Fishing Weekend

Saturday morning found me and Rod up at Butch's house getting the Jon boat ready for the first run of the year. It took a little bit to flip the boat, get the motor on, yard it over to where I could get the truck to it, and change out the stickers...but we managed and were headed out in about 45 minutes. We decided to head up to Hayden lake since it was a shorter drive than to Fernan, and the many bays led us to think we could escape the wind. Got the boat in without a problem and after a few tugs on the pullcord...the little Yamaha came to life! Always a good thing after being in storage for close to a year.

We skipped over to some coves and started to troll a bit. The weather was TRYING to break, but every time we thought the sun would come out...another black cloud was waiting to block it. So it was cold, the water was still very chilly, and the wind was blowing...but definitely easy to deal with.



I'm obviously enjoying the first boat trip of the year

Short story short...we didn't catch anything and the above is the only photo I have. We DID have two tame mallards following us around while we trolled. Bizarre, they came right up to the boat begging for a handout. Then they'd fall back and seem to swim right over our lures...occasionally looking down at them. Then they'd fall further behind and literally fly to catch up...landing in the water next to us...and continue to beg.

So there we were about halfway up the lake...when we both looked to the south and noticed whitecaps!! SHOOT. The weatherman was correct when he predicted the wind to shift to the southwest at about 1400! That's also when we noticed we had about 1 gallon of gas left! That little motor sure does like to eat. With Rod at the stern, he gunned it to the dock....both of us slamming on the seats after each 2 foot wave. But, everything worked out, the boat got a workout, and we made it back to the put-in.

Now, seeing this trailer without the boat on it is difficult...because you CAN'T see it. I have since learned how to take the tailgate off, so did that and tossed it in the bed. I had an exceptional view of the trailer and got it backed up easily. Boat loaded...we then noticed one of the trailer tires was VERY low. By the time we got to a gas station to fill it up, it was almost flat. I'm now considering just investing in those solid-rubber trailer tires. I'd never have to worry about them again.

Then on Sunday while Sarah was running the Spring Dash, I took off to Fernan to do a little shore fishing. Pretty quick both Tick and Rod showed up and we battled the blowing wind and cold for a couple hours. Again, we didn't catch anything...but saw some other folks pull in a trout. The fish are THERE, at least that's good to know.

But, the wind was out of the west blowing right down the lake, and from the spray put up by the few boats out there...I'm glad we didn't try to do that again. Then right before we took off, we noticed a boat across the lake from us, obviously dead in the water...with someone waving a red flag. Hmm, dead engine in those winds and they were about halfway down the lake...coulda happened to us on Saturday. It didn't look like much fun, but being in no position to do anything...we just sat and watched until another boat came by and towed them to the dock. (At least in the Jon boat, I could oar it into the shore...but this was a big boat that woulda been hell to paddle.)

Overall, it was a good weekend. A little too much wind for my taste, but it's funny how quickly time goes by when you're fishing. Makes me wish the weekends were just a little longer.

Jon Boat Edit

This post will make it fairly apparent how LITTLE time I spend with my Jon boat.

I got a board and headed up to Butch's to measure out what I needed to cut to make a backing plate for the motor to mount to. Well, the boat is upside down on the trailer still and I shimmied it off to where I could take a look at the stern, and that's when I noticed it! The smart people at Alumacraft already HAD a backing plate built in! It's even covered with aluminum as a weather shield! Go figure.

I never noticed it before because a.) I never looked and b.) When the boat is right-side up, where you hook the motor on just looks like the hull itself.

*sigh* I need to start paying closer attention I guess. I sigh, because driving the 4 miles or so for this project took 45 minutes due to all the schools releasing their children at that exact same time. Waste of an hour for my lack of observation.

Now I guess there's really no other reason for procrastination. They keep changing the darn forecast on us though. Now tomorrow is almost guaranteed rain...and Sunday is holding onto that chance of snow. Might be a cold, wet day on the water.

Welp I'M sure boring anymore

Yep..."welp" about sums up what's been going on the past couple weeks. We're going on our fourth month of rain / overcast / gloomy weather. Don't get me wrong, there have been two sunny days in there. One of those sunny days was yesterday and I spent most of the day at a meeting in the basement. Funny though, once I left work I was in the one of the best moods I've been in for months...don't know why, just finally feeling alright. Rather than tell ya'll what I haven't been doing, how about what I HAVE been doing? Trap league is over and I made it to the banquet this year. It was a decent time as I shot better than I have all season. Rod paid my way into an Annie Oakley game and the first thing I did was shoot him out. (I was out three shots later.) BUT, I still had a box of shells so I walked over to where Rod was trying a round by himself. So, just the two of us there shooting, everyone else watching the game going on, and I came out in the 20's! Best round of the year...good way to leave it. (And unfortunately this was the first year I didn't "win" anything. I musta really sucked.)

I went out fishing once so far this year! I finally got Rod to show me how people rig up to fish lakes...as I'm totally clueless when it comes to that. I can use a bobber and I can throw a spinner, beyond that I'm lost. Turns out, all you need is an inline swivel, a weight, and a small treble hook. Weight above the swivel, leader out beyond that to a hook...with a big ball of powerbait covering the hook is all it takes! The powerbait floats, so you can imagine what that looks like in the water. Well, we didn't catch anything, but time sure flew by!

Uhm...wow. Getting down to that being pretty much it. Access into the woods is still lousy but improving daily...there are still morons getting stuck out there, so I'm letting them have it for the time being.

I'm TRYING to get motivated to tie flies and load bullets, but haven't fully succeeded yet. I kinda want it to get just a little warmer out before I go sit in the garage for hours at a time. I know, I could just bring that stuff in the house...but would kinda like to have a setup that's out of the way.

I was also kicking around the idea of building another flyrod. Kinda want a four-piece again...and this is relevant as I just put in for a mountain goat tag! There is ONE tag given out in the unit I want to hunt (on the St. Joe) and another fella and I applied with the idea that if one of gets it...we'll both go and spend a week or so in the woods. Lotsa lakes up there, so the idea would be to get some fishing in as well.

I'm slowly getting the boat ready to take out. And when I say slowly, I mean SLOWLY. A month or so ago I finally did all my registrations online. A week later all the stickers and whatnot came and are still sitting on the counter. Meanwhile, I made it up to Butch's house (where the boat is) and got the gas tank. Several days later (ie..yesterday) I was able to get GAS in the tank. So basically it's ready to go. Just have to go flip the boat over, take the trailer off the jack stands, put some stickers on it...and haul it to some water. I'm secretly appreciating the weather for that first day. It'll be nice because there won't be anyone around. (People around here are definitely solar powered. Once the sun comes out, so do all the people.) I'm thinking that day is going to be Saturday. Looks like the best day of the weekend with only a 30% chance of rain...unlike Sunday, which has a 30% chance of rain/snow. Ah hell, it's all the same at this point.

Oh shoot, I just remembered I want to put a board on the inside of the boat for the motor to mount to. I'm a little worried about just having it hanging on the aluminum. So I guess I have more work to do...get some wood...get some gorilla glue...etc.

And turkey season opens Friday. So hopefully that'll motivate me to get in the woods a little bit more. We'll see. (I already have a standing order to go turkey hunting with Rod's son Dusty. Dusty asked months ago if I would go with him and he will NOT let that go! He's super-stoked so it should be fun if he can shut up for a while. HA!)

So that's about it. Just thought you all might like to see how boring I am this time of year.