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Field trips 2.0


BC witness

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On 7/21/2019 at 11:50 PM, BC witness said:

Norseman, great shots of the Kaslo/Gerrard area. I hunted up there for 5 or 6 seasons, a couple of decades ago, with lots of success. 

 

Kiwakwe, I like your area a lot, too, though it does look a bit dry out there.

 

I got out for about 5 hours this afternoon, 'cause I just HAD to try out the new lift kit in the Outlander. I chose a quiet valley about an hour from my home, and wasn't disappointed in the improvement to the ground clearance of the vehicle, or the peace and quiet of the spot I chose to explore. It's a steep creek valley South of the Fraser River, extending back towards the US border. Because the road access is not marked, and fairly well hidden from view of the main highway, it sees almost no traffic, with no lakes or camp areas to attract weekend warriors. I saw no one at all in the whole time I was up there. 

 

I did see a couple of grouse, some deer tracks, and a fairly big bear scat, but no other wildlife at all.

 

I like the Outlander, glad the lift did not disappoint. Is there a decent source of aftermarket equipment? Can you get aluminum skid plates? When i replace my "grocery getter" VW, I'd like to go with one of those.

Sounds like a good choice in spots to explore too. I don't know if BC is the same but out here in UT, it seems if you don't have a giant RV with a "garage"  or toy hauler for all your atvs/sidebysides you don't go outside.

The forest roads are becoming race tracks for those things and their often obnoxious operators. I've a good sense that most would never be out there but for the fact they spent $25,000 on a toy and need to show the spouse they didn't waste the money.

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56 minutes ago, Kiwakwe said:

I've a good sense that most would never be out there but for the fact they spent $25,000 on a toy and need to show the spouse they didn't waste the money.

 

Make my FLIR purchase a while back look like pocket change LOL. I saw where the FLIR One is down to just less than $200 and looking around could perhaps find a lower price than that. I think it could be time to start a thermal image thread somewhere on the BFF as I'm actually pretty impressed with the resolution of the low end FLIR TK. Could be fun to see people's images. Anyway, as usual, get home in one piece, K, and thanks to you and everyone else again for the great pics. So much lovely country.

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Right, Catmandoo, family slave labour, but not my wife. At the time I had 2 eager young teenage boys, lured to the claim with a couple of dirt bikes to ride when they weren't shoveling. There was a very nice hot spring just a km downstream, so the end of every day had us all soaking in the hot water, with lots of cold beer on hand.

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Kiwakwe, virtually no aftermarket for the outlander here in N. America. I had to source the lift kit from Russia. No skid plates made for it that I know of, so you'd have to go to a fabricator for custom items. 

 

The Mitsubishi would never be my go to for an adventure vehicle, but I bought mine for the very cheap to run hybrid driveline, as I use it in my courier contract business. I can't afford a separate vehicle for outings, so I chose to make the Mitsu as capable as possible, and avoid the really gnarly trails. With an electric motor on both front and rear axles, it is very capable on the often very steep logging roads here in BC. No transfer case to worry about, and exceptional low speed torque for slow crawling. For downhill, the adjustable regen braking works well, though not as well as low range in a 2 speed transfer case, and has the added bonus of generating power for the drive battery as you descend. On the outbound leg of the trip I took the other day, I generated 12 km worth of drive energy while descending a 10 km hill.

 

Here's a shot of the descent anlge near the bottom of the valley:

 

IMG_0151.JPG

Edited by BC witness
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 Sounds like some good side benefits to a hybrid, didn't realize it wasn't a gasser.  Yes, that descent looks as if it would generate some juice.

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Spending some time this fall in the Holy Cross Wilderness of Colorado, Northwestern Sawatch. In the vicinity of Camp Hale, Eagle/Gypsum, Leadville, and Vail. All of these areas are full of history sightings and mysterious disappearances. Anyone is welcome to join, and I hope to come back with some sort of experience. I cover 10 to 25 miles a day, hiking sunrise to sunset. 

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9 hours ago, Hikingcoyote said:

Spending some time this fall in the Holy Cross Wilderness of Colorado, Northwestern Sawatch. In the vicinity of Camp Hale, Eagle/Gypsum, Leadville, and Vail. All of these areas are full of history sightings and mysterious disappearances. Anyone is welcome to join, and I hope to come back with some sort of experience. I cover 10 to 25 miles a day, hiking sunrise to sunset. 

