We picked up our element the day before thanksgiving. It didn't really get driven on T-day and Friday was a trip to lion country safari with 6 people so the new odyssey got the drive that day. Friday night I stopped by lowe's for homemade grillguard parts, lots of rocks & bugs in the glades. Saturday was a day for the element and I though. I picked up a friend in Miami and we headed west out the tamiami trail to fish off the road for snook, tarpon, and whatever else we could find. It was slow going at first so I focused on playing with the element and taking pictures of it. Here are some pics from our first stop (couldn't get any farther away or I'd swimming:

Element from the front:
http://www.pbase.com/kstaples/image/52854515.jpg

Element from the rear:
http://www.pbase.com/kstaples/image/52854507.jpg

Look! The locals were checking out the new car!
http://www.pbase.com/kstaples/image/52854510.jpg

My homemade grillguard:
http://www.pbase.com/kstaples/image/52854512.jpg

And one more from the side:
http://www.pbase.com/kstaples/image/52854511.jpg

So we continued to work our way west until we got to one of the spots where I've had some success before. This time it was the best! I caught a nice snook mixed in with a bunch of smaller ones. My friend caught snook & ladyfish. didn't take a lot of pictures though. Here are a couple:

Me & my snook:
http://www.pbase.com/kstaples/image/52854517.jpg

And one more:
http://www.pbase.com/kstaples/image/52854519.jpg

It was getting late at that point so we started working our way back. Tried a couple of more spots and ended the day fishing a spot loaded with assorted panfish, gar & oscars. Oh, and an 8 ft alligator hanging around!

Verdict: The E performed just as I imagined it would as a fishing vehicle: perfect. Great room, great mileage ($20 covered the whole 170 mile round trip); great on the side of the road, great turning radius, great XM radio! Couldn't be happier! And i'm looking forward to many more excursions!!

Ken

ps - maybe i'll call it the "swamp bug E". still kicking names around.

Ok Super, I'm on my way down!

Cool images! Always good to hear that the Element works so well for an outdoor lifestyle. Swamp Bug-E would be a different name too-good choice and you got the perfect color for it too.

I also see you guys look to be suffering from a severe cold snap down there :-)

Enjoy!

Thanks!

Yeah, our cold front moved in last week (notice I'm wearing long pants! :) ).

I'm just psyched about how well the element worked on this trip. Definitely made it easier. Even though my truck had more room it was pretty big and difficult to get to all of the stuff, especially in tight quarters. I actually would always carry a step ladder to reach the stuff in the middle of the bed and to load my kayaks (and I'm pretty tall). The back cargo area has more room than it looks and the tailgate was very useful. I think I should have put one of the seats up but i wanted to try it with the standard configuration.

The next accessories that are going in/on are rodholders and kayak racks. I'm leaning towards the yakimas (although I've always owned thule before) since the reviews on this forum seem to indicate that they have a nicer finish. Also I think this rodholder might work pretty well:

http://www.rodmounts.com/RodLoftPRO.ivnu

I'll post a review when I try it out.

Ken