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Join us on this episode of Sportsman of Colorado as we delve into the fascinating world of gun collecting with Cindy Jewell from the Colorado Gun Collector Association. Cindy shares captivating stories about the evolution of gun shows and the collection’s significance in preserving history. Discover how women are playing a pivotal role in this community and the diverse backgrounds of the association’s members. Whether you’re an enthusiast or just curious, this episode is sure to unveil the treasures and joys found in antique firearm collections.
SPEAKER 01 :
Welcome to Sportsman of Colorado, Colorado’s premier outdoor radio show heard every Saturday afternoon on KLZ 560 with insights on hunting, fishing, archery, guns, and ammo from Colorado’s top outfitters featuring the industry’s leading experts on how to enhance your experience in the great outdoors. Now, here’s your host, Scott Watley.
SPEAKER 06 :
Welcome to Sportsman of Colorado. Thank you so much for joining us today. Hey, we’ve got a great show in store for you. We’re going to kick it off with our good friends from Colorado Gun Collector Association, and we are very proud to have Cindy Jewell in studio with us. So, Cindy, welcome to the show. How are you?
SPEAKER 10 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 06 :
I’m fine. How are you doing? It’s good. I’m good. You know, it’s neat to have a lady in and talking about guns. So it’s kind of unusual, to be honest with you. So thanks for coming in and doing this.
SPEAKER 10 :
Thank you. And it’s not actually as unusual as you would think. In our club, we have quite a few women.
SPEAKER 06 :
collectors well good we’re going to learn all about that today with cindy so let’s just kind of talk a little bit about you at first a little bit about your background and what made you want to get involved with the gun collector association well currently i am the secretary treasurer of the club and probably about in the mid 90s i started attending the annual may show
SPEAKER 10 :
I was so overwhelmed and amazed at all the items. You looked up and there was tables and tables and guns and uniforms and swords and rifles. And I was just overwhelmed. So I had to come back again for a couple of years. There was everything from the large military arms to the typical shotguns, rifles, and handguns that we all know about today.
SPEAKER 06 :
So how you talk about the shows like that, and those happen in May, and we’ll be pushing that real strong for you guys, you know, next year. But when you look at those first few shows to maybe last year’s show, how have those changed over the years?
SPEAKER 10 :
Oh, my gosh. They have changed so much. Our first show was in 1966, and it was held at the Jefferson County Fairgrounds. I think we had 140 tables then, and the admission was 50 cents to get in.
SPEAKER 06 :
50 cents.
SPEAKER 10 :
50 cents to get in. Wow. People just brought used guns and old guns. And today it’s a collection of the antiques that we mostly focus on and that we all love dearly. The antiques that made our country what it is today.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah. That’s so cool. And, man, back then, think about the freedoms of just probably people loading up guns in their trucks and coming in the front door with them. It wasn’t a big deal.
SPEAKER 10 :
Exactly. It wasn’t. We went from Jefferson County to downtown Denver. Right. So imagine downtown Denver in today’s climate pulling up to the Corrigan Hall or the Albany Hotel or the Hilton Hotel. We were at many of those hotels down there first. And like you said, pulling up in a truck, unloading things in the middle of downtown Denver.
SPEAKER 06 :
Wow, that’s awesome. All right, let’s talk about the purpose. Now, Gun Collectors kind of tells us that, but what’s kind of the mission or purpose? How would you describe that?
SPEAKER 10 :
The purpose of this organization is to establish in our state of Colorado a permanent organization for the promotion of friendship among and the mutual benefit of persons interested in the collection, preservation, and study of firearms and other accessories.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay. And man, that must bring you people from all walks of life, so to speak.
SPEAKER 10 :
It does. It really does. Early on, our club began with a group of guys just sharing stories and showing some particular guns that they had brought, some that they thought were really cool. And they decided, well, let’s just start a club. So in 1966 is when our club was first started. Wow. And I’m proud to say that I knew five of the founding fathers.
SPEAKER 12 :
Really?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes. And one of our founding fathers is still alive. He attends our meetings, and he’s also active in our gun shows. So he’s gone from gun show number one to gun show 58 so far.
SPEAKER 06 :
My goodness. Yes. Wow. So when people want to get involved, well, let’s talk about it this way. Let’s talk about the members and the growth that you’ve seen. And you mentioned a little diversity now. A lot of women involved in it, too. So kind of talk about the growth through the years.
SPEAKER 10 :
So our club is now a little less than 500 members. We’re in 39 states, including Hawaii. We have two members that live in Hawaii. Our oldest member is a lady that’s 100 years old, and our oldest gentleman is also 100. Wow. Our youngest member is 20. And we do have families that have several members of the family that is in the club. They attend regular meetings. They help with our gun show.
SPEAKER 06 :
Wow. Now, how often do you have meetings?
SPEAKER 10 :
We have meetings once a month. in southeast Denver off of I-25. Our meetings are generally a presentation from one of our members that will talk about a particular gun or series of guns or a type of gun. And it’s very educational. We have a lot of fun with it. Then we also have social time.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, wow.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
Once again, Cindy Jewell is with us. We were talking about the Colorado Gun Collector Association. And, hey, if you’re interested, you can check out their website. Just Google Colorado Gun Collector Association, and it will direct you to their website, and you can learn more about membership there. So do most of the members have, like, one era of firearms or swords or uniforms that they’re interested in, or how does that work?
