Totally Jealous of Nate Muskoka's Lifestyle!

Happy New Year!!!

This dude goes on trips with the Baird bothers, the Budnick brothers, hangs with PineMartyn, and tons of other amazing content creators.
He's also the General Manager of Algonquin Outfitters in Huntsville.

But he's so chill.

Drop in for a listen with a really cool fellow that's very " No big deal" about doing all the things we love to do..

Originally recorded May 1, 2023.

Find him here:

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCgOLRJGODg4elwE4X5r5ZgA

instagram.com/natemuskoka/?hl=en

Transcript

00:00 - 00:01
Hello, and good day, eh?

00:01 - 00:04
Welcome to the Super Good Camping podcast. My name is Pamela.

00:04 - 00:04
I'm Tim.

00:04 - 00:06
And we are from supergoodcamping.com.

00:07 - 00:10
We are here because we're on a mission to inspire other families to enjoy camping adventures

00:10 - 00:11
such as we have with our kids.

00:12 - 00:14
Today's guest lives in Huntsville, Ontario.

00:14 - 00:20
Paraphrasing his about section on YouTube, he loves Crown Land camping, canoeing, and spending

00:20 - 00:24
his time outdoors learning to appreciate all the things that draw him to the wilderness.

00:25 - 00:30
He claims to be an expert of nothing and an avid enthusiast of building skills, exploring new

00:30 - 00:34
areas, fumbling about in the woods, and lazing about in his canoe.

00:34 - 00:37
Please welcome Nate, AKA Nate Muskoka from YouTube.

00:38 - 00:39
Hey. Thanks

00:39 - 00:39
for coming by, man.

00:39 - 00:40
Hey, Nate.

00:40 - 00:42
Thanks for having me.

00:42 - 00:43
I we you know what?

00:43 - 00:47
It's, we did a did an episode with, Chris and Julia Price.

00:48 - 00:55
And one of the, it's a tiny little thing but it stuck with me so hard, she said, we love to

00:55 - 01:01
chat with like minded people And that's exactly what we seem to be doing.

01:01 - 01:05
I was gonna say for a living, it's kind of the opposite of that. But yeah.

01:05 - 01:05
A 100%.

01:06 - 01:06
Yeah. There you go.

01:06 - 01:09
3 years in and still enjoying it.

01:09 - 01:11
Still enjoying your step. Doing it. Yep.

01:12 - 01:14
I I may have a small issue with that.

01:14 - 01:21
So I see you dude, you you seem to be tell me if I'm wrong but I'm watching your your YouTube

01:21 - 01:26
channel which we will put all the links to all your social media stuff down in our description.

01:26 - 01:31
I I seem and and it could be simply because we just came out of winter and I'm catching up.

01:31 - 01:35
You seem to be doing more winter things or maybe filming more winter things.

01:37 - 01:39
Is that is that a thing for you?

01:39 - 01:41
Like, are you doing more? Or

01:42 - 01:49
No. It's, it's only because I I just started my YouTube channel, like, Okay. 3 months ago.

01:49 - 01:52
Right in the middle of it. Yeah.

01:52 - 02:00
And, it was, it was a trip I did in in February with Jim Baird, Max Budnik, and Xander Budnik

02:01 - 02:06
where I kinda just last minute realized that if I didn't at least try to film this, I'd be crazy.

02:06 - 02:14
So I grabbed a, a GoPro and between my my poor iPhone and a GoPro, that's, that's how the the

02:14 - 02:18
first at least feet like longer length video came about.

02:18 - 02:19
Where'd you go?

02:20 - 02:27
To tomogony. We, we spent 9 days doing sort of a teardrop shaped loop after, our first plan

02:28 - 02:30
went awry because of, warm weather.

02:30 - 02:32
Lush. Yeah,

02:32 - 02:35
yeah. Slush, slush and more slush. Yeah.

02:35 - 02:43
That looked like a looks like a good trip, like an enjoyable trip, but holy macroman, slogging through that crap.

02:43 - 02:51
I I I I think I probably would have bailed much earlier and headed for the the Ski Doo tracks and stuff like that. Like, oh, man.

02:51 - 02:56
Yeah. We, you know, to everybody's credit, we made the most of it, and we still did a really

02:56 - 02:58
nice nine day sort of tour.

02:58 - 02:59
And, and you know what?

02:59 - 03:01
It ended up being a lot of fun.

03:01 - 03:06
And and, all the guys, it was, it was a pleasure being on that trip with those guys. That's for sure.

03:06 - 03:11
Cool. If you don't mind me asking, how did you how do you manage to to hook up with the boys

03:11 - 03:13
to to work out that trip?

03:16 - 03:23
I get funnily enough, it goes back to, Karina, who who has her channel Alexis Outdoors.

