I was in Toronto over the weekend to visit some camera buddies – that's how I described them to the border agent, who replied, "What?"

Hamilton is a lot farther from the U.S.-Canada border than I realized, and Toronto even farther. The trip went fine, although my newly reconditioned SVO Mustang seemed to be having some problems with idling smoothly. One of the people said immediately, "the timing must be off." Hmmm. It has to go back in to address a braking issue, so I'm going to have them check that as well. Still, the car can really light up the pavement. It's old, loud and a bit rough and really takes on a new personality when it's driven fast. The road-racing days are behind me. Thank goodness.

The various camera buddies and I had a very nice time. There were a lot of cameras on the table, and I brought some of my favorites – most Zeiss Ikons but a few others as well, including my new fun camera – a Foca Sport II (French rangefinder) – to the show, tell and swap party.

I took a total of 0 photos this weekend. In fact, no film ever made it into any of the cameras. Those who picked up the Zeiss Ikon seemed to like the feel and operation. To some, it was larger than they expected.

In general, positive comments about the viewfinder, the relative quiet of the shutter (in which we compared it to a Nikon S rangefinder) and the fit and finish of the Luigi half case. I left the Nikon S in Canada so Mike could give it a test drive for a few months.

I made it to Stephen's house in Toronto quite late but somehow managed to lose two maps, directions and his phone number. My mobile phone service stopped at the U.S. border. I tried to call directory assistance, but the operator was so impatient that I barely had two words out of my mouth before she hung up.

I had looked at the map, so I knew I was within 1/2 mile. So I simply guessed and found his neighborhood and street – remember, this was around midnight. But I couldn't remember his house number, so I cruised up and down the street hoping to see him standing outside in the sub-freezing night. Unfortunately for me, Stephen had more sense than that, and I still couldn't remember his house number.

Finally, it dawned on me that I had brought my laptop (not my primary e-mail computer), but by luck I happened to have one of his e-mails with the directions but still no house number. So I took one last pass up the street, and there was Stephen looking out one of the windows of his house. Lucky me! I had almost resigned myself to spending a night in the front seat in a sleeping bag.

The next morning, Stephen brought out his Leica M6. It's one of the earlier models (don't ask me how early, because I don't know). The previous owner removed the white filling in the letters and also the red paint on the Leica ball and cut four tiny notches in the film chamber in a rather Hasselblad-like fashion. Side by side, they are about the same width. The Zeiss Ikon is slightly less deep from front to back and taller by 1mm or 2mm.

We swapped lenses -- the Summicron on the Zeiss Ikon and the Planar on the M6. Both seemed to focus fine, although we didn't take any photos.

In the meantime, I unloaded a few cameras that I will never use, including my fourth Kodak Duo 620 (leaving me with two having sold the other several years ago), several Kodak bakelite specials, a Graflex Graphic 35 with the push-button focusing, a Box Brownie and an Ikoflex TLR that consumed way too much of my time and has been gifted to someone for the second time.

Tomorrow, I head to Austin, Texas, for two days. I hope to get a few free hours on the first night and maybe get off a few shots. I'll be taking along some Kodak Gold 200 – one of Kodak's nicest color films, as well as some Ilford FP4+ and a couple of rolls of Tri-X.