SPEAKER 10 :
Our members collect a large variety of items. They can range from military, American, British, German, turn of the century, or as special as Colts, Remington, Smith & Wessons, Winchesters. And depending on the collector, sometimes a collector wants to focus on only 1911s. So that’s a model number. And They will explore and try to achieve as many of those 1911s as they can. They generally try to get the most pristine. Sometimes they will go for…
SPEAKER 06 :
That’s okay. Sometimes they’ll go for just certain types of models or different things that they like, right?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes. Yes.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 10 :
Sometimes they will incorporate the handguns into the rifles and the shotguns. Sometimes they’re only rifles. Sometimes they’re only shotguns. Sometimes it’s only military. For example… our big makers, Colt, Smith and Wesson, they also made military.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, right. And a lot of people probably don’t know that. So you were mentioned before we came on air here, the the chase, you called it. And that’s where certain collectors are looking for certain things to purchase for their collection. And it’s fun for them to go figure out how to find that item and buy it, right?
SPEAKER 10 :
Oh, it’s so much fun. One of our members told me that he saw the movie Winchester 73s.
SPEAKER 06 :
Oh, yeah, Jimmy Stewart, yeah.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yeah, and he decided he wanted a Winchester 73. He wanted one of 1,000. So he looked and he searched. He went to a lot of pawn shops and smaller stores at that time. he finally acquired three of them that were one of a thousand he acquired a 32 caliber a 38 caliber and a 44 caliber and another one of our stories that I’ve heard is a member was at a gun show waiting to speak to the vendor there was a guy in front of him and he was My person was very much interested in a particular gun that was on the table. Well, the guy in front of him just happened to buy that gun when my buddy was standing behind him. So he says, well, I still want that gun. So it took him about 15 years chasing that gun, but he finally got it. Wow. And it just completed one part of his collection.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right. Yeah. So, you know, in being around you guys over these last few months, and you all were at the gun room over there when we did a live remote this summer. Yes. really want to get more people involved, but also young people, because that’s important to keep this going, isn’t it?
SPEAKER 10 :
It’s very important. One thing that really stands out to me a lot that I’ve noticed in the last couple years is that our gun shows, the young people are coming in for the history. I met, through another connection of mine, a lady that says, oh, my son would love to see all of those. He’s majoring in history and firearms. So he came down to our show and thought it was awesome. This past year we had a group of junior junior children come in, middle school children. Okay. And they came in and they toured our show and they were learning all about guns in school.
SPEAKER 06 :
Wow. Isn’t that awesome? That’d be really neat.
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes, it is.
SPEAKER 06 :
I think it’d be cool for like homeschool groups, you know, different things like that, where maybe the kids don’t get to normally go get to do a lot of activities for something like that, for them to come in and see something like the gun collectors. Yeah. So what does Cindy like to collect?
SPEAKER 10 :
I like unusual things.
SPEAKER 06 :
Now, your husband looked at me kind of weird when you just said that. You like unusual things. He’s sitting over in the studio in the corner. What do you like?
SPEAKER 10 :
Early in my gun show travels, I saw what they call a palm pistol. And a palm pistol is a circular pistol. gun that sits in the palm of your hand with the trigger that comes out between the second and third finger it was just very different than anything that i had seen and the one that i happened to see that really caught my attention was pretty well worn and my husband said well we can find one that’s better than that so again i got in on the chase because of its uniqueness. And it took me several years to find it, but I found one just a couple years at our show. And it was made in France in the late 1800s. And it’s actually one of the first concealed carry guns.
SPEAKER 06 :
Wow. Well, that’s cool.
SPEAKER 10 :
And it’s very easy. You just hold it in the palm of your hand and
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah. Very easy to use. Yeah, it’s amazing when you look at some of those. And if folks have ever been to the museum in Wyoming, Cody Fire Museum, which I highly recommend that. That is something to really see when you just look at the involvement of the different type of weapons through the years. I mean, it’s amazing.
SPEAKER 10 :
You know, several of our members have guns on display at the Cody Museum.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 10 :
And also at the NRA Museum.
SPEAKER 06 :
Wow. Well, how special is that? Now, the other ladies, let’s take that sector that are involved with what is some of them like to collect that you visit with?
SPEAKER 10 :
A lot of times the women are into the smaller guns. They’re easier for us to handle, control, carry. Derringers are some of the types that they usually like. Or just the small, small caliber guns.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right, right. Well, once again, it’s the Colorado Gun Collector Association. Again, they have their big show in May every year. And that’s up in Greeley, correct?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes, it is.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay. And we’ll get you more information on that as the time comes. But I’m telling you what, if you’ve been thinking about it or maybe this is the first time you’ve heard them on the show and you didn’t even know they were around, hey, check into their website there. Become a member. It’s Colorado Gun Collector Association. And you guys are even doing some things here for the holidays, aren’t you, for your group?
SPEAKER 10 :
Yes, we are. We just did a charity auction, and all the money that we made from that is going to go to youth shooting groups, generally the scouts, and then there’s a couple of schools that have shooting teams. So we donate the money to them. We also will be having a Christmas party in December in place of our meeting.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right. Well, that always works. Oh, yes. Get to eat instead of have a meeting.
SPEAKER 10 :
That’s right.
SPEAKER 06 :
Anything we forgot you want to touch on? That’s okay. Look through there. I want to make sure we get everything that we got for you. And once again, it’s the Colorado Gun Collector Association. And, hey, it would be great. Dads and moms out there, get your kids involved in this. Just give them something to learn a little bit about history of guns would be a great thing. And it’s not all guns. I mean, there’s swords, all kinds of different things. Anything else you saw we need to hit?
SPEAKER 10 :
No, I think I’ve shed a little bit of light on things.
SPEAKER 06 :
No, absolutely. You’ve done a wonderful job and we appreciate it. And thanks for all you do for them. And we’ll look forward to getting you back on again.
