CARF Outdoors

Sunday, May 5, 2019

Gear Swap at BMFS

Bob Mitchell's Fly Shop in Saint Paul had a gear swap. There was a lot of cool stuff there. There were also a bunch of cool people. Here are some photos I took while I was there.

Outside of the shop.

Outside of the shop Patagonia was showing off their new wading boots, and then under the BMFS tent the grill was going and there were hot dogs and chips for all.

Steelhead Talk

There was a lot of fish talk going on, and in the photo above Mr. Sherlock was talking about steelhead, per usual. He likes to toss an egg pattern first before using a streamer - I'm kidding. That's how you get him "triggered" haha :).

Hot dogs and chips.

Sam trying to get Aaron to give him all of the goods for free.

There was a lot of old gear that found new homes, and will find new fish. There were so many fly rods this year! So many!

Inside the shop

The Legend - Wilderness Bill

The Man, The Myth, The Legend - Wilderness Bill made an appearance to the gear swap. He's known to wrestle Canadian gators in his sleep, and chug bottles of maple syrup by the gallons, and destroy Costco sized pizzas with 1 bite.

Wilderness Bill scores!

Wilderness Bill is also good at hunting down some seriously good deals!

Big thanks to Bob Mitchell's Fly Shop for the hot dogs, and hosting a fun event!

FYI - I don't know what is going on with my Google account and blogger, but it won't let me traditionally reply to your comments. I have to instead create a complete separate comment to reply back.

Wednesday, May 1, 2019

TenCARFa

We're getting to have a Spring here in Minnesota, and I have been able to get out and enjoy it. Other than the trout in the State Parks of Minnesota, the only fish I am able to get out and target are currently panfish. With it being Spring and all, I went out for a walk around a local lake, and decided to bring my Tenkara rod.

With a beaded San Juan Worm tied on the end of my Tenkara USA Hane rod recommended to me by The Tenkara Master Blaster himself, Troutrageous (Tenkara Angler Magazine), I went out and dominated the sunfish!

#icatchsmallfishtour

During the walk I stopped at the Como Park Zoo & Conservatory. Within the conservatory there was a Japanese garden and there were so many Bonsai Trees. I was thoroughly impressed, because, I have never seen one in person. Since FOREVER I thought a Bonsai Tree was a specific species, but I was completely wrong. I had no idea that it was an actual art form of growing much larger trees, but stunting them to be mini. I was amazed, and conducted 30 minutes of research when I got home, and purchased a Bonsai Tree seed kit for Colorado Blue Spruces. Soon, I will be a master of Bonsai.

I hope I possess the skills to Bonsai.

Also, I must give a shot out to Cheech of Fly Fish Food, because, he dubbed my style of Tenkara as TenCARFa, and I think it's RAD. Thanks!

All the cool kids are raving about TenCARFa.

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Thursday, April 11, 2019

Ted Hansen Art

Recently, I stopped by Ted Hansen's studio to pick up some stickers and a smallmouth bass canvas print I had ordered from his Etsy shop. During my visit we had a beer, ate some Girl Scout Cookies, spun some Hank Williams and Bob Dylan on the record player, and bounce around some ideas for this summer.

Classic.

During out chat, Ted set up a blank canvas on his easel and started to paint the entire thing red. I'm really looking forward to seeing what comes of that piece since I got to see it from the start.

Blank canvas meets Ted Hansen and red paint.

At the beginning of the year, Ted has taken up a challenge other artists have done in the past to invoke some new ideas. He has been doing a daily piece - Study a Day. After he was finished painting the base layer of red on the blank canvas, he grabbed a pencil and a pad of sketch paper (I think), and began whipping up daily study #97 of 365.