around which tables were situated. Some old men were at the tables drinking coffee, eating biscuits (they smelled delicious!), and playing cards.
There was a variety of ammunition under the glass of the counter - 12, 20, and 410 gague shot and slugs, 22 ammo, some 7.62 and .308. There was more, but that was all I got a chance to read. A variety of hunting and fishing gear adorned the shelves alongside normal convenience store fare. The door outside had a placard proclaiming this establishment as a Game Check Station. Cool. A great resource for future trips.
The lady that walked up behind the counter was kind of uncool, though. She either had a permanent sneer affixed to her face or she was doing a terrible job concealing her contempt for Earl and me.
I guess we didn't exactly look like the locals, but damn! I'm a Virginia native from Barboursville - not exactly a metropolis. Didn't she read my Hillbilly Haiku? Sure, I live in Charlottesville now. Yeah, it's a college town and, yes, I work for the University. But it's not like I'm a Professor of Gay and Bisexual Studies or even a professor, for that matter!
Maybe she was just having a bad day...
I slept like crap Saturday night. I dragged my arse out of bed at about seven-thirty. Coffee and camp slop. Mountain Dew (Electric Hillbilly Piss). In short order I was bright eyed and bushy tailed. Amazing how brisk air right off the bat along with massive doses of caffeine will utterly eradicate the effects of a bad night's sleep.
As I broke down my tent and gear I discovered my camera. It was in the foot of my sleeping bag. Who the hell knows how it got there? The only thing I could figure is that I must have bent over in the tent to pick something up and the camera fell out onto the sleeping bag. I must have then inadvertantly kicked it into the foot of the sleeping bag.
We had only two cigarettes left and those were gone in short order. So after breaking camp we headed out. At the entrance to the RWMA, we pulled over and Earl turned on his cell phone. Beep! Beep! Blip, beep!
Civilization had officially reestablished its noose on our necks.
<HAL>"Dave, you were away, Dave. Where did you go? I missed you. You should never leave me like that, Dave."</HAL>
Can I get a what, what from my sci-fi nerds? In the house with a 2001, A Space Odyssey reference! Oh yeah, and toss in an HTML reference for good measure. Dork-tastic!
We went for the first store we saw, needing nicotine by this point. Wolftown Mercantile Country Store to the rescue! It seemed like a cool little Mom and Pop operation. There was a large iron firestove in the middle of the room around which tables were situated. Some old men were at the tables drinking coffee, eating biscuits (they smelled delicious!), and playing cards.
There was a variety of ammunition under the glass of the counter - 12, 20, and 410 gague shot and slugs, 22 ammo, some 7.62 and .308. There was more, but that was all I got a chance to read. A variety of hunting and fishing gear adorned the shelves alongside normal convenience store fare. The door outside had a placard proclaiming this establishment as a Game Check Station. Cool. A great resource for future trips.
The lady that walked up behind the counter was kind of uncool, though. She either had a permanent sneer affixed to her face or she was doing a terrible job concealing her contempt for Earl and me.
I guess we didn't exactly look like the locals, but damn! I'm a Virginia native from Barboursville - not exactly a metropolis. Didn't she read my Hillbilly Haiku? Sure, I live in Charlottesville now. Yeah, it's a college town and, yes, I work for the University. But it's not like I'm a Professor of Gay and Bisexual Studies or even a professor, for that matter!
Maybe she was just having a bad day...
08 April 2009
A Weekend with the Conway River, pt 2
Saturday, 04 April 2009
I woke that morning at around nine o'clock to a very chilly 40 degrees. I got up, got dressed, and got motivated in short order. First thing was first - the GigaStove kicked out some boiling water quickly and coffee was set to brewing in my french press.
Next up was my patented "camp slop" breakfast. Cook up some sausage links, remove them from the pan, add butter and some whipped eggs, salt, pepper, cheese. I then cut up the links into bite-sized pieces and tossed them back in with the eggs. Cook and scramble them all up together. Voila - camp slop. Breakfast of Champions.
Earl and I ate breakfast and set about getting ready for a day of hiking and trout fishing. Here are some pics:
Earl sets up some bait
Earl and the Conway
Me all ready to go
Back at camp before we left
Oh, well. It was nice to be out in Nature doing some fishing. Very Zen, very calming. We lost a lure and a hook/bobber set to branches and rocks. That's kind of par for the course for a day of fishing, though.
As we hiked along the river, we ran across a campsite that looked abandoned. It had an awesome rock firepit and there was even some cut firewood piled up. We decided to see if the place was still abandoned on our way back and then come back with the car for the firewood. I could easily make kindling from this stuff with my hatchet.
On the way back there was a family setting up for what looked like a picnic. We decided to come back towards dusk and see if they were still there. They were. Oh, well. We returned to our camp and began gathering firewood from the wooded slope just up from our camp.