SPEAKER 10 :
All right. Thank you.
SPEAKER 06 :
Thank you. That’s Cindy Jewell, Colorado Gun Collector Association. Once again, check them out. Just Google Colorado Gun Collector Association. You can learn more about them. If you’ve got any questions, of course, you can get in touch with us here at the station. You’re listening to Sportsman of Colorado. We’ve got to take a quick break, and we’ll be back with more right after this.
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SPEAKER 04 :
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SPEAKER 14 :
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SPEAKER 12 :
AM 560, KLZ, your home station.
SPEAKER 06 :
Welcome back to Sportsman of Colorado. Again, thank you so much for joining us. Melissa Fling is with us. She is our doctor of audiology for our Haystack show and here for Sportsman of Colorado. And I’m telling you, I did a visit with her a week or so ago, and I got my hearing tested. And so before I get into that story, Melissa, welcome back. How are you?
SPEAKER 07 :
Thanks. Good. How are you?
SPEAKER 06 :
I’m good. I’m good. Now that I know there’s a reason I can’t hear. no but um you know went through her hearing test and um and then um got some things made you know for custom custom molds for some hearing protection but um you know we talked about this on our haystack show but um do you find most people have had hearing tests before when they come in to see or do you find some people even At my age, I’ll say, they come in, this is the first time I’ve ever had this done.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, I work with a lot of veterans, actually, and most of them, you know, if they’ve been out of the military for 30, 40 years.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, they might have got tested when they went in.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, and they haven’t been tested in 20, 30 years. No, I find it’s a part of our health that seems to be ignored pretty regularly until you have a problem. Sure. And then even then, a lot of people don’t necessarily know where to turn. A lot of people might not be aware of what an audiologist is, you know, that we’re hearing and balance health care specialists. So, yeah, it’s one of the things that doesn’t get checked until there’s a problem or until it’s too late and forget about preventing noise-induced hearing loss. I mean, that goes for years without even having any awareness. So, yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah. You mentioned veterans. I can’t imagine there’s got to be some significant loss with some of the patients you see.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, and all different ages, too. I think most people would think the older veterans, but it’s not just them. I see veterans and service members that are in their 20s and 30s, and they’ve already got A pretty serious high-frequency hearing loss from noise exposure. And in that circumstance, especially with those that have served in combat zones, it’s not feasible and it’s not realistic to prioritize wearing hearing protection. You just can’t. So they just have to deal with it. They just have to go with it.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
Now, we did this on our other show, H-TAC, but I wanted to kind of break down kind of what’s involved in your earring test and your method. You mentioned on the other show there’s maybe some places may go through orders different or do some different things, but let’s talk about your test.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah. So, first, I always like to look in the ears, make sure there’s no earwax, impaction, that the eardrums look healthy. In your case, they were clear, squeaky clean.
SPEAKER 06 :
You could see from one side through the other. That was the problem. You shined your light in there and there was a reflection on the wall.
SPEAKER 07 :
No, because that’s a problem I can’t help with. No, clean, clear ears, beautiful eardrums. Then we check eardrum function. So we did that pressure test on your ears that just makes sure that measures to make sure that the eardrum is vibrating normally. Then we put you in the booth and first had you listen to… some speech to see what the softest level of speech is that you can understand. Then we move into the tones, which is a measure of hearing sensitivity. And we’re looking for the softest tones that you can hear from low pitch to high pitch. And, you know, everybody does their kind of order of tests in different order, depending on what they’ve learned and what their habits are. But I typically go from low pitch to high pitch. And we talked about this earlier, but the standard range for testing hearing is from 250 hertz to 8,000 hertz. And the reason that’s standard is because based on research, That’s where we think most speech sounds fall, in that frequency or pitch range. But we can actually hear up to 20,000 hertz. So if we only test up to 8,000 hertz, there’s this whole chunk of our hearing that we’re completely ignoring and not testing. And that’s starting to become an area of interest in audiology. We’re starting to pay more attention to that. And so for you, we tested that. We tested up to 18,000 hertz in both ears just to see what that looks like. And that’s important for people that might show normal hearing at the standard range, but they come in with complaints of hearing loss or saying, I have to ask people to repeat themselves a lot. I can’t understand in background noise. I’m turning the TV up and my family’s complaining about it. Some of those people have normal hearing at the standard range, and then we go above 8,000 hertz. And some of them still have normal hearing, up to 18,000 hertz, but a lot of them don’t. And so it’s important to reveal that area, to see what’s going on in that area. That’s an important part of our hearing, too. It’s there for a reason. Sure. So, yeah, so I’ve been testing that a lot in everybody, and we did that on you as well. Right, right.
SPEAKER 06 :
Do you see a significant difference between men over 60 and women over 60? I mean, do men seem to suffer more with hearing loss than women?
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, that’s a good question. I would say yes. Not maybe. OK, there could be two reasons. One, health could be. issue more so in in men maybe like heart problems maybe diabetes although I’d have to look at that to see if more men have diabetes than women I’m not sure about that one but heart just I’m thinking of all the meat eating and the artery clogging foods that men might lean towards eating more which can cause a problem with your hearing eventually but also noise men I think participate in more noisy activities than women would be my guess. So yeah, probably more noise-induced hearing loss in men than in women.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right. Now, you do some work with pilots, veterans, different things like that. So when you take the pilot industry, you would think, hey, they’re in a plane. I mean, we’ve all been on planes. It’s not that loud, you know, whatever. What causes that for them?