03:23 - 03:24
Now it's called Karina Alexis.

03:25 - 03:25
Right.

03:25 - 03:30
And her and I kinda met each other through Instagram, which was sort of my my still what I'm

03:30 - 03:32
mostly on as far as social media.

03:32 - 03:37
I've been posting camping and and Crown Land exploring and and just shot, like, you know, just,

03:37 - 03:40
camping shots for a long, long time.

03:40 - 03:45
And we just sort of, started talking about she knew I worked at Algonquin Outfitters.

03:45 - 03:53
So there were some gear she needed and then, her and Ted Baird and Jim were organizing this

03:53 - 03:58
pond hockey thing at the Baird's cottage, and I got invited to that.

03:58 - 04:04
And, there was sort of like a it was a repeat of the February trip just to get into their cottage

04:04 - 04:11
because it was it was about I remember it was, like, 8 o'clock at night, and it was supposed

04:11 - 04:14
to be this, like, hour and a half across the lake.

04:14 - 04:17
And and we didn't get there until about midnight because of the slush.

04:18 - 04:24
So it was like slush in the dark, fully loaded. It was awful.

04:24 - 04:32
But, anyways, that weekend ended up being a ton of fun, because, Jim, showed up a little later.

04:33 - 04:36
We all had a blast all weekend long, and that's how I had met Ted and Jim.

04:36 - 04:42
And then, because Jim and his family just live up in Magneto on, when we both got back from

04:42 - 04:46
that trip, we just sort of stayed in touch and would meet up here and there.

04:46 - 04:56
And then, and then I somehow got invited to, to a big meetup last year, last winter, just north

04:56 - 05:03
of Sudbury and some Crown Land there, with a whole pile of other other content creators and and YouTubers.

05:03 - 05:04
And, that was an awesome weekend there. Yeah.

05:04 - 05:06
It certainly looked like it. Yeah. Yeah.

05:06 - 05:08
So that's I met Xander

05:08 - 05:09
and Max there,

05:12 - 05:15
which was super cool along with a whole pile of other awesome people.

05:15 - 05:20
And, and then after that, everybody you know, there's quite a few people that stayed in touch after that.

05:20 - 05:26
And then, when Jim cooked up this trip, he he invited me, and that's, that's how we wound up,

05:26 - 05:28
all being together for that February trip.

05:28 - 05:34
It was just, you know, there were some other other sort of names involved that, you you know,

05:34 - 05:39
of course, just from doing this that putting a trip together with 4 to 5 people who all have

05:39 - 05:43
different stuff going on in their lives is like, you know, it's next to impossible. Right? So

05:43 - 05:44
Yeah. No. It's,

05:44 - 05:51
basically, I'm lucky I got, I'm lucky I got lumped in with, with that with the crowd of people

05:51 - 05:57
who could have that sort of time allotment to, to make that trip happen. So

05:57 - 06:00
Very cool. And and I'll say the video looks fantastic.

06:00 - 06:05
Like, if you it was GoPro and and would you say crappy iPhone, did a really good job, man.

06:05 - 06:11
Like, your editing skills, I would say, were pretty darn good. I hate editing video.

06:11 - 06:14
I will edit audio all the time. No problem.

06:14 - 06:16
I can I've got that down.

06:17 - 06:18
Not so much the video.

06:19 - 06:22
No. And that was the first time I I was just learning.

06:22 - 06:25
Like, I I literally got back from from the trip and I had all this stuff on my phone and the

06:25 - 06:30
GoPro, and I downloaded some editing software.

06:30 - 06:32
And that was, like, my first crack at it.

06:32 - 06:36
And, yeah, it's learning that is just a nightmare.

06:36 - 06:42
And it's still one of the most, like, you know, tedious parts of that whole process of of making,

06:42 - 06:46
you know, being, being a creator.

06:46 - 06:52
It can often be sort of I I realize that a lot of those skills are great to build up and learn,

06:53 - 06:56
and it also forces you to innovate sometimes and get creative.

06:56 - 07:04
But, yeah, overall, it's it's, it's it's insanely tedious and and can be really frustrating at times.

07:05 - 07:13
Yeah. Yeah. I I find very much that the intuitiveness between what I do in audio, which looks

07:13 - 07:15
really very much the same.

07:15 - 07:20
It had it has sort of timelines moving along and it has snipping tools and it so and you go, okay, great.

07:20 - 07:25
That should transfer perfectly into nope. Not a chance. Not even close.

07:25 - 07:29
The the concept does but the actual doing of it, no.

07:30 - 07:33
So it's just like I say a lot of bad words when I'm when I'm video editing.

07:35 - 07:36
Bound to happen.

07:36 - 07:42
Yeah. Well, cool. Do you mind, what, what software do you use to edit with?