We found plenty of firewood and even rolled a six foot cedar log down the hill. It was actually pretty dry. We used more cattail to start the fire, but this time used a three phase ignition system - cattail to trioxane bar to camp fuel. Fwoosh! Fire!
More brews, more grub, and some campfire hypnosis. We played Texas Hold 'Em since the wind had died down, but it was kinda silly since we didn't have any money or chips to bet with. Earl bet heavy and I always saw his "bet." Why the hell not? We followed that up with some War.
CONTINUED...
I woke that morning at around nine o'clock to a very chilly 40 degrees. I got up, got dressed, and got motivated in short order. First thing was first - the GigaStove kicked out some boiling water quickly and coffee was set to brewing in my french press.
Next up was my patented "camp slop" breakfast. Cook up some sausage links, remove them from the pan, add butter and some whipped eggs, salt, pepper, cheese. I then cut up the links into bite-sized pieces and tossed them back in with the eggs. Cook and scramble them all up together. Voila - camp slop. Breakfast of Champions.
Earl and I ate breakfast and set about getting ready for a day of hiking and trout fishing. Here are some pics:
Earl sets up some bait
Earl and the Conway
Me all ready to go
Back at camp before we leftWe spent about six hours or so hiking up and down the Conway River and casting into the few calm pools we could find. It had been raining on and off all week, so the river was up quite a bit. After the trip I looked into the Virginia website for Inland Game and Fisheries and found that we needed to go further up the river to find the trout. As it was, we hiked downstream from our camp.
Oh, well. It was nice to be out in Nature doing some fishing. Very Zen, very calming. We lost a lure and a hook/bobber set to branches and rocks. That's kind of par for the course for a day of fishing, though.
As we hiked along the river, we ran across a campsite that looked abandoned. It had an awesome rock firepit and there was even some cut firewood piled up. We decided to see if the place was still abandoned on our way back and then come back with the car for the firewood. I could easily make kindling from this stuff with my hatchet.
On the way back there was a family setting up for what looked like a picnic. We decided to come back towards dusk and see if they were still there. They were. Oh, well. We returned to our camp and began gathering firewood from the wooded slope just up from our camp.
We found plenty of firewood and even rolled a six foot cedar log down the hill. It was actually pretty dry. We used more cattail to start the fire, but this time used a three phase ignition system - cattail to trioxane bar to camp fuel. Fwoosh! Fire!
Sometime after we got back from our hike-n-fish, I went to grab my camera to snap a photo of something. I looked in my breast pocket, which is where I remembered putting the durned thing last. No dice. I patted myself down and then looked in my rucksack and tackle box. Shit!
I actually got a bit "panicked," thinking of the last place I used it on the hike. I remembered fishing from a large rock and having to cut my line after getting hung up on some rocks in the river. As I redid my line I snapped a photo of the river and put the camera down on the rock. I was almost certain I had picked it back up and placed it in my breast pocket. Crap! Had it fallen out at some point, maybe when I bent over to pick something up?
I gave up looking and decided that, on the way out, we'd have to stop by a few of our fishing spots and try to find it. It was about dinner time.
More brews, more grub, and some campfire hypnosis. We played Texas Hold 'Em since the wind had died down, but it was kinda silly since we didn't have any money or chips to bet with. Earl bet heavy and I always saw his "bet." Why the hell not? We followed that up with some War.
CONTINUED...
06 April 2009
A Weekend with the Conway River, pt 1
Friday, 03 April 2009
My buddy and I (we'll call him "Earl") went camping this weekend in the Rapidan Wildlife Management Area. I met Earl at his house around 1 o'clock... a half hour ahead of schedule. We enjoyed a beer, gathered some gear, and hit the road. A quick stop at the grocery store to pack the cooler and we were on our way to BFE, or Outer Mongolia, as I like to call it.
About twenty minutes north of The Bavarian Chef we arrived in Wolftown, Virginia. We passed the Wolftown Mercantile Country Store and five minutes later we arrived at the park. My cellphone beeped right around the entrance to the RWMA - no signal. Ahhhhhh.... we were now out of the reach of civilization.
We drove into the RWMA along a ridge into a valley in Earl's Toyota Corolla. The road was sometime very rocky, often crossed by fast moving streams, and was gravelled in places. The Conway River was visible to our left for much of the drive.
It had been raining on and off for nearly a week before our trip, and we could see that the river was very swollen. We continued to drive into the RWMA until we finally ran into a stream crossing that looked too dicey for the Corolla's low undercarriage.
Fortunately we found a great little spot right near the uncrossable stream. It was about twenty five feet from the river on a solid piece of high ground. The wind was whipping along the river and buffeting our campsite.
I had brought my six person tent, thinking the extra space might be nice. It's about 8x10... kind of like a bivouac or mobile command post. With the wind gusting like it was, setting up this monster tent was challenging.
