Is it a mission or an Expdedition?

Over pints of grog GutZ and I were discussing possible destinations for upcoming fishing trips wherein I discovered the difference between a fishing mission and an expedition. As in going to Forks can be a mission for us, but the Columbia river is an expedition. Here is the key:
Fishing Mission: A weekend, leave Friday after work and come back Sunday night.
Fishing Expedition: Take a day or two off work as in a 3 or 4 day weekend.
Fishing Vacation: More days than an expedition.

Okay, I thought this would make an intereting post to see how everyone else defines the trips.

Bye the way, my girlfriend wanted to know why we couldn't just go for a day. After explaining the above to her, she is now thankful I am just going on a mission, and not an expedition! I wonder how long that will last.

The (x)wife said once "If you go fishing one more time, I'm outta here!"

Damn, I'm gonna miss her!

To me a mission is a get there, bag a limit, get back kind of thing. Usually a long drive, a tide bracketed fishing trip and a long drive back. Two drivers is good.

An expedition is when you bring the tent or look for a flea bag. Most dive trips I take are like this.

A vacation for me involves a plane ride. We do this every year when we go to Florida to go diving for a week.

Another bumper sticker I saw went like this
"Please don't tell my Mom I'm a fishing guide, she still thinks I'm the piano player in a brothel"

I can think of a category, maybe beyond expedition - a quest, or as Chevy Chase termed it in one of his Vacation movies, a "f*****g quest." As in "this is no longer a fishing expedition, this is a quest, a f*****g quest!" This would be when an expedition turns horribly bad due to bad weather, bad information, bad directions, forgotten/broken/inadequate/wrong equipment, mistimed runs, etc., etc., and you are too far along on the journey, or too stubborn, just to give the damned thing up. It's the kind of expedition where your buddies gradually start talking quietly among themselves just outside the glow from the campfire at night, casting furtive glances in your direction, while you sit staring fixedly into the fire , thumbing the edge of your knife, muttering to yourself.

Fishing Mission to me= Planned destination, planned fishing strategy on certain drifts and holes, but really isn't a weekend long.

Fishing Expedition to me= going some place in the wilderness or no civilization, but not to be confused with a mission since you don't really know the area at all and you rely on God and mother nature to be kind to you.

Fishing Vacation= A good time, plane ride, and a boat ride. Lots of expensive beer consumed, warm weather, line ripping Marlin or tarpon. Usually accompanied by brothers or close friends. It isn't a good vacation if someone isn't sunburned, pukes from drinking, has the squirts for a week afterwards, and comes back with a venerial disease, or has some non-english speaking chick in love with him. Now that's a fishing vacation.

Who's up for fishing in Costa Rica?

Tad- I like the f****g quest... like chasing the holy grail. I definitely know a quest type of fisherman complete with crazed far away look in the eyes. When the rest of us are far too hungover..tired...wet..injured..or whatever, he is rantin and ravin at 5:00 AM what a bunch of g*d d*mn sissies we are. I won't reveal the lunatics name though (GutZ).

Ratherbfishin,

My friends sometimes accuse me of being like that. I don't know why. Like, to them, a half day of fishing is on the shy side of one half of the daylight hours. When I talk to them of "gettin' in a half day," I mean 12 hours - not including the drive. They just don't understand. I have noticed that a few of them won't go with me anymore, especially if I'm driving.

One thing about being on a f*****g quest, which by definition is an activity of overarching importance, is that you don't need to seek, or ask permission for, release from such mundane things as household chores, honeydos, the obligation to house, clothe, and feed your family, and the like. If you ask these things, you aren't on a quest. If you're on a quest, everything else pales in significance. I don't much appreciate a supposedly boon companion interjecting into my f*****g quest that he has to get back and mow the yard, or do this or that around the house. You don't ask for permission to go on a f*****g quest. There's nothing in the legends about Sir Galahad asking for a few days off to go look for some stemware. Do you think Jason thought about who was going to milk the goats while he was off looking for the golden fleece? I don't think so!

Another thing about a f*****g quest, is that you don't bail just because times are tough. People that ask you how you can get up so early after an evening in your cups, stand around in the rain, cold, etc. all day without getting a bite, or a rise, or a strike, stay out after what to them seems an unreasonable time, get no sleep, and then do that again day after day are neither called nor chosen.

The object of a f*****g quest is, again, by definition unattainable. No matter how far along you get, what one chases is an ideal. You may get near it. You may come agonizingly close to it. But, ultimately, it stays just out of reach. Really then, it's about the motivation and the journey. Why we fish is something we can't fully express, but it is as innate as our need to breathe. How we pursue this need, not whether we get our hands around the prize, is the whole story.

[ 04-10-2001: Message edited by: T Dodge ]

[ 04-10-2001: Message edited by: T Dodge ]

Ahhh, pure poetry T Dodge. If you have to explain to a partner why the quest is so difficult you need a different partner. The muttering beyond the edge of the campfire smacks of mutiny.

Brings back many happy memories ....... Thanx buddy!!

T Dodge, that is beautiful prose and right on. Thanks. My lunatic friend will tell you that I have always got up with him and been ready to go no matter how late the night before or whatever. This year was my introduction to winter steelie fishing and I have been initiated in every way except catching one of the beauties. I have been questing for fish for all my life and definately know the feeling.. if not the why.

Now I feel guilty for bailing out on some buddies for this weekend! Oh well,I won't be able to wait too long before the next mission.

Excellent thread boys. I'd go with calling the typical trip from the metropolis out to the coast when leaving on a Friday after work to return Sunday evening a mission. Depending on the season, the coast HQ is either a planter's motel or campground.

An expedition would be more like the 17 hour trips North to stay in tarpaper shacks, fish for at least five days and spend a lot of that time exploring new water.

Now "Vacation" is a whole other ballgame. I like Yall's definition except there's places in Mexico with fishing as good as Costa Rica only cheaper on the pocketbook all around. Still trying to figgure out a way to make a "business" trip out of that journey. Gotta love those expenses and deductions...

I know a f*****g quest when I do one. Friday-ten hr. shift-1 hr. drive home.-wife has d.b. ready.-scooter packed for relay-firewood and big coolers in boat-all other gear in month old limited 4runner-head out 8pm on 225 mi drive-catch keystone ferry 940pm-tacobell in p.a. at 12am-gas up beer up forks 330am-hit elk two mi. from oxbow on cruise control at 60mph.- hit ditch ,get stuck ,call tow truck-fall asleep at first light-fish that afternoon-catch nothin. Now thats a quest I will never forget.

Great takes, and reading them guys! Gee I'm glad to be a fisherman.