07:42 - 07:48
Right now, I'm using a free software free software editing suite called, Lightworks.

07:49 - 07:51
Cool. I haven't I haven't tried it.

07:51 - 07:54
We use I used, DaVinci Resolve.

07:54 - 08:01
Just it was the big there was tons of YouTube videos to tell me how to do it, so I went great. I'm doing that.

08:01 - 08:03
Yep. Yeah. I have heard that one is good as well.

08:03 - 08:10
So I'll see how long my free trial with this one last, and then maybe I'll, I'll try I'll give that one a shot. So

08:10 - 08:14
Cool. Well, I I mean, the end product is is fine. It is good.

08:14 - 08:18
It and it does all the things, and it gives me lots of gives me lots of audio options as well.

08:18 - 08:20
So that's I find that's nice.

08:20 - 08:29
Like, when I get to that part, I'm also using less bad words by the time I get to that part. So YouTube. So you're taking pictures. What's what's your equipment?

08:29 - 08:31
Like, what what do you shoot on?

08:31 - 08:34
And then what kind of sort of stuff do you get into shooting?

08:34 - 08:40
Well, for for Instagram, which I've been on for a long, long time now, mostly, I just I still

08:40 - 08:47
just use my iPhone now, and then I'll use, like, a little Sony Alpha, mirrorless DSLR that I have.

08:47 - 08:50
It's an older one, but it still works great for some shots.

08:51 - 08:56
And then I have an old Nikon as well that I'll I'll pull out now and then because I have a couple lenses for it.

08:57 - 09:05
But I would say 80% of the time for for the Instagram stuff that you see on my feed is is just my iPhone. So it works.

09:05 - 09:09
You know, and and it's easy to it's it's handy. It's easy.

09:09 - 09:12
It's robust, and the quality is okay. Okay

09:12 - 09:19
enough. Yeah. Well and I mean, so out camper Christina, she shoots she shoot shoots everything on her iPhone.

09:19 - 09:19
Right.

09:19 - 09:24
Yeah. But she keeps upgrading it so the better like the like the lenses that are out now, I'm

09:24 - 09:26
shooting, Well, I shot some stuff.

09:26 - 09:32
We did the French river this past summer, and I shot a bunch of stuff just just for fun, just to try it.

09:32 - 09:39
I I had a new new to me, Pixel 6 a, which isn't the newest version, and I was stunned at how

09:40 - 09:42
amazing some of the shots were. It's like, wow.

09:42 - 09:49
I I don't know if I could have pulled off the color saturation with any of my way more expensive

09:49 - 09:51
phones or way more expensive cameras at home. Yeah.

09:51 - 09:56
So it's it's stunning the the way that, they're just building better and better stuff.

09:56 - 09:57
Oh, 100%. Yep.

09:57 - 10:00
And if you just pull it out of your pocket, it weighs nothing, point, shoot, click,

10:01 - 10:06
Bob. Exactly. I even have a little floaty strap for mine that'll allow me to I I carry it in

10:06 - 10:10
my chest pocket of my PFD, and it's got a little floaty strap on it.

10:10 - 10:14
So, you know, if it winds up in the drink, like, the phone's waterproof enough. Right?

10:14 - 10:16
Most phones are waterproof, but they don't float.

10:17 - 10:21
So I had a I had a floater to mine, and, and I've had good luck with that. So

10:22 - 10:23
That's excellent idea.

10:24 - 10:26
So has it ended up in the drink at some point?

10:26 - 10:26
Oh, yeah.

10:29 - 10:31
Well and, good to hear the word PFD.

10:31 - 10:33
Yes. We like we like PFD.

10:33 - 10:34
I I'm a bit anal

10:34 - 10:35
PFD friendly.

10:35 - 10:39
That sort of stuff. So let's talk canoeing then.

10:39 - 10:41
Where do you what are your favorite haunts?

10:42 - 10:43
Do you are you lake guy?

10:43 - 10:44
Are you a river guy?

10:44 - 10:49
Do you like white water? What's what's the deal?

10:49 - 10:51
I'm mostly a flat water guy.

10:52 - 10:59
I I love exploring kind of the smaller lakes up and down, you know, the the west and and sort

10:59 - 11:04
of southwest sides of Algonquin Park and then west into the areas off of the 5 18 towards Georgian Bay.

11:05 - 11:08
There's so much current land to explore in so many little lakes that if you put in a bit of

11:08 - 11:12
work, it can be really rewarding.

11:12 - 11:18
So last few years, that's, that's sort of what I've been doing a lot of is just kind of portaging

11:18 - 11:23
or bushwhacking into smaller lakes here and there to explore and paddle around mostly mostly

11:23 - 11:25
for camping, but I go out for the day a lot too.

11:26 - 11:28
I do I really enjoy rivers.