I had to break out my uber-stakes to pin the bad boy down - no whimpy thin little aluminum stakes would do this night.... oh, no. After Earl and I got the tent stood up and staked down, it was time to setup the rainfly, which promptly about blew off. We fastened every little piece of velcro strapping and tied down every cord on the thing, but I was still less than confident that the rainfly wouldn't fly away in the middle of the night.
So I used some rope to lash down one side of the rainfly to a tree next to the tent and we made a little side shelter on the other side of the tent under which we could stow gear. Some carbiners, a little rope and one tarp later we had the other side of the rainfly secured.
Earl's tent was a small, one-man arrangement that you could only really lie down in. His tent was setup in a flash.
After the site was all set, we got the fire started. Gathering wood wasn't really an issue. There was plenty of standing deadwood around, so we had a nice pile of wood in short order. I had brought a tin of cattail dander (fluff? seeds?) because I read in one of my Tom Brown books that it was an excellent firestarter.
Basically, you harvest a cattail head... that bit that looks like a corn dog, right when it looks like it's starting to burst, or go to seed. Then take it home, let it dry out a bit if necessary, and then use your thumbs to break it apart. Make sure you have a container that is at least twice the size of the cattail you're harvesting because the volume expands massively.
In any event, it lived up to expectations and then some! We piled up a bunch of it at the base of the fire and Earl hit it with a spark from his flint and steel set and fwoosh! The stuff went up like napalm! I mean it really flared up. Unfortunately the wind was so harsh that we had a to use a touch of camp fuel (for Earl's lantern) to get the fire going well.
The heat reflector wall we built did a damn fine job helping with the heat. Basically we hacked up a log into two pieces of roughly equal length and used stones to stand them up against the firepit and then tied a reflective emergency blanket in between. It held up surprisingly well against the gusting wind.
Shelter and warmth attended to, we broke into the beer. Fine ales were at hand, too. We had some homebrew Belgian Ales (14), homebrew Nut Brown Ale (2), a 22 ounce Double Bock homebrew from my brother, some West Coast IPA (3), some Left Hand Pale Ale (2), and a twelve pack of PBR for good measure. Not that we drank it all that night or anything!
We basically sat around the fire, bullshitted and drank and then went to bed. I turned in a bit earlier than Earl... I was looking forward to a good night's sleep with no kids to wake me up early the next morning.
The wind continued howling all night, with the river's rush heard in between gusts of wind. At one point I woke up, dreaming I was being rolled into a giant's cigar only to find out that the wind had blown the side of the tent almost all the way over top of me. Between my sleeping bag and the tent I practically was being rolled into a cigar!
TO BE CONTINUED...
My buddy and I (we'll call him "Earl") went camping this weekend in the Rapidan Wildlife Management Area. I met Earl at his house around 1 o'clock... a half hour ahead of schedule. We enjoyed a beer, gathered some gear, and hit the road. A quick stop at the grocery store to pack the cooler and we were on our way to BFE, or Outer Mongolia, as I like to call it.
About twenty minutes north of The Bavarian Chef we arrived in Wolftown, Virginia. We passed the Wolftown Mercantile Country Store and five minutes later we arrived at the park. My cellphone beeped right around the entrance to the RWMA - no signal. Ahhhhhh.... we were now out of the reach of civilization.
We drove into the RWMA along a ridge into a valley in Earl's Toyota Corolla. The road was sometime very rocky, often crossed by fast moving streams, and was gravelled in places. The Conway River was visible to our left for much of the drive.
It had been raining on and off for nearly a week before our trip, and we could see that the river was very swollen. We continued to drive into the RWMA until we finally ran into a stream crossing that looked too dicey for the Corolla's low undercarriage.
Fortunately we found a great little spot right near the uncrossable stream. It was about twenty five feet from the river on a solid piece of high ground. The wind was whipping along the river and buffeting our campsite.
I had brought my six person tent, thinking the extra space might be nice. It's about 8x10... kind of like a bivouac or mobile command post. With the wind gusting like it was, setting up this monster tent was challenging.
I had to break out my uber-stakes to pin the bad boy down - no whimpy thin little aluminum stakes would do this night.... oh, no. After Earl and I got the tent stood up and staked down, it was time to setup the rainfly, which promptly about blew off. We fastened every little piece of velcro strapping and tied down every cord on the thing, but I was still less than confident that the rainfly wouldn't fly away in the middle of the night.
So I used some rope to lash down one side of the rainfly to a tree next to the tent and we made a little side shelter on the other side of the tent under which we could stow gear. Some carbiners, a little rope and one tarp later we had the other side of the rainfly secured.
Earl's tent was a small, one-man arrangement that you could only really lie down in. His tent was setup in a flash.
