Fish Catching Travel
We all know the old saying that BOAT stands for break out another thousand. The way things have gone lately with me and friends, it has never been any more pertinent. First it was my friend Clyde in Canada and the Trailer from Hell. Then on Wednesday I hit something with the boat. Finally my friend Chris had something happen that just says it all about things that can do wrong. If you are a friend of mine with a boat, be careful, it may be me.
I got the following message from Chris with a photo attached. “Yep, the BoatUS tow insurance is worth it…….”
Boy I hate it when that happens.
He said he was just turning a corner when he thought the bearings went out on one side, but it turned out the axle broke. I can actually say I have never heard of that happening before. And he is so right about the insurance. When you buy a policy from any of the boat towing companies you can buy a rider for anything that happens to the trailer while you are on the road. I had that policy and let it lapse, time to renew it, you never know.
And speaking of insurance, the policy on our boat has a zero deductible, well worth the cost with what has happened. Always carry insurance, it can save you money at some point, and helps protect you and others if the unthinkable happens. In 41 years of boating I have never hit anything that required repair, but it happened. Maybe the odds were coming around to my turn, but no matter what that policy we pay yearly is going to pay off. But it does not make having something like that happen any easier on my pride.
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My friend Todd got to spend the weekend fishing in Lousiana. He sent me these pics, and it looks like it was a good trip.
Todd with an 11lber caught sight fishing.
A nice mess for the group.
Todd commented on how “red” they were. Love the color of marsh reds.
Looks like they had a good trip. There is nothing like hitting some new water. Makes success all that much sweeter. Thanks for the pics. And for the rest of you, send me some pics, we love to see them.
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I got the following question from Joe, one of my regular readers:
“When you all say that Coleto Creek has risen, is there a way to gauge from the full pool line that runs around the lake? Or from the boat ramp platforms? Its amazing what 4-5 feet do to that lake . Thanks”
The best way to tell is by using the fingers of the docks at the ramp. When the lake was around 4′ down the water just came to the ends of the fingers, and when it was at it lowest there was no water touching the docks. Now it is about halfway up the docks and the lake appears to be at full stage. Sorry that is a pretty simplistic measurement, but it works for me.
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When we were in Canada we met Troy and his son Logan. I got a nice note from Logan telling me if I am ever in Oklahoma I have a fishing invitation. Thanks Logan, since my daughter lives in OK City, and I get there a couple of times a year, maybe we can get it together. The reason I bring this up is Logan got to Canada the second week we were there and the smallmouth went on the beds big time the day after he got there. He was just pitching a beaver style plastic to them, and those nice big smallies were eating it up.
So he had his dad film him pitching to a big smallie, and like clockwork the bass did his part in that clear water, but dad turned off the camera before he got it all. So Logan tosses the fish back in, dad turns on the camera, and Logan pitches to the same fish, and he eats it again. Cool story. Logan send me the clip, folks would love to see that. One thing I found that was hard to get across to folks, especially you bass fisherman out there, just how amazing the smallmouth fishing can be when it was on.
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I did want to tell you the best thing about my site, at least in my humble opinion. And that is the ability to be able to search by month. Just use the archive search box on the right hand side. Select a month and year, and all the posts for that month will come up. For me it has been a real useful tool to get a head start on what the fish were doing at the same time last year, and the years before that.
Now it is no guarantee that it will be exactly the same conditions, but it is close. It gives me a place to start, and the patterns that worked in the past. At times it also helps me to not repeat the same mistakes. And do not forget to cruise the fishing boards, there is often lots of useful information to be gleaned from reading the fresh reports.
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That’s all I have today. It has been a quiet weekend here, but hope the rest of you had a great holiday. Now I get to head to the Gulf and find out how the fishing is after a couple of million folks flogged the stuffing out of them. Monday it will be making sure the boat situation is in order, and then a few days of fishing. I knew I kept the Carolina Skiff for some reason. Keep stopping in and thanks for reading my stuff.
Good Luck and Tight Lines