11:28 - 11:30
I I wish I was a better whitewater paddler.

11:31 - 11:37
You know, I'm comfortable enough in, you know, c one to maybe some c two stuff, some nontechnical c 2.

11:38 - 11:42
And then after that, it's time to time to carry your or line.

11:42 - 11:45
But, yeah, that's definitely something I wish I was better at.

11:45 - 11:50
And and, you know, I'm I'm pretty comfortable, I'm pretty comfortable working my way through,

11:51 - 11:55
you know, parts of the upper Big East River, which I paddle a lot, and parts of the south and

11:55 - 11:59
north Muskoka river, which I also paddle fairly frequently.

11:59 - 12:03
And those are great stretches, great stretches of river that are close to me and and make for

12:03 - 12:06
an awesome day or even 2 days if you wanted to.

12:06 - 12:08
Sweet. Do you do fishing when you're out there?

12:08 - 12:09
Is that a thing for you?

12:09 - 12:12
I'm starting to do more of it. I didn't used to.

12:12 - 12:17
I it was just kinda one more thing to tangle around within the in the canoe because I was just an awful angler.

12:17 - 12:24
So, luckily, I've, I have a lot of friends that are really into fishing and are good at it.

12:24 - 12:28
And, and so I'm starting to get some more pointers and I'm starting to fish a bit more.

12:28 - 12:34
And I had a pretty good season the last year just with, with bass, which is a lot of fun.

12:34 - 12:38
So I am doing more and more of it, and I will continue to do that because it gives me something

12:38 - 12:43
you know, one more thing to to learn and to appreciate, while I'm out there.

12:43 - 12:49
So, yeah, I got my first brook trout last year on Cedar Lake, which was, which was, you know,

12:50 - 12:53
a real easy way to get hooked on hooked on brook trout fishing.

12:54 - 12:56
And then after that, of course, I got skunked. So

12:56 - 12:58
Yeah. Yeah. I hear wonderful things.

12:58 - 13:02
I I've never I don't have my first yet, so I'm looking forward to it.

13:02 - 13:05
They are out there, you know, and you see all these photos. So

13:05 - 13:08
That's that's but Photoshop is a thing too.

13:08 - 13:11
Yeah. That's right. That's right. Yeah.

13:11 - 13:17
Yeah. No. I I watch, you know, I don't watch we're busy with the podcast these days, so I don't

13:17 - 13:19
watch as much as as I used to.

13:19 - 13:20
But, you know, you yeah.

13:20 - 13:24
I even just scrolling by on Instagram, you see, you know, see Tunis.

13:24 - 13:31
He's got a a beauty in his hands or oh, Kevin and the the paddle head guys went out 1 and and

13:31 - 13:33
it's like, oh, that's that's wonderful.

13:33 - 13:36
And and it just it's just one after another. It's like, okay.

13:37 - 13:39
You guys are killing me.

13:39 - 13:40
You guys are killing me.

13:40 - 13:41
I'm gonna get on those techniques.

13:41 - 13:43
I can get to the lakes.

13:43 - 13:44
I just need to get better at the techniques.

13:44 - 13:46
As they're doing the things. Yeah. I can

13:46 - 13:50
get to the spots. The the technique is something I just need to work on. Yeah.

13:50 - 13:51
And probably the timing as well.

13:51 - 13:56
Okay. I I we'll flip back to winter camping for second and then and then we'll maybe we'll we'll

13:56 - 14:00
dive into your job and why this is all such a thing for you.

14:00 - 14:07
What's so there's multiple ways to do winter camping, there's the hot tenting, there's cold

14:07 - 14:15
tenting, have you have you done all the all of the things or and or have you do you do you choose

14:15 - 14:17
to do one specific way and for what reason?

14:18 - 14:28
I've mostly done hot tenting, just because for me, it's well worth the wait to have that awesome stove and tent. I just love it.

14:28 - 14:29
I love the wood heat.

14:29 - 14:33
I love the the feel that can't, you know, just the atmosphere of the canvas tent with the stove

14:33 - 14:40
inside and and it can be as cold out as it wants to be, but you're still gonna be toasty inside. I I love that.

14:40 - 14:43
It's it's more work, of course, but for me, it's worth it.

14:44 - 14:49
Because no matter what I mean, if you're cold camping and it's minus 30 out, there's there's

14:49 - 14:54
gonna be a lot of parts of that that little trip that are gonna be fairly uncomfortable no matter what you you do.

14:54 - 14:55
Lucky. Yep.

14:55 - 15:01
Whether that's wet gear that you're trying to dry out without a without a stove, etcetera, etcetera. Right?

15:01 - 15:03
So, I much prefer hot tenting.

