Welcome Miles!

[Erik]

It seems our SA friend and expert spearo will be spending some time close to us... I'll wait and see if he comes on here to announce the place and time haha.

[Marwan]

whats he doing in canada...did the yellowfins migrate ??? if not whos salying them in Capetown??
cheers guys and merry christmas to you all...
miles happy eid my brother...take it easy on the lamb

[Erik]

Merry Christmas and Salam to you too, siddiqi.

[miles]

Hiya!!!

Sorry for taking sooooo long to respond, just got in!! Spent the entire day looking at houses and buying a car. Pretty hectic trying to start afresh in a new country!!

I'm in North Battleford and am LOVING the place!! Unfortunately for those tuna, i'll be back in South Africa early January and then come back to Canada in March/April. My plan is to spend the Canadian winters in SA, harrassing tuna and then spending the quiet SA season here in Canada, which should then be summer!!

Some advice on your water temp's in summer would be helpful!! Will a 5mm suffice?? I've dived in 9-10 degrees celcuis quite a bit in SA with a 5mm and 3mm socks and gloves. Not long though, maybe 3-4 hours before the extremeties start going numb!!

Would LOVE to hook up with some local spearo's or even just to get some diving practice in!!

Regards
miles

[Erik]

Your 5mm should be fine Miles. Can I ask what work you'll be doing here in Canadiana?

[miles]

Still have to find a job!! I'm an accountant/auditor by profession, but simply HATE living in a box!! Will probably find some outdoor type of job, just to keep me out of mischief So, i'm pretty much open to any suggestions.......

Wifes got some friends here and she's just accepted a 3 year contract. She simply got fed up with the way they treat South Africans doctors in SA, and here friends were RAVING about how great Canada was, so, here we are....

[BennyB]

Originally Posted by miles

I'm an accountant/auditor by profession, but simply HATE living in a box!!

Praise the lord, there's more than one of me 5 years audit, got out of that, 5 years commercial (mostly telco) now. PLEASE tell me there's more to life than debits & credits!!!

[miles]

Spent 2 years in London working as a auditor in 1998-2000!! No sunlight, going to work in the dark, getting home in the dark.......... got sick for 2 weeks ......... missed the WHOLE summer........ Dull, boring, grey and cold.......but hey, when i got back home to South Africa, it made me appreciate EVERYTHING so much more!! Not really a good environment for a "water' person like myself!!

Seriously, come to CANADA!!! A million time better than London!! EVERYWHERE you go here the people are INCREDABILY friendly. My wife can't get over how the check out staff at the local supermarket tell you :"enjoy the rest of your day", with a huge smile and they ACTUALLY are sincere!! Rush Hour - 10 cars standing at a traffic light!! I remember running for a tube in London, pushing your mates out of the way, just to get there in time..........knowing ful well that the next train will be 2 minutes later..... As you can tell, lovin' it here!!!

[settingsteel]

Congrats on your new move Miles, you got the most imp. aspect well set...The Right Attitude, rest is smoooth, diving, enjoy your holidays

[messey]

Hey Miles welcome to Canada

Good choice moving to the prairies so many nice lakes out there. I have a place about 3 maybe 4 hours from North Battleford, there are some 60+ lakes with in a hour of camp. You are more the welcome to come up some time.

Vessey

[Paraaronoid]

Welcome to Saskatchewan, one of the greatest places on Earth. The incredible vast amount of land combined with only 1 million residents = lots of playground for yourself!

I am just ~120-130 km southeast from you here in Saskatoon.

If you are ever into taking up hunting on land, not just water, you are in the hunting mecca of N. America and possibly one of the best places in the world for it. Hunting can almost be a year round thing. In the fall, you have almost an entire continent of waterfowl pass through Saskatchewan as we sit in the hub of central flyway of N. America. Watching 50,00 Snow geese tornado down into a field definitely makes a person go "Wow". If you ever are into big game hunting, just about 75 km straight south of you (near Biggar, SK), the world record Whitetail deer was taken back in 1993. You are not far from great bear, elk, moose hunting as well. With such vast land, there are many hunting opportunities for coyote/fox, if that is your thing as well during the winter months. Rural Saskatchewan is in the decline as people are moving in droves into the cities, so you have lots of hunting room.

If you enjoy fishing and lakes, we have over 100,000 lakes. Many of these have never seen a fishing lure, with only pontoon planes being able to access many of our northern lakes. It is not uncommon to go days in certain areas without bumping into a single person. Spearfishing here is an unknown thing here, I don't understand why. We have pretty much the most LIBERAL restrictions you can have in interior N. America, being able to take all of the same fish that you can via hook/line. Not the case for many other provinces and states as well.

You may find this useful as well:
fishingsaskatchewan.ca :: Index
(A forum about fishing various lakes in Saskatchewan)

In one of our lakes (actually a man-made reservoir called Lake Diefenbaker), two brothers calling themselves the "Fishing Geeks" managed to break the world Rainbow trout just last year (43.6 lbs)...Breaking records is what goes on here in Saskatchewan! You can see pictures here:
MySpace.com - Adam - 27 - Male - CA - www.myspace.com/rainbow_fishinggeek

Oh yeah, you may or may not be familiar with another HUGE thing in Saskatchewan. Saskatchewan's people are absolutely fanatical about our only professional sports team here, the SASKATCHEWAN ROUGHRIDERS (American style football team). We just won this year's championship about a month ago. A "Have a nice day" or a "enjoy the rest of your day" is pretty much interchangable with "Yeah Riders" or "Go Riders"!!!

WELCOME TO SASKATCHEWAN!

[Erik]

Maybe we should plan a long weekend event in Saskatchewan that we can all attend, like the Queen Charlotte trip this year? Head up to one of messey's lakes for camping and spearing... yes.

[messey]

Erick that sounds like a good plan, I would be able to do that anytime except the may long weekend.

[fer_abella]

Big change of life.
No tuna around.
Nice to ear everything is fine.
Merry Chrismas !!

[Erik]

Originally Posted by messey

Erick that sounds like a good plan, I would be able to do that anytime except the may long weekend.

How about we say June7/8 for now? We could take the Friday (6) off too. Messey you pick the lake... I remember you saying up around PA was really nice.