After the site was all set, we got the fire started. Gathering wood wasn't really an issue. There was plenty of standing deadwood around, so we had a nice pile of wood in short order. I had brought a tin of cattail dander (fluff? seeds?) because I read in one of my Tom Brown books that it was an excellent firestarter.
Basically, you harvest a cattail head... that bit that looks like a corn dog, right when it looks like it's starting to burst, or go to seed. Then take it home, let it dry out a bit if necessary, and then use your thumbs to break it apart. Make sure you have a container that is at least twice the size of the cattail you're harvesting because the volume expands massively.
In any event, it lived up to expectations and then some! We piled up a bunch of it at the base of the fire and Earl hit it with a spark from his flint and steel set and fwoosh! The stuff went up like napalm! I mean it really flared up. Unfortunately the wind was so harsh that we had a to use a touch of camp fuel (for Earl's lantern) to get the fire going well.
The heat reflector wall we built did a damn fine job helping with the heat. Basically we hacked up a log into two pieces of roughly equal length and used stones to stand them up against the firepit and then tied a reflective emergency blanket in between. It held up surprisingly well against the gusting wind.
Shelter and warmth attended to, we broke into the beer. Fine ales were at hand, too. We had some homebrew Belgian Ales (14), homebrew Nut Brown Ale (2), a 22 ounce Double Bock homebrew from my brother, some West Coast IPA (3), some Left Hand Pale Ale (2), and a twelve pack of PBR for good measure. Not that we drank it all that night or anything!
We basically sat around the fire, bullshitted and drank and then went to bed. I turned in a bit earlier than Earl... I was looking forward to a good night's sleep with no kids to wake me up early the next morning.
The wind continued howling all night, with the river's rush heard in between gusts of wind. At one point I woke up, dreaming I was being rolled into a giant's cigar only to find out that the wind had blown the side of the tent almost all the way over top of me. Between my sleeping bag and the tent I practically was being rolled into a cigar!
TO BE CONTINUED...
02 April 2009
Camping in the Rapidam WMA
A buddy of mine and I are going camping tomorrow afternoon and through most of the weekend in the Rapidan Wildlife Management Area. Click the thumbnail below to get a map. It basically takes up parts of Greene and Madison counties bordering the Shenandoah National Park.
I just got my state wide freshwater fishing license and trout fishing license. It wasn't too expensive... $36 all told. The brook trout fishing at the RWMA is supposed to be great. I hope to land a few trout. Maybe enough to bring a few home with me for dinner with the family Sunday.
Since I got my license, I figured fishing would be a good hobby to get into with my kids. I got my two oldest fishing rods from Sportsmansguide.com. I got a great deal on some beginner's gear. Click here to take a look, in case you're looking for some cheap entry-level rod-n-reel setups for your kids.
I'm also trying to rope my Dad into coming down from Maryland for a fishing/camping trip later this year. Maybe drag a brother or two along with us.
My fishing gear is really lacking, but for this trip a buddy of mine is lending us some of his tackle. I bought a basic rod-n-reel for myself... a Zebco 33. I got mine at Dick's for slightly less than what BassPro has it listed for. It's a decent enough rod that I could hand down to one of the kids if I decided to upgrade later on.
As it stands now the gear I'll be dragging in with me is way too much to fit on my back. Soon I hope to be getting into more hiking/camping trips where I have to pack in all my gear. I know there are certain items that could be jettisoned with no worries, such as:
I just got my state wide freshwater fishing license and trout fishing license. It wasn't too expensive... $36 all told. The brook trout fishing at the RWMA is supposed to be great. I hope to land a few trout. Maybe enough to bring a few home with me for dinner with the family Sunday.
Since I got my license, I figured fishing would be a good hobby to get into with my kids. I got my two oldest fishing rods from Sportsmansguide.com. I got a great deal on some beginner's gear. Click here to take a look, in case you're looking for some cheap entry-level rod-n-reel setups for your kids.
I'm also trying to rope my Dad into coming down from Maryland for a fishing/camping trip later this year. Maybe drag a brother or two along with us.
My fishing gear is really lacking, but for this trip a buddy of mine is lending us some of his tackle. I bought a basic rod-n-reel for myself... a Zebco 33. I got mine at Dick's for slightly less than what BassPro has it listed for. It's a decent enough rod that I could hand down to one of the kids if I decided to upgrade later on.
As it stands now the gear I'll be dragging in with me is way too much to fit on my back. Soon I hope to be getting into more hiking/camping trips where I have to pack in all my gear. I know there are certain items that could be jettisoned with no worries, such as:
- Cooler full of homebrew!
- Camp chair
- Drop large 6 person tent in favor of a 2 person tent (saving about 8 lbs)
- Trim down on first aid kit - the one I currently have could easily service a family of six for a week barring major medical emergencies (go figure - I have a family of six!)