15:04 - 15:11
I did get really lucky with some weather early early March that just this past March and did,

15:12 - 15:17
did a bit of tarp camping, which was, just a just a tarp and a sleeping bag and a ground pad,

15:17 - 15:19
with a friend of mine.

15:19 - 15:21
We got lucky because the conditions were perfect.

15:21 - 15:26
It was about, goddamn about minus 11 overnight and about plus 5 during the day.

15:26 - 15:30
And it was sort of sunny and the snow was fairly hardened, so there wasn't a lot of slush to deal with.

15:30 - 15:36
And, and that was that was about the extent of my cold camping for this season. That's for sure.

15:36 - 15:38
But, it was it was great. You know?

15:38 - 15:43
So there is a there is a time and a place for it, but when, when you get into those, weeks of

15:43 - 15:47
minus 20, minus 30 weather, it's, it's always the hot temp.

15:47 - 15:50
Cool. Yeah. I I think I would probably swing the same direction.

15:50 - 15:56
I'd be happy to lug the extra weight just to to have that and and to cook on it and all those

15:56 - 16:00
things as opposed to sitting around going, it's really freaking cold, man.

16:00 - 16:01
Yep. Yeah. Absolutely.

16:01 - 16:05
Yeah. And other people have said, like, just so you can go out and do your activities all day

16:05 - 16:08
and you're warm enough because you're moving, but then then when you're coming back, it's so

16:08 - 16:10
nice to get into the hot tub.

16:10 - 16:16
Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Although, that said, on the downside, the one thing I do hear repetitively

16:16 - 16:23
is I I was a little tired in the morning because I had to keep waking up every 4 hours and re

16:23 - 16:26
throwing throw more wood in the, in the stove.

16:26 - 16:28
I usually do sleep sleep cold.

16:28 - 16:34
So what I'll do is I'll, like, I'll get the stove just cranked, unless it's really cold and

16:34 - 16:36
it bothers me, but I've got a minus 30 bag.

16:36 - 16:41
If I know it's gonna be really frigid, I'll throw a liner in there even to etcetera, etcetera.

16:41 - 16:44
And and, usually, I sleep pretty comfortably, actually.

16:44 - 16:49
So That's a good system if you can just get it really hot, which I wanna sleep and Right.

16:49 - 16:50
Tape or anything.

16:50 - 16:51
And down and

16:51 - 16:54
and then Get up in the morning and stalk it again. Yep.

16:54 - 16:57
Yep. So there's all kinds of I mean, that's a real personal preference is, you know, people

16:57 - 17:00
will, people will set a timer.

17:00 - 17:05
People will let the cold wake them up and then and then throw, you know, throw wood and people,

17:05 - 17:09
you know, hang an arm out of the side of their sleeping bag, and that that kind of cold will

17:09 - 17:13
wake them up at a certain point, you know, sometimes before the fire is completely out.

17:13 - 17:15
So there's all kinds of different ways.

17:15 - 17:20
I usually am just too tired and or lazy and just, you know, sleep.

17:20 - 17:24
That's that's valid, man. That's valid. Alright. Cool.

17:24 - 17:26
So you work for Algonquin Outfitters.

17:26 - 17:29
How did how did you get to work for Algonquin Outfitters?

17:29 - 17:32
Yeah. I'm the store manager of Algonquin Outfitters in Huntsville.

17:32 - 17:34
There's a number of different Algonquin Outfitters, of course,

17:35 - 17:35
all

17:35 - 17:35
over the place.

17:38 - 17:46
And, basically, my my previous experience or my my working career has been in in retail and mostly retail management.

17:46 - 17:52
So I, used to manage a shop that was just down the street from Algonquin Outfitters.

17:53 - 17:58
And then when this opport when this job opening came up, I applied and went through the process,

17:58 - 18:01
and and, and I got in.

18:01 - 18:07
So, this will, this will be 9 9 years now, actually.

18:08 - 18:08
That's awesome.

18:09 - 18:11
Yeah. Yeah. So

18:12 - 18:20
And did you was was it did you take the opportunity because of an outdoor love, or was it was

18:20 - 18:23
was it more of a business decision? It was

18:23 - 18:24
a bit of both, I think.

18:24 - 18:31
I was getting to the point in, you know, just in terms of my age where, basically I I grew up.

18:31 - 18:35
I grew up, but I spent most of my teenage years in my twenties, skateboarding and snowboarding.

18:36 - 18:38
That was like my passion.

18:38 - 18:44
Before that, I was a very outdoor oriented kid, as I grew up, with my parents.

18:44 - 18:50
But throughout my teenage years in my twenties, I all I did was skate skateboard and snowboard a lot.

18:50 - 18:52
And that'll take a toll on your body.

18:53 - 19:02
And, I was getting to where I was, you know, getting towards, well, getting on to over 30 and

19:02 - 19:07
and stuff just started sort of, you know, the injuries, just started piling up.

