Sitting In The Rain
Thanks to a tremendous amount of rain, I am currently sitting in the truck in an attempt to sit on something more comfortable than the ground inside the very damp tent. And since I actually have reception on my phone out this way, why not write a blog post?
Our first day of vacation yesterday, did not start exactly as planned. While hoping to leave the house by 6AM, the boat and our housesitter were still MIA at 5! Darrell is the organized sort when it comes to fishing trips and was hoping to have the boat back on Monday – to give it a once over and have it ready for to go. Instead, he picked it up at 6:30 Tuesday morning and we crossed our fingers.
Finally on the road, I could not help but get excited. It’s been a long year since our last vacation and I was ready to leave everything behind and get busy fishing! With Jack (our dog) sleeping between us in truck, we cranked the music and headed north.
It was only a few short hours before we reached our destination at Sturgeon Bay Provincial Park. After a quick tour of the open campsites we selected a location, setup camp and launched the boat.
It was while launching the boat that we realized something was seriously wrong with the boat trailer. The inside treads in both tires are almost bald. Further investigation revealed the axle has a huge bend in it. *sigh* Guess Darrell was right to want the boat back early.
Leaving that behind we decided to rig the rods while having lunch and drive them back to the boat. When you take as many rods as we do, walking them to the boat is not an option. It was when we arrived back at the boat that I was greeted with a horrific sight – something had fallen on my G. Loomis GLX drop-shot rod and broke the tip off! *sigh* I had really been looking forward to using that on this trip.
With the day starting to feel like it was jinxed we climbed into the boat and set off. I got a nice tour of an absolutely beautiful area – Sturgeon Bay and further out into Georgian Bay are stunning – before we settled down to start casting.
We had decided to come here to fish because both of us were hopeful to catch our first musky. We had bought some heavier gear and lures before leaving and spent a long time tossing them to no avail before giving our slightly tired arms a break and switching over to bass gear.
It was while drop-shotting off a rock point that Darrell landed the first fish – a beautiful 4lb pike. It was more than a little angry and proceeded to splash the boat as I kept the net in the water for a minute.
After getting rid to the skunk we managed to come across a nice school of crazy smallies. I’ve caught a lot of smallies but these things were even more torpedo-like than normal. What a blast. The drop-shot was nailing them.
After crossing the ‘highway’, which is what this waterway often resembles, we drifted into a channel between two islands and found another school of smallies that were eager to smash the drop-shot and crankbaits. Already having had an awesome day of fishing, we drifted into the little bay behind the islands and there we had our greatest moment.
Still tossing for smallies, Darrell was reeling in a chartreuse and white Booyah bait and as he pulled it into the boat there was an explosion of water followed by the yell, ‘I’ve got a musky!’ I threw my rod down and ran for the nets. Darrell played in the absolutely beautiful 6lb musky and I got it into the smaller of our two nets. Then as Darrell turned to get the pliers, the musky jumped, got out of the net, shook the hook, and was gone. I felt awful for not getting Darrell a picture with that fish!
However, we were both on a high after that fish, and although we had to pack it in for the night (both Jack and I were wanting dinner), we had an incredible day.
Despite the rain that has been falling since nine last night, we have decided to spend another night here before moving on, in hopes of landing another musky, and this time snapping a picture.
argosgirl
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That sounds like an AWESOME day out there! I must admit a small amount of jealousy on my part as I would love to be camping out there.
This may sound strange, but I love when it rains during a camping trip. The wife and I went last year, and on the last night, it rained. I don’t think I had ever slept better or enjoyed just laying around in a tent as each rain drop soothed any concern I had in the world. (The fact that the tent was leaking either helped tremendously as well)
The rain was actually kind of nice – I had a good excuse to stay sleeping 🙂