- Wool blanket (I have a sleeping bag)
- Hatchet (if my commando saw works out) (UPDATE: The commando saw was an utter failure. Go figure - the site I bought mine from no longer carries it.)
Other than the list above, I generally pack:
- An isopropyl cooker which folds up to about the size a large egg. My Giga Stove Titanium is very lightweight and extremely effective - one of the best camping gear buys I've ever made. I got mine at a local store for about 40% less than it's listed on the SnowPeak website.
- I only ever carry one fuel cell, which is very lightweight and easily lasts a weekend.
- My cookset is a lightweight stainless steel set (3 pans with lids).
- 2 titanium mugs. Very lightweight, but I could leave one if I had to.
- My plate and utensils are both lightweight. The plate could go if I packed some form of freeze dried food in pouches or MREs. But really, the plate weighs nearly nothing and takes up a negligible amount of space.
- 1 person self-inflating sleeping pad (only if I had to drop it. I love that thing!!)
- small coffee press (again - only if I had to. It's lightweight and takes up very little room)
- A bar of soap in a waterproof container.
- A small can of bugspray. It could go...
- some waterproof matches. One or the other between this and the flint.
- a flint and steel set (small). It would be more manly to keep this over the matches...
- a small whetstone (which could probably go)
- Roll-up, self-inflating pillow. Again - very lightweight and compact. It's not a necessity, but it has very little impact on weight or space and it fucking rocks.
- Buck knife. A must have. That bad boy stays above almost anything else!
- A zip-up journal pad with a deck of cards and pen. It could go, I guess.
- My trusty Fuji digital camera. Small and lightweight. It fits in a breast pocket with room to spare. It would be a shame to not take pics of the beauitiful places I like to camp. I have yet to find a camera that has a better size to picture quality ratio. Probably a keeper even on "hardcore" expeditions.
- 25' nylon rope. Never know when you might need some rope... pretty lightweight, too.
- Sleeping bag. Duh, gotta have it.
- A small LED lantern and a large LED lantern. I could choose one or the other. I'd probably choose the small one.
- 2 bandannas. Keepers for sure.
- Small hand-crank charged LED flashlight. Very dependable. A keeper even if I had to drop both lanterns to keep it.
- 5 plastic stakes. Very rugged. These have come in handy so many times that I couldn't ponder leaving them.
- Emergency insulation space blanket. Lightweight (like nearly nothing)... a keeper. A great insulator/heat reflector for the fire.
- a small roll of TP (for my bunghole)
- 2 gallon water bladder. Gotta have water.
- 2-3 nalgene water bottles
Damn. I think that's it... that's a lot of stuff.
That's why it's best to hike-camp with a buddy. You could share a tent, cooking gear, lanterns, camera, matches, and other stuff and split that gear between the two of you. That means after the communal gear split all you have to carry is your own sleeping bag, food, water, and knife. It makes the weight distribution much easier to handle.
11 March 2009
Ugly. Criminally Ugly.
In less than 18 months forty percent of global wealth has evaporated. Poof!
http://www.reuters.com/article/wtMostRead/idUSTRE52966Z20090310
That makes me think that forty percent (or more) of global wealth was pure bullshit.
In basic terms, this global economic crisis started in the U.S. housing market. Back during the late nineties, Phil Graham, a Senator, wrote legislation which majorly reduced regulation in the mortgage industry. This paved the way for the housing bubble.
People's income started going flat back around 2000. This meant that the housing party was going to be over and that housing prices would stop their meteoric rise and start to fall a bit as demand cooled. ARM and NINJA to the rescue!
ARM, as most people know, stands for Adjustable Rate Mortgage. This is a loan where you initially pay a lower interest rate. At a later date (2 years later, usually) the rate would increase, making mortgage payments as much as double in some cases. Designed for house flipping and speculation, many people were caught with these loans when the housing market started cooling off. Unable to sell, the higher interest rates kicked in and their payments went through the roof. Foreclosures by the millions followed.
NINJA is a less known type of loan. The acronym stands for No Income No Job Applicant. This initially started as a way to sell homes to illegal immigrants who could not legally be employed in America. They had jobs, they just couldn't claim them on the paperwork. The NINJA loan became a way for mortgage brokers to sell to any-old-body. Make a terrible loan, get your commission, and let the recipient of the loan deal with the fallout.
All of this was bad... oh, yes... but the worst has yet to be explained. Any idiot, even a Wall Street executive, could see that these were risky loans. There had to be some other way to make money off these loans aside from the monthly mortgage payment... let's think here, boys...
What Wall Street came up with was nothing short of criminal. Wrap these mortgages up into securities, price them at 20-30 times their value, break up the mortgages and slice them and dice them ten ways to Sunday so no one could tell what securities fund was comprised of what mortgages (and at what terms/rates), insure them, get them rated AAA, and sell them on the global markets.
