I always carry, especially when fishing. I had a run-in kind of similar to idahoron's at the local lake. I was using a remote/seldom used boat ramp one day. When we called it quits and went to trailer the boat, there was a few trailer trash-looking bums blocking the boat ramp with lawn chairs and catfish rigs. I gave them a wide berth and plenty of time to move their crap out of the way, but they didn't budge. Usually, I leave everything on the boat, trailer it, then throw stuff into the truck later. I was trying to be polite, so I even took the time to dock the boat, haul stuff up the stairs to the truck before backing down to the ramp...and they still hadn't moved. When I asked them to move, so we could trailer the boat and leave, they started getting belligerent about having to bring in their lines and move their chairs, coolers, etc. My buddy has much less patience than I do, when it comes to rude people, so he intentionally exposed his firearm while changing his shirt, before telling them to get the &$#! out of the way. They moved. It's certainly not how I would have liked to see it play out, but it worked. I guess the bottom line is that you never really know when you're going to run into an unsavory element. I feel its better to just stay prepared. On a more fun note, we stopped by another boat ramp on our way home to meet a couple friends and swap fishing stories and the local game warden happened to be there checking fishing licenses. We sent him over to the ramp we were just at, so he could check those bums' licenses and make sure they picked up all the trash they had thrown in the weeds by the ramp. I wish I could have seen the looks on their faces when the CPO's truck pulled in the lot...