by Glynn Wilson

LAKE WEISS, Ala., July 31 - If you are born in a land of lakes and rivers and have not completely lost your sense of biophilia, there should come a time in a man's life when the idea of possessing a boat is something you just cannot get out of your head.

There are many boats to choose from depending on your idea of how it should be used. In the northeast corner of Alabama around Lake Weiss, most men - and some women - feel the deep desire to own a boat made for fishing.

I distinctly remember when this urge hit my own father when he was in his late 30's or early 40s. He could not rest until he had it - a 17-foot aluminum fishing machine with a v-shaped hull. It had the added benefit of being fast enough for dragging around a couple of bored kids on skis with its 35-horsepower Evinrude outboard clamped to the stern.

Every chance he got from that point on, until he died at the age of 47 from stress on the job with the old Southern Bell telephone company, he would attach the boat trailer to the hitch on the back of his 1962 Chevy pickup and high-tail it to a lake.

He was happiest on the water, where they still say in these parts, "a bad day fishing is better than a good day at work."

Sometimes as a lad I got dragged along on these trips. Sometimes it was fun. When we actually caught fish.

Catching fish or not catching fish did not seem to matter one whit to my dad. He just liked being away from it all, on the water. He was not a drinking man, at least to my knowledge, but he would pack a cooler of Coca-Cola's, load up on Winston's and cheese crackers and live minnows, worms or crickets, and get his line in the water as fast as humanly possible.

Since he died, in 1973, I have been on countless bodies of water on many boats. I even owned a canoe briefly just a few years back when artist and photographer Spider Martin gave me his 17-foot Kevlar to put on top of my 1998 Plymouth Voyager in New Orleans. I think he was worried about me surviving hurricane season. That was before Katrina.

Photo by Glynn Wilson

The new/old Pelican Navigator atop the Chevy Van, or what we call around here, the mobile office suite . . . dot dot dot...

The Voyager did not survive my almost four year stay in New Orleans. It died one strange night on the side of Maple Street about four blocks from my apartment across from the Plum Street Snowball stand for reasons there is no need to go into tonight. I gave the canoe back to Spider, so we would have it in Blount County for our occasional runs on the Locust Fork River.

I replaced the van with a loaded Chevy Venture last year, after cashing the paychecks from covering the Scrushy trial for the New York Times. Since then, not a week has gone by without a picture of another canoe on top of the new van floating through my mind, usually about the time I'm about ready to fall asleep.

In recent days, the thought has grown so strong that I started the research in earnest to find the right canoe for the right price.

As I e-mailed the Locust Fork focus group just the other day, a preliminary investigation into the best canoe to represent LocustFork.Net atop the Chevy Venture mobile blog office resulted in a strong desire for the fine lines of a Wenonah Prospector.

First designed by the Chestnut Canoe Co. in 1910, and made famous by notable paddling enthusiast and wilderness artist Bill Mason, the Prospector remains one of the most recognized canoe designs. It is a special edition canoe in honor of the 200th anniversary of the Lewis and Clark expedition, which would make it a fitting boat considering our interest in science and American democracy.

The research took us on a mini-adventure to Alabama Small Boats in Helena on the Cahaba River. The guide there recommended the 16-foot Prospector after I described the types of uses we have planned - and after we talked a bit about business philosophy and politics. He recommends Wenonah as a company that has resisted the corporatization of the other boat companies, continuing to innovate in creative ways.

Even after talking to him and looking at a number of boats, I still liked the idea of a smaller one, maybe a 15 or even a 14-foot. The idea being the smaller and easier to handle the better. The plan for the LocustFork.Net canoe will range from a quick, lone paddle around lakes and streams to refresh the spirit, to joint ventures during bird migration season for digital wildlife photography, to the occasional wild river adventure over white water rapids with one or two onboard.

For the record, this particular guide does not recommend running the Locust Fork River rapids in ANY canoe. But I suspect from just a short visit he is from Mountain Brook and values his safety more than his freedom. I also doubt he truly understands the idea of being humbled by nature, finding the edge of experience.

"It's dangerous," he said of the Locust Fork.

I told him about running every bit of it with Spider Martin in the 17-foot Kevlar, never coming close to crashing or turning over, really, except for that final rapid right before the popular swimming hole near the takeout point at Highway 160.

But I admitted it did seem a bit crazy.

"I don't recommend crazy," he said.

I always knew Spider was a bit crazy. He would never take the easy way down the river, the natural way where the water flows the strongest around the rocks. But when I saw the look in that guide's eyes when I told him about our exploits, he seemed scared to death.

"You can get lucky and beat the river many times," he said. "But it only takes once for the river to claim you. That river is scary."