SPEAKER 07 :
It’s noise for them too. It’s pretty, it depends, you know, and I’ve been learning all about it from them, the different, the noisiest aircraft versus the quietest aircraft, you know, and between Boeing and Airbus. So up in the, well, they call it the flight deck or the cockpit, same thing. The noise comes from basically the air hitting the window, the friction of the air hitting the window. And depending on if it’s an older aircraft or newer aircraft and kind of the aerodynamics of it, the wind might hit the windshield harder in an older or less aerodynamic aircraft, so it’s louder. So it’s really loud in the cockpit. And depending on what kind of communication stuff they have available to them in the cockpit, they might be okay not wearing… any hearing protection in there or they might need to wear hearing protection in there. But the issue is, are they going to be able to communicate with the co-pilot? So, you know, we kind of talked about earlier There can be, like with the captain who sits in the left seat, if he or she needs to hear the first officer in the right seat, they have to have their right ear open so that they can communicate with them. So sometimes they have more right-sided hearing loss and the first officer… uncovers their left ear to hear the captain, so they might have more left-sided hearing loss. But I think it’s loud in planes, don’t you? I mean, I always wear my earplugs on planes.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, and to be honest, I’ve got some Bose headsets, kind of like we’re wearing here, that noise-canceling, that it will knock it out pretty quick.
SPEAKER 07 :
And they use that too, actually. A lot of them use the Bose ProFlight, which is an aviation headset, noise-canceling, so they can communicate with each other through that and use the active noise-canceling on it. But some of them can’t use headsets on certain aircraft, so they just have their ears open or they just have their communication piece in one ear and the other ears open. So there’s different situations. But, yeah, it’s pretty loud. Most of them, and a lot of them are, you know, learned how to fly in the military. So they’ve got hearing loss from that, from, you know, years of that. So, yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
What causes when we’re flying? Just a random question here. See if I can stump the audiologist.
SPEAKER 11 :
Uh-oh.
SPEAKER 06 :
When our ears pop, so to speak, we use that term, I can’t get my ears to pop. You see people, their jaws are trying to open, they’re trying to chew gum or whatever. Is it just the air pressure that causes our ears to…
SPEAKER 07 :
Oh, thank goodness I know the answer to this question. You haven’t, you didn’t stump me yet.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, good.
SPEAKER 07 :
Okay, so yeah, there’s, so yes, there is pressure in the middle ear. So in the ear, like when I look in your ear, I see the ear canal up to the eardrum. Beyond the eardrum, there’s a space called the middle ear is what we call it. And that is connected to the eustachian tube. which is just a tube that connects the middle ear to the nasal cavity. So whenever your ears quote unquote pop, that’s the eustachian tube on either side opening and equalizing pressure in the middle ear with atmospheric pressure. So like when you’re driving to the mountains or a you’re taking off in a plane, you might start to feel like your ears are getting plugged and that can also affect your hearing temporarily too. Like your hearing might be a little muffled and you know, you’re trying, you’re moving your jaw, trying to chew and get your ears to pop and you can’t get it to pop. And then finally they pop and you get this relief. That’s those eustachian tubes opening to equalize the pressure.
SPEAKER 06 :
I mean, your baby’s screaming.
SPEAKER 07 :
Is that hard on babies? Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
Then it’s hard on the past. Yeah. Never sit next to a baby. That’s my rule in flying.
SPEAKER 07 :
Or make sure you have your custom-fitted ear molds.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, from Custom Ear Solutions.
SPEAKER 07 :
That’s right, for that. But, yeah, that probably is a big reason why they’re crying, because their poor little baby ears are plugged, and they can’t get them to unplug, and it can be a little painful if you can’t get them to unplug. Right.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, if you’re just joining us, Melissa Fling is with us, Custom Ear Solutions. As I mentioned, I went and did the hearing test, and we both decided I need to wear consistently some custom-fitted, molded hearing protection for shooting and all. So there are a couple of scenarios with most people that are in the outdoors. We’ve got maybe a range where we’re inside or out, whatever, but we don’t need to talk to anybody. We just need to… take care of that. So talk about your solution there.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah. So if you’re doing, whether you’re doing outdoor or indoor shooting, if you don’t need to be able to communicate with anybody, you just need maximum protection, then I always just, if you want molds, I would just suggest solid ear molds. So no filtering for speech or gunshots. And one note that’s important there is with outdoor shooting, Unless you’re in some kind of enclosed, if you have something on the sides that’s causing sound to echo.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, and a lot of times they’re kind of a cubicle, so to speak, where there is on each side of your gun, especially at an indoor range, one that I go to, you kind of step up and there’s, of course, a flat top you can set your guns on or whatever. Yeah. But then there’s a wall on each side of you. So, I mean, right.
SPEAKER 07 :
Mm-hmm.
SPEAKER 06 :
You can’t see me. Okay.
SPEAKER 07 :
And would that be with outdoor too? You would have a kind of a cubicle area?
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, a lot of times outdoor. Sometimes there’s some cubicle areas. Other times there’s just some benches lined up where everybody’s got their individual bench. A lot of times on pistol and different things like that, yeah, they’ve got a separation.
SPEAKER 07 :
Okay. Okay. Yeah. So that becomes important because the sound can bounce off of the walls and make it louder. So with indoor shooting in particular, where the sounds bounce and all over the place, it’s always suggested to wear double hearing protection. So earplugs and… Yeah. So solid, solid ear molds for maximum protection. No need to communicate or anything like that. Then if you do need to be able to communicate with people, if you’re hunting and you need to be able to hear animal noise, brush noise, each other, Then I would suggest one of two options. The first one would be filtered ear molds. So those can have impulse filters in them, which is what we got for you. We got you both, solid and impulse. But you’ll try your impulse ones on Wednesday.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, I love the look of those. Yeah, yeah, I can’t wait because we are going Wednesday. So, man, I can’t wait because they’re small, you know, but they’re easy to put in, easy to take out.