All of this required massive collusion. The insurers had to be in on it. The rating agencies had to be in on it. Banks had to be in on it. Wall Street had to be in on it.
Massive. Criminal. Fraud. Conspiracy.
And now we, as the American tax payer, are expected to bail out the top 1%. Bail out the bankers. Bail out the insurance giants. Bail out Wall Street. And yes, it is the top 1% who dreamed up these loans and how to insure, rate, and sell them to make more money off of smoke and mirrors. Yes, it is the wealthiest Americans who are almost solely to blame for this mess we're in.
To top it all off, these same people are balking at a tax increase to help cover the fallout! Rich motherfuckers. Most of these people haven't been poor for generations and they have no idea what is is to live hand to mouth. They have no idea what it is like to have to scrimp and save for what they want or need. They have no idea what damage they have done.
Detroit is different. I have no problem bailing out Detroit, and here's why:
Without auto manufacturing in America we are no longer a superpower.
Never mind the fact that GM, Ford, and Chrysler are also victims of Wall Street's greed and incompetence. They are suffering from a lack of demand. Most of the green initiatives they are pursuing started long before the downturn. The Chevy Volt is a good example. They were in the process of changing their faulty business models when the recession hit.
The simple fact of the matter is that auto manufacturing is a matter of national security. It is this industry which provides the backbone for military industrial might. No modern nation can be a superpower without this component. It is a prerequisite.
But the right is using this as an opportunity to attack the unions. Yes, evil unions! Oh, noooo! They are responsible for such evils as child labor laws, workplace safety regulations, the forty hour work week, retirement and health benefits, and the list goes on. Do your research. Before unions, labor was exploited. It was during this time of rampant exploitation of labor that communist and anarchist movements in this country took hold.
Few people know this, but there was an anarchist movement and a communist movement afoot in this nation which was very strong around the turn of the century (1900). Much of their gripe was with industrial exploitation of workers. Horrible and dangerous working conditions where children worked like slaves, the hours were as long as the boss demanded, and the compensation incredibly low. This movement in America even managed to assassinate a President! William McKinley, to be specific.
Oddly enough, once the labor movement in this country started to gain ground and improve conditions for workers, the base for these more violent and destructive movements began to dry up. So why is it that unions get such a bad rap in this country?
Essentially, you can blame it on Jimmy Hoffa and the infiltration of some union shops by the mob. Much of this, at least on the larger scales, was cleaned up by the Justice Department under the RICO Act. However, the taint of this corruption provided the necessary "in" for some elements within our political establishment to go after unions and demonize them.
These same elements persist to this day. They are politicians in the pocket of the captains of industry and finance. These same politicians are eager to bail out Wall Street (no questions asked) and defuse any blame that anyone tries to place at the feet of these captains. At the same time they make Detroit grovel for an amount that was roughly 5% of what they approved for Wall Street with no strings attached!
All I am saying is that we have been taken for a ride. We've been pumped and dumped. Forces are at work that favor the extremely wealthy and screw the middle class and poor. And many of us still don't see it!
The American Dream once meant an honest shot at a decent life for anyone who would work hard and play by the rules. It has been hijacked to mean "wealth and glamor", or wild success. It is no longer good enough to simply own your home, raise your family without hunger or desperation, and retire with dignity. Now you have to have your ride pimped, granite counter tops, and take deluxe vacations to have attained the "American Dream."
By hijacking the American Dream to mean "extreme wealth" we have been made to think that any policies that do not favor the wealthy above all others are somehow unAmerican. We are meant to believe that tax policies that shift wealth upwards are fine, but that tax policies that shift wealth to the middle class or poor are "class warfare" or socialism at work.
Let me tell you something - America has never experienced class warfare. The French Revolution was class warfare. The Russian Revolution was class warfare. The American Revolution was not class warfare. The elite and wealthy in America lead a revolution against the wealthy and elite of England.
In France the wealthy were carted off and executed en masse at the guillotine. In Russia the ruling class was exterminated like rats. And so I say to you again - America has never seen class warfare. The wealthy are terrified of it here because the wealthy never win at class warfare. They die like rats.
Am I saying we should start killing rich people? Hell no! I'm saying that the wealthy interests in this country are doing everything they can to rip us off, to squeeze every last drop of blood they can out of us, and at the same time stave off retribution at the hands of the masses. These chickens always come home to roost, however.
One thing that France and Russia both had in common was an autocratic regime that ignored the people and favored the wealthy to the exclusion of everyone else. America is different in that we have a democracy which is at least marginally responsive to the will of the People.
We have flirted with open class warfare in the past and we were brought back from the brink by people like Teddy Roosevelt (Republican - trust busting) and Franklin Roosevelt (Democrat - New Deal). Regardless of whether or not you feel these initiatives were worthwhile or not, they altered public perception of the landscape and brought us back from potentially huge civil unrest as a result of the lower classes rebelling at their lot in society.