Although the year we did most of our runs was 2002, a year remembered for a heavier than normal amount of rainfall in the winter and spring. This year, there's not much water in the Locust Fork. In places it is as dry as a boneyard.

But back to the point. The LocustFork.Net canoe might also be used once in a while to accommodate a member of the opposite sex in a romantic moonlight float on one of the many small and large lakes in the area - or anywhere from the Smoky Mountains to the Great Northwest, when we get ambitious.

Or maybe we will take along three companions, one of the kid variety. It should also work just fine for longer camping trips.

The main thing you have to know about this canoe buying experience is that the lighter the canoe, the higher the price. Since I'm slowly becoming a member of the old, lazy fart club, the priority again is: The lighter the better.

The Prospector comes in the class of canoes called Touring Canoes, which are the most versatile for the widest range of uses. They are durable enough, maneuverable enough, stable enough, etc. It should be pretty fast in a lake or handle most river work, although it won't be as maneuverable as a kayak or even a smaller canoe designed more for rivers, such as the Pelican Navigator.

Some of the focus group recommend a kayak or yak for short instead of a canoe. It would be much easier to pop on the van and go, for sure, but the prices look about the same. And, I wanted something you can carry along a 12-pack of Yuenglings and lunch, plus an expensive digital camera and a laptop. I wanted something that doesn't turn over, especially in cold water.

Also, keep in mind what a canoe would look like on top of the Chevy van with LocustFork.Net in big white letters on both sides, upside down of course. It will make a fine billboard.

Considering the prices on new canoes started making me think the boat idea was just going to have to float around in my head awhile longer. Then the idea hit of looking for a used one on Crag's List.

An ad in the Birmingham online classifieds turned up nothing, I suspect because B'ham. is still not up to Internet speed with America's larger, real cities. So a friend recommended checking Atlanta.

Boom. There in Rome, Georgia, was a 13-foot red Pelican Navigator for $200.

So on Monday after a late breakfast, I made the arrangements and crafted a Mapquest map up I-59 to I-759 at Gadsden, then to Highway 411 all the way to Rome. It is just across the state line from serious Bob Riley and Confederate flag territory, judging by the public displays along the highway.

On the way there, I made a mental note of the free state boat launch on the western side of the bridge over Lake Weiss.

Then in a community ironically called Mountain Brook, I found a man named Joel and made a deal. I won't reveal his last name or address to save him from the prying eyes of Google searches, spammers and the Bush NSA. But he was a very nice and knowledgeable boatman himself who has graduated to kayaks for himself and his young son.

He told me all about the boat, how it turns pretty quick in class I and II rapids, but is not so fast in a lake. The best way to canoe a lake solo would be from the front seat, he said, paddling backwards.

But since we have no plans for long boat races on any lakes, and at only 57-pounds and made from tough RAM-X polyethylene, we know it will serve our needs for some time - until we can afford that $1900 for the ultra-light Kevlar you can lift with one hand.

We strapped and tied the Pelican on the Chevy and I headed back toward Alabama in search of a watering hole to make sure the damn thing actually floated before I got too far away to take it back.

The local knowledge at the red neck marina and gas station on the paying side of the lake said you don't need a boat license for any craft without a motor. Good news. Possessing beer on the lake is a misdemeanor, but not so much if you pour it into a plastic cup and don't go running up on anyone's peer.

"You shouldn't run into any trouble today," the man behind the counter said. "Somebody sunk Rob's boat this morning. Pulled the plug when he wasn't looking. He won't be going out today."

So I eased over to the other side of the bridge and took her down to the water and loaded the paddles, the cooler, binoculars, the digital camera, a large flashlight in case it was dark on the way back, and pushed off.

I paddled around the bend to the other side of the launch and into a cove, where I spotted the only large bird worth a photograph. It was a large, white Egret.

Guess the presence of a strange man in a strange boat scared him from his fishing hole. Too bad, but I only had a couple of hours of sunlight left anyway. And the purpose of this trip was just to test the boat in the water and get a feel for what she would do.

"I'll be damn," I said to no one in particular. "She floats."

Wait 'til people see what live, literary blog essays look like filed from the middle of a river, with photos.

There is not a New York Times reporter alive who has ever accomplished that feat. Even Ed Abbey wrote his stuff from dry land after the trip.

Photo by Glynn Wilson

A sunset view over the bow of the LocustFork.Net Pelican Navigator canoe on it's maiden voyage on Lake Weiss in northeast Alabama. They call it the Crappie Capital of the World. But we are more interested in the view - and the wildlife - in the lower Applachians mountains.