Originally Posted by CDSmith

A little more on the visit....

These three uncles of mine haven't been in the same place at the same time in many years. This was like an aligning of the planets in my family, so to speak. The oldest uncle is an ex boxer, was the Canadian west coast welterweight champ back in the late 50's in fact. He's 80 now and has an incredibly storied life.

The youngest of the three, he's been hunting and fishing in N Ontario all his life basically. Back in the early 60's he was drafted by the Leafs (yes, the Toronto NHL team), as was my other uncle, the middle one that owns the place on Nym lake. Both were signed by the Leafs at one time. The middle one declined thier offer, the younger one defaulted and ruined his chances because of a girlfriend back in his hometown. To this day he has that as one of his larger regrets in life, but damn the guy can fish! All three have hunted moose and deer and fished the lakes of Northern Ontario for the past 60-odd years.

I say this to give you an idea of just how incredible this trip was. The stories, the lore of the region, the history that was shared, I could write books I tell you. Also each one has his own ideas of how true fishing should be done, thus the old school smart-ass comments flying back and forth between brothers (and nephew) were quite priceless. Made the fishing and the trip that much better.

Those three will in all likelyhood never get together like that again, so this was a once in a lifetime opportunity for me. And there are about 80 first cousins on that side of the family and many more 2nd, 3rd, and 4th generation cousins as well, and out of all of that I was the only one invited. A true honor.