| Fishing Journal |
| 10-05 to current(8-1-06) Boat Project - Last fall I bought an 18-foot Wellcraft Center Console Project Boat. I've been wanting a boat of my own for years now, and considering we were expecting our third child, which we just had, a boy, Luke Thomas Christian, doing great, I knew I couldn't just drive down to Chatlee and sign up for a new one. I've always enjoying designing, customizing,restoring, and creating things myself, so I wasn't afraid to take on a diamond in the rough. The project hasn't made much progress lately, but I hope to have it in the water by October. I'll post more on it soon. 5-06 - Seeking Hybrids/Stripers on the Haw Again- Caught several largemouth bass instead 10-05 Wildman trip to Cape Hatteras - I, my brother-in-law, James Wilkins, cousin Ken Harris, and James' Dad, Larry Wilkins, headed down to the coast one dark Saturday morn this past fall. Our intention was to get on the beach somewhere around Cape Hatteras and fish. The other details would work out when we got to them. We got down there with no delays despite my rear parking lights being out the whole way down in the dark. Once we were there I didn't plan to do any driving at night and we planned to head back Sunday during the day. We baited up at Frank and Fran's and tooled on down well south of the lighthouse. It was a pretty crowded beach, to me at least, since I'm more used to the isolated beaches of Cape Lookout. We worked our way almost to the ferry to Ocracoke and fished for an hour or so. We felt the water was too clear and calm and we weren't catching anything so we worked our way back toward Buxton. Once we kind of turned the bend in the banks to where we were just above the point we found a spot to fit our two trucks that faced what appeared to be a nicely forming slough as the tide changed. We fished that spot consistently throughout the day, with our reward being a steadily increasing number of fish caught until around dusk we were catching mullet, puffers, blues, and the occassional gray trout with almost every cast. I has the idea that we would sleep in shifts so I tried to get in a little shuteye early in the evening after a nice meal of my award-winning chili. Turns out it's hard to sleep when you hear other people catching fish and having fun. So we all fished into the early hours of Sunday morning until we all had to crash. I slept in the front seat for a couple of hours and when we all came to, we were still beat after around 16 hours of non-stop fishing so we started getting everything together so we could make it to a breakfast buffet. We made it to one in Nagshead and ate like men lost at sea. |
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| 5-05 - Seeking Hybrids/Stripers on the Haw- Despite my deeply-ingrained work ethic, I dropped off my girls at their sitter and snuck over to the Robeson Creek Canoe Access on the Haw River to do a little "research". Earlier in the week Gray Talley emailed me to let me know he had caught a bunch of Hybrids there using white woolly buggers. The day was beautiful and sunny without being too hot and I hiked into the trail that leads over to where the rocks first jut out of the river as you come upstream from the lake. Dodging a jungle of poison ivy, I made it over to where I could first climb out onto the rocks to do a little flyfishing. On the first good cast into a nice deep run of water, I saw a flash and felt my rod dip down and I set the hook. I had a nice fight with the hybrid as it pulled with the strong current through the jagged rocks. Soon I had it in an eddying pool and worked it over and up to me. I pulled the white beadhead woolly bugger out of its mouth and eased it back into the water where it vanished in a splash and flash. I fished hard for two more hours without luck. I've got to figure out how to get out earlier (and/or stay later). |
| 4/05 - Weldon Striper Fishing - I met my Uncle Bill at the Walmart on Tryon Road in the morning and we headed for the Roanoke River in search of stripers. Bill had fished there the week before with a "Weldonian" acquaintance and they caught 40 or so in an afternoon and early evening drift using Albino Super Flukes on jigs. We had given Bill's small bassboat a shakedown cruise for the season the weekend before and we were ready to be busy catching "The Rock". As we exited the rough I-95 into downtown Weldon we both realized the impending need for sustenance and quickly sighted the welcoming letters "KFC". Pulling into the very small parking lot, Bill realized he couldn't get the truck and boat maneuvered around to the drive through speaker, so he sent me over to it. As I jumped out of the unfamiliar truck, I slammed my right thumb in the door. As I headed over to the speaker, nursing my sore thumb, a Honda with Maryland plates zipped in front of me and placed an order. As she finished she finally sighted the truck and boat in Her Highness' path and muttered something about someone jumping her. Bill