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, I love them. Yeah, so those are going to be good when you need to hear normally and communicate relatively normally. Then when a gunshot or any other impulse noise goes off, the filters in them will bring that down to a safer level. So you get the best of both worlds there. You can hear and communicate relatively normally, but then when you need the protection, you’ve got it. And you don’t have to worry about putting something in your ears. It’s already in and you’re ready to go. Right. Yeah. The other option with that would be electronic. And that would be a good option if maybe you have a little bit of hearing loss also and you need something to amplify sounds a little bit. And you can get those in earmuffs also, but there’s an option with custom fitted too. So that will allow, because there’s microphones on it and you can adjust the volume, you can turn it up a little bit. So if you have a little bit of hearing loss and you need to turn the sound up, to be able to hear each other or whatever while you’re hunting, those are a great option. They can be rechargeable, they can be Bluetooth capable, and coolest of all, they’re custom fitted to your ears. Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
We learned everybody is different in their size of ear hole, right? Yeah.
SPEAKER 07 :
Well, I’d call it an ear canal. Ear hole sounds a little funny to me. That’s what most people say, though, ear hole. Yeah, your ear hole or your ear canal is just as unique as your fingerprints, really. Everybody’s ears are a different shape and size.
SPEAKER 06 :
Now, are most people, if they’re small or medium size, are they the same in both ears? Or do you have some where, like, maybe one side is a little bit smaller than the other?
SPEAKER 07 :
Mm-hmm. Yep, yep. Even between ears on the same person, one ear can be a little different than the other. One can be slightly more narrow, a little bigger, a little curvier than the other. Yeah, I see that all the time. Nobody’s ears are completely symmetrical on the inside. Right, right. Wow.
SPEAKER 06 :
Again, it’s Custom Ear Solutions. And hey, if you’ve got an HSA account, Melissa can help you there as well. But give her a call. Hey, this is a great idea to get it done this time of year. Everybody kind of thinks about getting healthy in January. But hey, let’s take care of your hearing here in the month of December. All right. Her number is 720-839-7705. It’s Custom Ear Solutions. And hey, you can get in for a hearing test. And again, And what does that run for folks?
SPEAKER 07 :
Hearing test is $125. Okay, man.
SPEAKER 06 :
Sheesh. What price can you put on your hearing?
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, and you can use your HSA or FSA for that.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay. Just to figure out, get a baseline of where you’re at. Monitor. Right. Yep. And then what do you suggest, you know, it’s kind of like we deal with Stack Optical and they talk about getting your eyes tested. So how often, is that a yearly thing or every couple of years?
SPEAKER 07 :
Yeah, it can depend on kind of what you have going on. But yeah, I would say… The standard recommendation is every year. That might be overkill for some people if you’re younger and or if you aren’t around noise at all. So there’s not anything really that’s going to change your hearing when you’re young and healthy. So in those cases, I might say more like every two to three years. sooner if you feel like something has changed. But yeah, for people that are regularly exposed to loud sound and or are 50 or older, I would say it’s better for those people to get it checked every year, I would say. Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
And, of course, our waterfowl season, man, you get in these – I’ll have to show you what I’m talking about.
SPEAKER 04 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 06 :
You know, a goose pit where you’re kind of underground, and you’ve got, you know, five or six buddies, seven buddies all dropped beside you shooting 12-gauge shotguns. You know, three-inch shells, I mean, really loud. And so, man, water fowlers out there, this is especially for you, too. All right, hey, you know what it’s like to be in those pits and the shotgun’s going off right beside you. So, hey, take care of your hearing. Highly recommend Melissa and Custom Air Solutions. And, hey, when you call, let her know you’re here on Sportsman of Colorado or you’re here on our Haystack show as well. We just… Mention you heard her on KLZ 560, and we’d appreciate that as well. So, Melissa, we thank you for your time. Thank you for hooking me up, and hopefully I’ll be able to hear you throughout the year as we do these shows. So it’ll be good. So thank you very much.
SPEAKER 07 :
Thank you.
SPEAKER 06 :
You’re listening to Sports from Colorado. We’ve got to take a quick break, and we’ll be back with more right after this.
SPEAKER 08 :
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Here’s why you need personal injury attorney Kevin Flesch on your side. He understands the way the jury thinks. In the context of a personal injury case, you’ve been hurt by someone else’s negligence. The idea is that you’re going to try to recover so that you can get back to where you were just prior to that incident occurring. What that really means from a jurist’s perspective is that you’re going to be asking them to award you money. So when we talk about fairness, we’re talking about six people that you don’t know. Those six people view the evidence and make a unanimous decision that will decide what the fair value is. When you’re the one who’s hurt, you have a good idea of what you think it’s worth. The question is, can you persuade those other individuals whom you don’t know and were witnesses to believe that’s what the case is worth? Kevin Flesch understands the way the jury thinks. Call now for a free consultation. 303-806-8886
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Riding an e-bike will make you feel like a kid again. Just try it. Hi, I’m Randy Crancy, founder of e-bike of Colorado. E-bikes are a fun way to ride the trails. Pedal assist technology flattens the steepest hills. We have 14 major brands to choose from and our expert staff will find you the perfect bike. Come take a free test ride at e-bike of Colorado in downtown Louisville next to the historic grain elevator. Open seven days a week from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Learn more at ebikeofcolorado.com. Just try it. 560 KLZ, your home station.