In both cases (trust busting and the New Deal), the public was outraged by the abuses of the wealthy. At the turn of the century it was the robber barons and industrial titans like Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Schwab who used the Pinkertons and like methods to brutally suppress worker strikes and unionization.
In 1929, short selling and abuses on the stock market were the cause of massive hardships in this nation. Forces beyond the average man's control had ruined his life and they were rightly angered by this. These forces were again comprised of those who had wealth and wanted more and more and more and more.
Forty percent of world wealth lost. The poorest among us always bear the heaviest brunt of these downturns. Historically, when the better educated middle class starts to feel the pinch is when things get ugly. They "rouse the rabble", as it were, and with numbers they break the back of the wealthy establishment and, at least, force concessions.
So let's all pull together before it gets that bad, eh? We're rocketing in that direction, if you hadn't noticed. How many people do you know who have lost a home, a job, or both? I am lucky in that I live in Charlottesville. Between the University of Virginia, hospitals, NGIC, and other agencies and industries our area only tends to get hit by the worst recessions.
I will tell you one thing, however... I walk to work every day right through our downtown and Main Street areas and I've been seeing a noticeable uptick in the number of homeless people or people begging for change. Old ladies living in tents, people pushing shopping carts around picking up cans, disabled people in wheel chairs on the Mall asking for money.
It's getting ugly.
http://www.reuters.com/article/wtMostRead/idUSTRE52966Z20090310
That makes me think that forty percent (or more) of global wealth was pure bullshit.
In basic terms, this global economic crisis started in the U.S. housing market. Back during the late nineties, Phil Graham, a Senator, wrote legislation which majorly reduced regulation in the mortgage industry. This paved the way for the housing bubble.
People's income started going flat back around 2000. This meant that the housing party was going to be over and that housing prices would stop their meteoric rise and start to fall a bit as demand cooled. ARM and NINJA to the rescue!
ARM, as most people know, stands for Adjustable Rate Mortgage. This is a loan where you initially pay a lower interest rate. At a later date (2 years later, usually) the rate would increase, making mortgage payments as much as double in some cases. Designed for house flipping and speculation, many people were caught with these loans when the housing market started cooling off. Unable to sell, the higher interest rates kicked in and their payments went through the roof. Foreclosures by the millions followed.
NINJA is a less known type of loan. The acronym stands for No Income No Job Applicant. This initially started as a way to sell homes to illegal immigrants who could not legally be employed in America. They had jobs, they just couldn't claim them on the paperwork. The NINJA loan became a way for mortgage brokers to sell to any-old-body. Make a terrible loan, get your commission, and let the recipient of the loan deal with the fallout.
All of this was bad... oh, yes... but the worst has yet to be explained. Any idiot, even a Wall Street executive, could see that these were risky loans. There had to be some other way to make money off these loans aside from the monthly mortgage payment... let's think here, boys...
What Wall Street came up with was nothing short of criminal. Wrap these mortgages up into securities, price them at 20-30 times their value, break up the mortgages and slice them and dice them ten ways to Sunday so no one could tell what securities fund was comprised of what mortgages (and at what terms/rates), insure them, get them rated AAA, and sell them on the global markets.
All of this required massive collusion. The insurers had to be in on it. The rating agencies had to be in on it. Banks had to be in on it. Wall Street had to be in on it.
Massive. Criminal. Fraud. Conspiracy.
And now we, as the American tax payer, are expected to bail out the top 1%. Bail out the bankers. Bail out the insurance giants. Bail out Wall Street. And yes, it is the top 1% who dreamed up these loans and how to insure, rate, and sell them to make more money off of smoke and mirrors. Yes, it is the wealthiest Americans who are almost solely to blame for this mess we're in.
To top it all off, these same people are balking at a tax increase to help cover the fallout! Rich motherfuckers. Most of these people haven't been poor for generations and they have no idea what is is to live hand to mouth. They have no idea what it is like to have to scrimp and save for what they want or need. They have no idea what damage they have done.
Detroit is different. I have no problem bailing out Detroit, and here's why:
Without auto manufacturing in America we are no longer a superpower.
Never mind the fact that GM, Ford, and Chrysler are also victims of Wall Street's greed and incompetence. They are suffering from a lack of demand. Most of the green initiatives they are pursuing started long before the downturn. The Chevy Volt is a good example. They were in the process of changing their faulty business models when the recession hit.
The simple fact of the matter is that auto manufacturing is a matter of national security. It is this industry which provides the backbone for military industrial might. No modern nation can be a superpower without this component. It is a prerequisite.