19:07 - 19:13
And, and I'm like I think I'm the kind of person where what I do for my work also needs to sort

19:13 - 19:17
of be part of my lifestyle because I do, you know, I take a lot of ownership of it.

19:17 - 19:18
I I take pride in it.

19:18 - 19:21
And so it was it was a bit of both.

19:21 - 19:25
It was time to move on from where I was at, and it was time to also sort of try to follow a

19:25 - 19:31
new passion that linked me back to, you know, the way I grew up, which was which was the outdoors.

19:32 - 19:37
So do you occasionally get out for any of the those like skateboarding or snowboarding?

19:37 - 19:41
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Absolutely. I still I still snowboard now and then.

19:41 - 19:45
And I'll still I have a basement here full of skateboards still.

19:45 - 19:51
I still, I still roll around now and then, but certainly not like I used to, you know, where

19:51 - 19:55
I'd be heading to a spot or heading to the skate park every single night after work and usually

19:55 - 19:58
coming home limping or sore or, you know, something. Right?

19:58 - 20:01
So, those days are gone.

20:01 - 20:03
Does your family go camping when you're a kid?

20:03 - 20:11
Oh, yeah. Yeah. So, fortunately for me, my my parents in an effort to be closer to the outdoors,

20:12 - 20:20
we moved from, we moved from the Newmarket area when I was 9 years old up into a rural area

20:20 - 20:22
east of Bracebridge, and that's where I grew up.

20:22 - 20:29
So sort of, just north of, of the Queen Elizabeth to Wildlands, park there.

20:29 - 20:33
So, yeah, just a bit northwest of that. Yeah.

20:34 - 20:36
And, and that's where I grew up.

20:36 - 20:41
And part of the reason that we moved to this area was to be closer to a to a kid's summer camp

20:41 - 20:47
that they were involved in volunteering at and that's where I would go to to camp for, you know,

20:47 - 20:48
a few weeks of summer growing up.

20:49 - 20:54
And it was a, you know, it was a very classic sort of kids canoe outdoors camp.

20:55 - 20:59
And, and, yeah, both my, you know, my parents still volunteer there to this day.

20:59 - 21:03
My brother went on to be the director for for a number of years.

21:03 - 21:09
And so my family had, you know, always has had sort of deep ties with with camping and the outdoors

21:09 - 21:12
and and, and that sort of, culture.

21:12 - 21:18
I it's I find it for somebody who's I don't get out as much as you guys do, but but but know

21:18 - 21:23
that I log as many hours watching all the things and reading all the things and doing all that stuff.

21:23 - 21:24
Vicariously.

21:24 - 21:31
Vicariously, very much so. Like, I did scouts, cub scouts, air cadets, all that, and and we

21:31 - 21:34
were fairly outdoorsy sort of people.

21:34 - 21:39
We were rural but rural, like, Oshawa, like, the north end of Oshawa kinda thing.

21:39 - 21:42
I had no idea that that canoe camps and stuff existed.

21:42 - 21:49
It wasn't until until I really started to embrace the whole backcountry thing and and getting

21:49 - 21:52
into doing some more research on it that I was like, really?

21:52 - 21:57
I could've I could've been out paddling all those years ago. Are you kidding me?

21:57 - 22:00
My j stroke will be so much better than it is now.

22:01 - 22:06
Well, it's funny. You know, a lot of those, I went to that camp until I was, 13.

22:07 - 22:14
And, and it's funny all the skills that you sort of build as a kid going to going to camp like that.

22:14 - 22:21
You know, you do all these, you know, we went through the basic Orca courses for paddling and and things like that.

22:21 - 22:23
And and now a lot of that, luckily, you

22:27 - 22:27
know,

22:31 - 22:32
you know, more into it again.

22:32 - 22:37
So I was really lucky to have that experience as a kid where, you know, it was a very it's a

22:37 - 22:38
it was a very simple camp.

22:38 - 22:43
You know, it wasn't, you know, it wasn't, one of these, you know, sort of more luxurious kids

22:43 - 22:44
camps that there are a lot of these days.

22:44 - 22:50
It was a very basic, simple camp, but it was in a, you know, beautiful setting and it was, you

22:50 - 22:54
know, it was a blast, sort of growing up, doing a lot of my summer there.

22:54 - 22:56
Yes. It built that muscle memory early in in Yeah.

22:57 - 22:59
Yeah. Forever. Exactly. Yeah. Yeah.

22:59 - 23:02
The muscle memory is the term that was coming to my mind too.

23:02 - 23:06
So to flip back to, Algonquin Outfitters, man, so many questions.

23:06 - 23:13
What do you how do you so as a general manager, what's your what's your give me a rough idea of your job description.