SPEAKER 06 :
Welcome back to Sportsman of Colorado. Again, thank you so much for joining us. Just a quick reminder now, if you miss our show on Saturdays, 1 to 2 p.m., you can catch us twice on Sundays. That’s from 8 to 9 p.m. both on Sunday, 8 to 9 a.m., 8 to 9 p.m. Then also on Thursday, the following Thursday, we also have an encore presentation of the previous Saturday show here on Sportsman of Colorado Radio. So hopefully one of those four times will work out for you. But, hey, we’re super excited to have a new friend, Steve Wells. Steve has just returned, and you heard Melanie on before with the Wild Alaskan Lodge. And Steve has just returned from being there with them. And so I asked him if he’d come on and tell us all about some Alaska fishing. So, Steve, welcome to Sportsman of Colorado. Thanks for having me. All right. So tell us a little bit about you, first of all, and your background, and then what led you to Alaska.
SPEAKER 03 :
I’m an outdoorsman from southern Idaho. I grew up and have lived in southern Idaho my whole life. I spent a little time in the Marine Corps, so I’ve spent some time around the world, but I always come home. I’m an avid fisherman, hunter. I love to fish. I work on an ambulance service here in Burley, Idaho, and Jason, who built the lodge up there, was a police officer in the area, so I knew him. I had worked with him a lot.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 03 :
when he had mentioned he was building the lodge i i had caught wind of it was paying attention to what was happening and one of the paramedics that i worked with him and i discussed it called jason and we said hey we’d we’d like to be your first so we signed up just about a year ahead of time and got her all paid up and uh we just knew what we wanted to do we wanted to go up there and catch big fish so
SPEAKER 14 :
That’s fantastic. So tell us a little bit about how you got from Idaho to where they are in Alaska.
SPEAKER 03 :
So we booked a flight out of Boise and flew into Seattle from there and then Seattle into Juneau.
SPEAKER 14 :
So a direct flight into Juneau from Seattle.
SPEAKER 03 :
Directly right into Juneau. Okay. We chose to fly in a little early so we could see some of the sights. Juneau is a fantastic town for that. Yeah. Beautiful town. State capital.
SPEAKER 14 :
Lots of stuff going on there.
SPEAKER 03 :
A lot of stuff going on. Friendly people. Everybody there was fantastic. We’d ask them questions. Everybody was fantastic about, these are the kind of jigs you want to use. This is what, just everything we asked, they were fantastic.
SPEAKER 14 :
Had you fished in Alaska before this trip?
SPEAKER 03 :
This is my first time to Alaska.
SPEAKER 14 :
Wow.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay. Self-guided. No, I was going to say self-guided. You are a fisherman. Yeah. Or crazy. Yes.
SPEAKER 03 :
The gentleman that I went web with, Jason Parkinson, a friend of mine, he fishes a lot out at Bui Tin and the mouth of the Columbia. Okay. Yeah. Takes his boat out there and trolls for salmon. And we fish for kokanee here in Idaho. And it turned out that fishing for kokanee is about the same as catching kings, other than kings are way bigger. Way bigger. Way bigger.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah, absolutely.
SPEAKER 03 :
They sent a ferry from Pelican, met us in Juneau. So we spent the night in Juneau and then got on the ferry the next afternoon. Yeah. It’s a four-hour ride out to Pelican.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah. And how was the weather when you got there for the ferry ride? It was amazing. Was it?
SPEAKER 03 :
Sixty degrees, sunny.
SPEAKER 14 :
Nice.
SPEAKER 03 :
You could see whales everywhere you looked. There were whales breaching and surfacing and bald eagles everywhere.
SPEAKER 12 :
Sure.
SPEAKER 03 :
It’s a very scenic ride.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
mountainous, a lot of islands and lighthouses, just beautiful.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah. Wow. So that part of the trip was just the beginning. You’re like, wow, I’m sure if you hadn’t been there before. Flying into Juneau, did you fly in late at night then or did you fly in during like day or night hours?
SPEAKER 03 :
I flew in fairly late in the evening, which, mind you, the days are long. Right. Sure. So it seemed like early in the day, but I believe I landed in about seven o’clock in the evening.
SPEAKER 14 :
OK, so you got to see some of the country flying in then, too. Yes. Oh, yes. Yes. So then you have the four hour trip and the whale watching and all of that other stuff. Just, you know, it’s kind of like a whale watching on the way. Exactly. Especially with the nice weather.
SPEAKER 03 :
It’s just like when you go anywhere. I don’t know if you’ve ever been to Australia. When you get to Australia, you’re hoping, I hope I see a kangaroo. And then they’re everywhere. And then they’re just another kangaroo. I hoped I was going to see a whale in Alaska, and we were only about… So 40 minutes in and the captain says, oh, there’s a whale there. I was surprised. They blow their spout up. Boy, you can see them a long ways away. They’re large animals. Orcas. We saw the orcas. We saw the little river or the ocean otters, the sea otters. They were out there. There’s a lot of wildlife to see if you’re into that.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
Wow. And things just kept getting better and better. As we went.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right. So again, not everybody’s schedule will be the same, but your schedule then got you there probably about what time to the lodge?
SPEAKER 03 :
That put us into the lodge. Let’s see. They met us at 3.30, 4 o’clock in the afternoon. We got into the lodge.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay.
SPEAKER 03 :
We actually stopped in Pelican, which is about a mile north of Jason’s Lodge. And we stopped there. They had a local bar there and eatery. We actually ate dinner there that day and walked around the town. They showed us where the store was. There’s a fish cannery and processing plant. So they walked us through all of that and then brought the boats over and we met our boats and took them from Pelican over to the Wild Alaskan launch.