 

Take lots of pics!

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have fun out of "likes" to give today, but dang, I'm loving all the pictures you all are posting. Why don't you each have your own threads, out of curiosity?  I restarted mine from my first year here in 2012.

Edited by Madison5716
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Madison, I started this one as a place for those who get out in the field to share their pictures and stories, so they would all be in the same place, but I also enjoy following individual threads, so there's a place for both, I think.

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Heading out today for an overnight in an area that has produced in the past. Will retrieve (hopefully) the card from a trail cam there already and put up a 2nd trail cam. 

 

The weather forecast looks perfect.

 

Will report back.

Edited by wiiawiwb
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The general area I went to has over a dozen ponds some of which you must bushwhack to reach. Nothing eventful to report except a small tree came/fell down at dusk about 125 yards from me. That could simply be coincidental but there was a fallen tree four outings in a row at another pond 1 1/4 miles from the one I went to Monday night.  I wonder what the odds of that are. 

 

I'm embarrassed to say that there were no videos on the trail cam I had up for a month. I had a v-shaped block behind the trail cam, which pointed it toward the area of interest, but the v-block fell out and all of the videos were useless. Lesson learned.

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6 hours ago, wiiawiwb said:

I'm embarrassed to say that there were no videos on the trail cam I had up for a month.

 

No need to be, my friend, no one here is perfect. And believe me, one little leaf blowing in the wind at the end of a small branch rewarded me with hundreds of frames of virtually nothing. It happens. 

Edited by hiflier
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Admin

Bigfoot strikes again..... 😉

61D7CF1A-203B-495D-B576-CC1D6F69FCEC.jpeg

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On 8/7/2019 at 1:31 PM, wiiawiwb said:

The general area I went to has over a dozen ponds some of which you must bushwhack to reach. Nothing eventful to report except a small tree came/fell down at dusk about 125 yards from me. That could simply be coincidental but there was a fallen tree four outings in a row at another pond 1 1/4 miles from the one I went to Monday night.  I wonder what the odds of that are. 

 

I'm embarrassed to say that there were no videos on the trail cam I had up for a month. I had a v-shaped block behind the trail cam, which pointed it toward the area of interest, but the v-block fell out and all of the videos were useless. Lesson learned.

 

I had a set up that triggered on moving vegetation during a hot sunny day. Probably had a thousand images of a moving bush. The price of high sensitivity on the PIR. It was a trail with elk, deer, black bear, bobcat and other. Worth the battery consumption.

I started out with bungee cords and items to place between the camera and tree for aiming. I quickly switched to a ball mount set up that handled up to 8 ibs and indexed the camera back to the previous aim position for repeatability.

 

First image: I ended up with a box of these mounts. They have been out of production for years. The ball mount is bolted to a piece of steel channel with serrated edges. I use friction grip mounts on living trees and screw in mounts on dead trees / stumps. The ratchet strap is laced through ASAT 3D leaf cut camo. I think the rating on the ratchet strap is about 1500 lbs.

 

2nd image shows post bear taste test. Knownst to the bear but unknownst to me, the cover scent was cut with vegetable oil. I tried an essential oil, pine / cedar and the bear showed me that it was cut with veggie oil. Camera survived, mount stayed in place on the tree.

 

3rd image is mounting plate.  "Field braking", as the sheet metal guys call it, returned the plate to almost like new. I abandoned the metal mounting plates after testing determined that they were reflectors / projectors of ultrasonic noise. I now use white oak for mounting.

 

4th image is python security cable laced through ASAT camo.

 

It takes time to set up and have the camo cover the straps. The camera / mounting fixture slide into the ball mount and lock. There is a positive stop on the ball mount so the camera re-registers in the same place / angle.

                                                                                                                                                                                             

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Edited by Catmandoo
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15 hours ago, norseman said:

Bigfoot strikes again..... 😉

61D7CF1A-203B-495D-B576-CC1D6F69FCEC.jpeg

Shoulder of a paint horse. ;)

Edited by BigTreeWalker
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