23:15 - 23:21
Sure. So I manage the sort of day to day operations, of the store. So we're primarily retail.

23:21 - 23:24
We do a little bit of rental and outfitting, but

23:25 - 23:28
by At the Muskoka store specifically. Correct. Right.

23:28 - 23:30
At the Huntsville store. Sorry. Yep.

23:30 - 23:32
Very sort of retail based. Yep.

23:33 - 23:38
And so it it really is, it really is sort of a lot like most other retail management jobs.

23:38 - 23:44
It's it's scheduling and it's more scheduling and scheduling.

23:45 - 23:52
But it's also, you know, there's obviously some there's, hiring involved and there's, you know,

23:52 - 24:00
tasking staff and there's, you know, merchandising and and basically also, a lot of time on the sales floor.

24:01 - 24:07
And a lot of time on the sales floor with staff and, of course, with, you know, with customers as well.

24:07 - 24:13
And then just sort of doing all the all the other odd jobs that sort of get lumped in with, with a store manager.

24:13 - 24:18
And and you can find me on any given day, you know, sweeping out the sweeping out the back parking

24:18 - 24:25
lot, changing changing the the toilet paper rolls in the in the bathroom or, you know, dealing

24:25 - 24:31
with, you know, resolving, all the all the issues that tend to pop up in in any sort of retail

24:31 - 24:33
environment, that, you know, that are inevitable.

24:34 - 24:42
And, but, of course, the the biggest, you know, the biggest plus to that is that it's an outdoor star.

24:42 - 24:44
You you work with like minded people.

24:44 - 24:46
The customers are often very like minded people.

24:47 - 24:52
You're surrounded by, awesome gear all the time. Right?

24:52 - 24:55
So we, we have a fantastic team there.

24:56 - 25:00
So, you know, in one way or another, everybody that works there loves the outdoors.

25:01 - 25:06
And, and in one way or another, all the customers that walk through there love the outdoors. Right?

25:06 - 25:09
So some of them just don't know it yet, but they're on their way.

25:11 - 25:13
And, and, you know, it's pretty cool.

25:13 - 25:17
We're right in downtown Huntsville, which means when you look out look out any of the windows

25:17 - 25:19
in the back, you see the river. Right?

25:19 - 25:21
And I'm very fortunate in that.

25:21 - 25:25
Our house is, I can I can walk to work, and I've been doing that just to try to, you know, burn

25:25 - 25:27
off burn some extra calories?

25:27 - 25:33
So, I can paddle I can even paddle to work if I really want to from the from the boat launch

25:33 - 25:37
just down the street, and I've done that a few times just so that I can say I did it.

25:39 - 25:47
But, but, yeah, I would say, you know, we have we have, we have terrific team members that are

25:47 - 25:50
always up to something outdoorsy or always sort of eager to learn more.

25:50 - 25:58
And then we have customers that are, you know, every from every spectrum of the outdoors imaginable. Right?

25:58 - 26:07
So, you know, you have a customer walk in that, you know, looks like, looks like they you know,

26:08 - 26:12
nothing nothing outdoorsy about what they might be wearing or anything and then you start talking

26:12 - 26:18
to them and realize that they've done, you know, arctic river trips or, you know, they've they've

26:18 - 26:24
done the Nahanni four times, you know, and, and those are the kind of those are the kind of

26:24 - 26:28
customers that have a wealth of experience and insights to, you know, that it's really cool

26:28 - 26:29
to sort of learn from.

26:30 - 26:35
And then we have customers that maybe need a bit of help just with some direction as far as

26:35 - 26:41
gear goes or even destination planning and and route planning and and we're always happy to

26:41 - 26:44
help with that because a lot of people kind of know what they want to do.

26:44 - 26:47
They just need to know how to go about it properly.

26:47 - 26:52
Yeah. Totally agree. Speaking personally, I've been been in your store twice, I believe.

26:54 - 27:00
I've been in a handful of Algonquin Outfitters but but twice and and the very first time and

27:00 - 27:05
I I couldn't tell you the gentleman's name, We I walked in. I don't remember.

27:05 - 27:10
I I think I just went in because because I'm I'm a outdoor gear junkie.

27:10 - 27:17
And I ended up chatting with, I don't know, it was like he was like a a greeter, but I I honestly don't know.

27:17 - 27:21
We act for, like, man, it's like half an hour.

27:21 - 27:24
Just talk to the camping stuff. It was awesome. It was awesome.

27:24 - 27:29
It's like, I don't even know why I came in anymore, but I'm gonna look around some stuff. Yeah.

27:29 - 27:30
It was it was a yeah.

27:30 - 27:32
It was a it was a I don't know.

27:32 - 27:34
It it was such a great experience.