SPEAKER 14 :
Got it. And you said that’s about a mile run?
SPEAKER 03 :
It’s about a mile, yes.
SPEAKER 14 :
Got it. Wow. That’s awesome. And so tell us about, for those folks that are thinking about the self-guided, let’s just talk about the process of getting your own boat and what they do to sort of help you through that process.
SPEAKER 03 :
They walked us out and walked us through all of the amenities of the boat. There’s Navionics. You’ve got the fish finder. You’ve got twin outriggers on the back, pole holders. Yeah. It’s all set up for halibut and salmon fishing, so you can control or just sit. Okay. But they explained all the gear to us. It was all brand-new gear. Yeah. Brand-new boats and… They went through everything you had to go through. You had to know all of your, where the fire extinguishers were and where all the safety equipment was. Life preservers. They were very thorough.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yes.
SPEAKER 03 :
Very thorough on that. They are an enclosed cab boat, so it’s a hard…
SPEAKER 14 :
cab and it turns out one one day there it was fairly rainy and it turns out that’s a blessing yeah yeah no doubt enclosed boat is nice yeah you know the majority it just seems having been to alaska on a number of trips we’ve it seems you know you get good weather but most of the time you get sort of that drizzly foggy wet yeah just kind of damp cold weather is kind of what you have so that that’s great to hear that that that makes a huge difference so that you can get out of the weather when you need to it was fantastic and how about any uh any bathroom facilities or what do they do for folks on the the boats they give you some they’ve got what we termed the squatty potties they got a little that’s a little toilet that goes out with you nice sure okay
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, cool. Once again, if you’re just joining us, we were talking about the Wild Alaskan Lodge. Hey, check them out on all their social media, Facebook, Instagram. They post some great pictures there. It’s the wildalaskanlodge.com, and you can see all they do. And again, it’s not that Alaska fishing is unique. But for us, self-guiding was unique when we met these folks at the Denver International Sportsman’s Expo this last year. And it’s just from everything we’ve heard, and that’s why we’re getting some people on to do testimonials. We’re not able to go until next year, Steve. So, man, we’re living through you guys here right now. Yeah.
SPEAKER 14 :
The last summer we went to a lodge where we could take out boats in the evening, and we had one evening that we did that, and we did our own self-guided stuff, and we hooked a giant halibut. So that’s part of the allure with this sort of self-guided is that you’re not limited to sort of what the guides can do in Alaska and what fish you can keep because of being guided, and it makes a big difference.
SPEAKER 06 :
So what, and I don’t know if you remember everything off the top of your head, but I mean, the guidelines and what Kevin’s referred to, of course, is the guidelines. You know, if you’re guided, you can keep one halibut a day and it’s got to fit in a certain slot and all that. And there’s just different limits. But that does change when you’re self-guided.
SPEAKER 03 :
Yes, it does. You get more fish.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah. And what did you find? So we haven’t even gotten to the lodge yet.
SPEAKER 03 :
We should get to the lodge, Scott.
SPEAKER 14 :
We should just let him get to the lodge.
SPEAKER 11 :
Our brains are all over. Okay. Yeah.
SPEAKER 14 :
So you take the boat. You get the good. They talk with you about the boats. Boats are new. And you take them over to the lodge. So describe for folks what the lodge is like and what they can expect when they come.
SPEAKER 03 :
The lodge was chiseled onto a rocky little bank. That is literally just a work of art what they’ve done. And I got to walk around and look at the footings. They had to chisel into the rock, and that’s got large stilts. They are sitting up probably 20 feet off the ground in the front. No kidding. And the back is right on the ground.
SPEAKER 14 :
So you must feel like you’re right over the water then.
SPEAKER 03 :
You are right over the water. I could step out of my room and look straight down and see the moon jelly exploding by in the water. Wow, that’s cool. Jeez. It’s crystal clear water. It’s a pristine place. It’s untouched. It’s just beautiful.
SPEAKER 06 :
And did you see much in the other rooms as far as type? So let’s say, I would assume it’s a great place for husband and wife to go and bring a couple of kids or a few buddies come. I don’t.
SPEAKER 03 :
I don’t know if, I mean, if I was to go up there again, I would probably take my wife just so she could experience Alaska.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right.
SPEAKER 03 :
She gets seasick very easily.
SPEAKER 06 :
Mine too, mine too. Maybe we can go together and your wife can hang out with my wife because she’s the same way.
SPEAKER 03 :
Fantastic, because they’ve got, in the kitchen of the lodge, they’ve got some beautiful tables, windows overlooking the ocean right there. The view is just breathtaking. It’s high mountains all around you. It’s green. It’s gorgeous. It would be a good spot to hang out. Not a lot to do. Pelican has a few things to do. So you could go into Pelican. Like I said, they’ve got a little store and a bar and a few hangouts.
SPEAKER 06 :
But it’s remote, isn’t it? It’s what you would term remote Alaska. Yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
very remote yeah and it’s yeah and from what it sounds like it’s a fishing lodge it is a fishing lodge yes that’s it’s it’s a lodge set up strictly for fishing and uh and it’s you know you don’t want to go there expecting the king size bed with all the fluffy pillows and whatnot it’s it’s uh I mean, fantastic bed. I slept wonderful. But it’s designed for you to come home and sleep because you’re fishing all day.
SPEAKER 14 :
Yeah, so let’s talk about that. Let’s talk about the meat of the issue, which is the fishing. So describe your days that you’re there. Breakfast in the morning that starts, I’m assuming, pretty early and then get out on the boats?
