Brett,
I sure do know what ya mean. I have been to places that have been advertized as very "out-there" only to find....wave runners. After my daughter was born we went to a Lake Umbaygoag. billed as this state's most Wild lake. Instead we introduced out daughter into our life's passion by paddling next to gas docks and wave runners and "wild camp sites" that folks were ferried to by pontoon boats after paying 15 dollars, and evicting my family. Folks chucking beer bottles into the lake at nonmotorized traffic. I'll agree to the advertizing on just one point.... IT sure was wild... We now refer to Lake Umbeybog as lake OH-my-God.

I feel the same way about the Candian Boundary waters. So much of it has been opened to motorized traffic that it now is not what it once was. Still the smaller lakes are out there a few quiet portages away. Its funny how places get once they are discovered. I read a post Greg Stamer put up a few days ago alerting me that one of my favorite lonely paddles in Greenland is now a major destination for adventure cruise liners. Cruiseliners in Greenland???? Who'd have ever thunk it.....WOW its hardest when wild place get found.

I think this is one of those risks we take. Going outside sometimes means we get fish-skunked and sometimes we get "wild-skunked" Fish-skunked I can deal with. I'll always be out to toss another line. Its when I get wild-skunked that gnaws at me when it happens.

The problem is one person's version of wild is different from the other. For some folks wild is a weekend in a motor home. And it can be hard to tell the difference when we are reading up on a destination.

I have found in those wild skunked situations that ya have to look micro rather then macro. If everyone is on the water in motor boats go into the forest and look for amphibians. When I get wild skunked I look under leaf litter and roll stones. Search for wild in the micro environments. There is something out there to see ya just have to learn to look smaller, and off trail This strategy won't save the day you had planned for. But at least ya won't feel like your wasting time.

Last night I was guiding an 86 year old woman who wanted to see loons one more time. A wild back country trip wasn't possible but by finding the small uninhabited corner of a inhabited lake we found a loon family with a 2 day old chick that filled her hard of hearing ears with that haunting call. Showed every bit of loon behavior and all by a sunset that was fantastic. Its a moment my 86 year old wild friend will never forget. It was a matter of turning over the smaller environments.

getting wild skunked truly sucks, but don't give up on the trip. Sometimes the unverse will suprise you if you go off the well travel trail and alter the plan.

Case in point: A few years ago I was guiding a group that had been recommended to me as "serious out doors men". I picked up the group from the airport and started driving. By the time we left the airport lot I knew it was going to be a long trip. Several hours later the tone and foulness of the conversation was just vile. 20 minutes of male pair bonding is something I can tolerate, but this jsut intensified over time into really disgusting discussions that never really seemed to end. Yuck! Note: I was in the merchant marines and my ears are not exactly tender. To offend these ears requires some expertise. Suffice it to say my ears sagged by trip's end.

This group had asked for a very wild outer island trip. In the end they wanted to go shopping and get the I did it T-shirt trophy. They wouldn't help cook or clean up, move boats or even set up tents. And the conversation....Yuck To make matters worse they had lied about their capabilites and weren't up to the trip and really knew nothing about paddling. The kayaking classes they said they had taken hadn't in fact happened. worse, this gang wasn't looking for a guide they wanted a slave.

I found myself humming the last line of the Beach Boys Hoist up the John B Sails...."This is the worst trip I've ever been on!" I decided for my own sanity to take one hour paddle in the evening just to cleans my head from the day's filth. It was in those breif outings that I saw the water spout. The birds we never saw as a group. The sunset no one else had the brains or heart to appreciate.

On the night of a very calm full moon. I was out of my tent checking the boats to make sure they were above tide..... That's when I got the invitation....You know It was one of those times when ya just know what your supposed to be doing. Me and My buddy Mr. Orion were going to hang out the rest of the night. I pointed my bow at his belt. Took a bearing on the island for the return and was off into the Atlantic ocean at night. I went out solo and gathered 3 new pelagic species for my life list. Saw huge schools of squid under the water lit up by the moon like millions of silver dollars. Then 8 miles off shore I heard what sounded like a small leak in my boat..... Eventually, it got louder. Brett, I spent the evening in the company of a sperm whale calling under my boat and surfacing as near as 30 feet from my boat. In hte moonlight his surfaces under the water were all lit up. It was incredible! Suddenly the worst trip I had ever had became the worst trip I ever had with the best moment I ever had in it. The pardox was incredible. It was one of those high moments in paddling that keep us in it. Keep us building and keep us going even when we have the occasional bombed trip.

When I got back to camp at sunrise, my vile mouthed clients asked me how my night paddle was in a tone that implied they thought I was crazy for being out there. My answer was a yankee laconic "Ey yup it was good." Never told them the story. It wasn't their gift from the universe. They never would have understood it. It is my beleif that those who go 5% farther on any trip ussually get 500% more out of it.

Hang in there Brett. I'm sorry you had a blown trip. Don't worry your next big wild moment is out there and you can take a bit of solice knowing that the wave runner crowd from gasoline alley will never even in a million years know what it is your seeking. And when it is your moment its will be yours alone.

Whales Tales and Mackrel skies,

!RUSS