But the right is using this as an opportunity to attack the unions. Yes, evil unions! Oh, noooo! They are responsible for such evils as child labor laws, workplace safety regulations, the forty hour work week, retirement and health benefits, and the list goes on. Do your research. Before unions, labor was exploited. It was during this time of rampant exploitation of labor that communist and anarchist movements in this country took hold.
Few people know this, but there was an anarchist movement and a communist movement afoot in this nation which was very strong around the turn of the century (1900). Much of their gripe was with industrial exploitation of workers. Horrible and dangerous working conditions where children worked like slaves, the hours were as long as the boss demanded, and the compensation incredibly low. This movement in America even managed to assassinate a President! William McKinley, to be specific.
Oddly enough, once the labor movement in this country started to gain ground and improve conditions for workers, the base for these more violent and destructive movements began to dry up. So why is it that unions get such a bad rap in this country?
Essentially, you can blame it on Jimmy Hoffa and the infiltration of some union shops by the mob. Much of this, at least on the larger scales, was cleaned up by the Justice Department under the RICO Act. However, the taint of this corruption provided the necessary "in" for some elements within our political establishment to go after unions and demonize them.
These same elements persist to this day. They are politicians in the pocket of the captains of industry and finance. These same politicians are eager to bail out Wall Street (no questions asked) and defuse any blame that anyone tries to place at the feet of these captains. At the same time they make Detroit grovel for an amount that was roughly 5% of what they approved for Wall Street with no strings attached!
All I am saying is that we have been taken for a ride. We've been pumped and dumped. Forces are at work that favor the extremely wealthy and screw the middle class and poor. And many of us still don't see it!
The American Dream once meant an honest shot at a decent life for anyone who would work hard and play by the rules. It has been hijacked to mean "wealth and glamor", or wild success. It is no longer good enough to simply own your home, raise your family without hunger or desperation, and retire with dignity. Now you have to have your ride pimped, granite counter tops, and take deluxe vacations to have attained the "American Dream."
By hijacking the American Dream to mean "extreme wealth" we have been made to think that any policies that do not favor the wealthy above all others are somehow unAmerican. We are meant to believe that tax policies that shift wealth upwards are fine, but that tax policies that shift wealth to the middle class or poor are "class warfare" or socialism at work.
Let me tell you something - America has never experienced class warfare. The French Revolution was class warfare. The Russian Revolution was class warfare. The American Revolution was not class warfare. The elite and wealthy in America lead a revolution against the wealthy and elite of England.
In France the wealthy were carted off and executed en masse at the guillotine. In Russia the ruling class was exterminated like rats. And so I say to you again - America has never seen class warfare. The wealthy are terrified of it here because the wealthy never win at class warfare. They die like rats.
Am I saying we should start killing rich people? Hell no! I'm saying that the wealthy interests in this country are doing everything they can to rip us off, to squeeze every last drop of blood they can out of us, and at the same time stave off retribution at the hands of the masses. These chickens always come home to roost, however.
One thing that France and Russia both had in common was an autocratic regime that ignored the people and favored the wealthy to the exclusion of everyone else. America is different in that we have a democracy which is at least marginally responsive to the will of the People.
We have flirted with open class warfare in the past and we were brought back from the brink by people like Teddy Roosevelt (Republican - trust busting) and Franklin Roosevelt (Democrat - New Deal). Regardless of whether or not you feel these initiatives were worthwhile or not, they altered public perception of the landscape and brought us back from potentially huge civil unrest as a result of the lower classes rebelling at their lot in society.
In both cases (trust busting and the New Deal), the public was outraged by the abuses of the wealthy. At the turn of the century it was the robber barons and industrial titans like Carnegie, Rockefeller, and Schwab who used the Pinkertons and like methods to brutally suppress worker strikes and unionization.
In 1929, short selling and abuses on the stock market were the cause of massive hardships in this nation. Forces beyond the average man's control had ruined his life and they were rightly angered by this. These forces were again comprised of those who had wealth and wanted more and more and more and more.
Forty percent of world wealth lost. The poorest among us always bear the heaviest brunt of these downturns. Historically, when the better educated middle class starts to feel the pinch is when things get ugly. They "rouse the rabble", as it were, and with numbers they break the back of the wealthy establishment and, at least, force concessions.
So let's all pull together before it gets that bad, eh? We're rocketing in that direction, if you hadn't noticed. How many people do you know who have lost a home, a job, or both? I am lucky in that I live in Charlottesville. Between the University of Virginia, hospitals, NGIC, and other agencies and industries our area only tends to get hit by the worst recessions.
I will tell you one thing, however... I walk to work every day right through our downtown and Main Street areas and I've been seeing a noticeable uptick in the number of homeless people or people begging for change. Old ladies living in tents, people pushing shopping carts around picking up cans, disabled people in wheel chairs on the Mall asking for money.
It's getting ugly.
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