SPEAKER 03 :
At 5 o’clock, we would meet them. They had breakfast ready, and our coolers were filled with, cold lunches, everything set up, chips, snacks, anything you want, waters, everything you want. Bake coolers were set out. We had to do nothing. We were spoiled rotten up there. That’s awesome. You gather up your coolers, you put them in the boat, and then we had discussed, Jason cannot tell you where to go. That’s part of the biggest thing.
SPEAKER 14 :
Right, exactly.
SPEAKER 03 :
He did tell us that, okay, the The salmon are going to be hanging offshore in the open ocean, and the halibut, as the tide changes, you want to put a chum bag down, and that’ll take the smell of your chum bag out, and it’ll bring these halibut in. They like to come up on top of a plateau to eat, and we’ve been told by that by several people. So we thought, well, we’ll go out and we’ll target the kings first because we were told the bite was a little hard.
SPEAKER 12 :
Yeah.
SPEAKER 03 :
And I think in… oh an hour and a half we within 30 minutes we had our first fish on board oh man but in an hour and a half we had doubled up a couple times and put a smaller one back we caught some that were too small but very quickly we had our salmon that’s awesome and so then we were able to target the rockfish and lingcod and halibut and uh Just by going off what they had said, we found a spot that turned out to be, we went there every day for halibut, and it was kind of in a valley that dropped off into a deep hole, and as the tide would start going out, you’d put that chum bag down there, and those halibut would come up, and boy, it was fantastic. kick in the pants that’s awesome well good steven anything else do you think be good information for our listeners to know uh well one thing um i don’t get i do not get motion or seasick and jason does not get motion or seasick but his wife does uh we did have the scopolamine patches for her that you put behind your ear okay Worked fantastic the first few days. You have to change them out every three days, though. And she forgot to change hers out. Do not forget to change out.
SPEAKER 06 :
You won’t forget but once, right?
SPEAKER 03 :
I’ve never seen somebody puke that hard. Oh, man.
SPEAKER 06 :
Yeah, and that’s a bad. That’s the worst.
SPEAKER 03 :
It ruined the day for her.
SPEAKER 06 :
Right. Okay. Well, Bud, we appreciate it so much. When did you get your license? Before you arrived or did you get it at the lodge?
SPEAKER 03 :
I bought mine the night before at Sportsman’s there in Juneau. Sure.
SPEAKER 06 :
Okay, cool.
SPEAKER 03 :
You have to get a salmon card and your license. Right, right. And I think for both of them I was in about $85. Yep, yep. Sounds good, man.
SPEAKER 06 :
Well, bud, we appreciate you taking time with us. And like I say, we’ll stay in touch for sure. And, yeah, we need to get up Idaho and do some stuff with you maybe. So I’ll stay in touch. Perfect. And I know Melanie and Jason appreciate you coming on and doing this as well. So thank you very much.
SPEAKER 03 :
They were a fantastic host. It was a trip of a lifetime.
SPEAKER 06 :
All right, bud. Thanks so much, Stephen. We appreciate it.
SPEAKER 03 :
Thank you. Have a good day.
SPEAKER 06 :
All right. You as well. That’s Steve Wells, once again, a recent guest at the Wild Alaskan Lodge. We’ve met these folks. We haven’t been there yet. We are booked for next year. Our schedules just didn’t allow Kevin and I to go this year, but we are going next year. But we’re going to be having some folks over these next few weeks go. Now, real quick, and I’m kind of working on some things with them. We might figure out a little. A couple hundred bucks off a package. I don’t want to commit to anything yet. But, Kevin, it’s $4,300. Yeah. And I tell you, we’ve done several of these. You’ve done more places across the country. That’s a great deal. From everybody I’ve talked to already in this that was coming on the show, Their testimonials were just like Steve’s.
SPEAKER 14 :
Exactly. You know, the interesting thing, and it’s fun to talk to these folks. So Steve didn’t have a whole lot of experience maybe doing this sort of fishing. I mean, a little bit, but his buddy did. You’re going to need somebody that has some experience having been to Alaska, understand, I mean, from the safety standpoint, and then just an idea of what are we looking for. What he said about doing some research relating the night before, looking at the Navionics and looking at the structure. You’ve got to know some people that know what they’re doing. And that’s part of the fun, though, of the self-guided trip. Because I love going on these trips and being guided. I mean, they’re wonderful. And it’s fantastic. And the last one that we went on last summer, just really good time. But there is some downside to it. You go out later. You know, in the day, and you have to come back earlier, the requirements relating to what fish you can keep and what you can do during the day is somewhat limited because you’re normally with a bunch of people. You’re going to have your own boat. You’re going to go out.
SPEAKER 06 :
If you’re halibut fishing and you’ve got six people on the boat and a couple of your buddies have caught yours and you’re waiting on four other people to catch theirs, two more hours goes by and we could have been doing something else. Right, exactly. It gives you a little more freedom.
SPEAKER 14 :
It does, and it’s to do it on your own. I think there’s some real satisfaction in that, and it sounds like the facilities are new and just fantastic. So I’m really excited about it. I’m excited to talk to more people about it.
SPEAKER 06 :
Absolutely. Quick reminder now, if you miss our live show on Saturdays 1 to 2, catch us twice on Sundays. That’s 8 to 9 a.m. and once again 7 to 8 p.m. on Sunday evening. And we thank you for being with us. Hope you have a great rest of your day and a great rest of your weekend.
SPEAKER 11 :
The views and opinions expressed on KLZ 560 are those of the speaker, commentators, hosts, their guests, and callers. They are not necessarily the views and opinions of Crawford Broadcasting or KLZ management, employees, associates, or advertisers. KLZ 560 is a Crawford Broadcasting God and country station.