27:35 - 27:39
Good. Good. I mean, we're, we're always happy when we can sort of have those experiences with

27:39 - 27:43
with our customers and and man talking gear in a gear store.

27:43 - 27:47
That's a real real good way to make the make the day go by.

27:48 - 27:50
Yeah. Yeah. I could see how that'd be alright.

27:50 - 27:50
Yeah.

27:50 - 27:52
Yeah. Paycheck go by too.

27:53 - 27:57
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. It's bad. It's bad.

27:59 - 28:04
Yeah. Yeah. It's like whether it's an Algonquin Outfitters or a mountain equipment.

28:04 - 28:09
It's like I have to be careful about whether I choose to take my wallet with me when I go. Yeah.

28:09 - 28:13
Let me go we'll do we'll do some preplanning, then I'll go home and get

28:14 - 28:14
Have a

28:14 - 28:15
cooling off period.

28:16 - 28:23
Well, we're, you know, as employees, we're really fortunate to get usually get some pretty good deals on gear. Right?

28:23 - 28:27
And that's always the that's always the the best and worst hook.

28:27 - 28:33
Well, I'm getting a deal on it. So why not? Why not? That's why

28:33 - 28:36
you have a minus 30 bag and a liner for it.

28:37 - 28:44
Yeah. Yeah. And that's how you wind up with, you know, with a basement that's just crammed full of of, of stuff.

28:44 - 28:45
We have that.

28:45 - 28:47
We yeah. Without the discount.

28:47 - 28:48
So maybe I need to come work for you.

28:48 - 28:53
Yeah. Yeah. Good. Yeah. It's all cool stuff, and I really hope I get to use all of it.

28:53 - 28:55
At some point. At some point. Yeah.

28:56 - 29:05
Because I went to they took completely off talk, but, Riley Riley Riley outdoors? Riley outside? Yep.

29:06 - 29:08
I went went for beers with them yesterday.

29:08 - 29:09
Nice.

29:09 - 29:14
For just we just we've we've been yakking a little bit and and we got talking and it was like,

29:14 - 29:16
well, how many tents do you have? 6.

29:19 - 29:20
And I don't do winter camping.

29:21 - 29:26
And And it was just a wide eyed, all right, you're my kind of people.

29:28 - 29:32
And it is, it's like I don't I don't I I kinda do.

29:32 - 29:34
I have a purpose for each tent.

29:34 - 29:38
I will never use the pup tent again, but I'm keeping it because of the story of the time that

29:38 - 29:43
we went and did a week with 2 of us in the pup tent. So it stays.

29:43 - 29:46
Yeah. Totally. Totally. And, you know what?

29:46 - 29:52
There are there are far more expensive or slightly, we'll say, interesting hobbies out there

29:52 - 29:55
you can spend a lot of money on.

29:55 - 30:00
You know, for instance, I'm more than happy to, have a bit of a tent collection because for

30:00 - 30:05
me, anyways, I'd rather have an expensive tent collection to go and enjoy the outdoors with

30:05 - 30:08
than, an expensive trading card collection. Yeah.

30:08 - 30:10
But that's that's just me.

30:10 - 30:12
Yep. No. I I don't disagree.

30:12 - 30:17
Each each to their own, it it absolutely works for me. Yep. It's like, wow.

30:17 - 30:20
Today, I want the lighter tent.

30:20 - 30:23
A little smaller, we're gonna take that one. Whatever.

30:23 - 30:24
How that that needs to play it. Yeah.

30:24 - 30:26
I'm not gonna mention the CD collection or the

30:26 - 30:29
Or the guitar collection or the book collection. Okay.

30:29 - 30:31
So I have a collection issue.

30:31 - 30:32
We're not gonna talk about it.

30:32 - 30:34
That's not part of this show.

30:37 - 30:37
Love you, honey.

30:38 - 30:39
The first step is acknowledging that you have a problem.

30:39 - 30:45
You have a problem. I don't. It's not. There you go. Alright.

30:45 - 30:46
That's it for us for today.

30:46 - 30:49
Thank you so much for joining us, Nate Muskoka, from Algonquin Outfitters.

30:50 - 30:53
It was such a great conversation, and we hope you'll join us again sometime.

30:53 - 31:00
Thank you so much for listening to us, and we will talk to you again soon. We're from SuperGoodCamping.com. My name is Pamela.

31:00 - 31:01
I'm still Tim.

31:01 - 31:04
And we are still from supergoodcamping.com. Please do email us.

31:04 - 31:06
We're at hi@supergoodcamping.com.

31:06 - 31:11
That's hi@supergoodcamping.com, and we on all the social media.

31:11 - 31:15
Please do DM, email, whatever you like. We're on Facebook, YouTube.

31:15 - 31:18
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31:19 - 31:20
Talk to you again soon.

31:21 - 31:22
Bye. Bye.