starting placing the order at the window to speed things up and as he finished his simple order of ten pieces, dark, the driver of the Honda got out of her car and stomped over to us. The woman with magenta hair, which I suspected was not her natural hair color, began complaining to the order-taker as the she continued filling our order. The kindly KFC employee explained that we were unable to get to the speaker, and Bill explained to the lady how she would certainly get her food before the sun went down. That's when the cursing began. Magenta told Bill he shouldn't be a certain bodily orifice and BIll said she was the one, then she commented, negatively, upon his hairline. This cracked Bill up and she didn't seem to see the humor in anything going on at the KFC this morning. She continued her harangue as Bill rolled up his window and giggled. Magenta then hit the window and offered to drag Bill out of his truck. More giggling, and then Bill thought of a few politically incorrect yet incredibly funny things to say. Once again Magenta seemed to miss the punchline. Our chicken arrived and the kind lady who responded to BIll's original polite behavior with the same, commented on Magenta's probable frustration in the realm of matrimonial relations. After that adventure fishing the rocky flowing river seemed rather tame. We put in and cruised downstream where Bill had caught fish earlier. We fished hard and caught just a few. We should have switched to live bait, as it seemed the only ones catching any of the numerous fish below had done. The bite supposedly improved later in the early evening but we had to get on the long road home. We enjoyed catching what few stripers we actually caught and the weather was perfect. We saw fighting kingfishers and several wild turkeys, two of which flew across the river just twenty feet from our boat. But the adventure was not to end there. We shredded a tire on dragging the boat out and had to limp over to Walmart to get a new tire. Lessons learned from this trip- Driving on 95 does scary things to women with magenta hair Fried chicken tastes better drifting down the Roanoke River Just because the fish are there doesn't mean you are going to catch them. When in doubt, use live bait. Bring a freaking jack, and... Uncles can be very entertaining, especially when provoked. |
| Late '06 to 11-'07- My most recent successful fishing trip took place early this October. The Chowan River Crew got together for what we hoped would be a nice trip where noone had tire blowouts on I-40, the Cottonmouths kept their distance, and Nor'easters stayed out of the forecast. In other words, we hoped for the opposite of our recent three or four forays in the wild. Things turned out well, the weather was fine, and with the exception of some boat battery issues, our trip went smoothly. After a little experimentation we found a pattern that worked on bass. We worked down the main river channel, casting white floating worms around huge cypress trees. Working with the wind, with only minor trolling motor corrections, we were able to fish like this for miles, catching nice bass often enough to make us pay attention to every cast. We quickly lost count, and caught almost all healthy bass from 1 to 4 pounds. A perfect fishing trip. My Latest Toy - This June I found a Boston Whaler 13 for sale cheap on Craigslist while looking for parts for my 18' center console project. I had been thinking about rigging up a jonboat or getting a Tracker for a lightweight bassboat at some point and then the idea of a little Whaler just sang to me as a great idea. I went to see the boat and I could see why no one had bought it even though it was a highly collectible little Whaler. The previous owner had rigged it up as a bassboat, which I had a notion to do, but he didn't do it exactly up to my standards. The treated lumber decks were rotten and it was painted a very early '80's metallic navy blue. It looked like the perfect project to me and I handed over the $800. Did I also mention it had a 2 year old foot controlled trolling motor, and the galvanized trailer was in good shape. My first reasoning was that I could put it in the water immediately and start fishing while I worked on the Wellcraft. Unfortunately, the ancient Seahorse 15 motor needed more work than I thought, but I didn;t worry about it. I had decided to put my effort into this in the hopes of having it ready by Fall. Well, it's fall now and it's not done, typical with my schedule nowadays, but I have made good progress on it. The biggest setback was the transom. IThe previous owner had chopped it down to fit the little motor on it. I couldn't find a short shaft motor so I decided to raise the transom. I found several sources for doing that through Boston Whaler collector websites. Some of the 13 were short and some were long. I used some of the info, bent some marine plywood, epoxied it up and cut it to fit. Then I used epoxied stainless bolts to peg it into the rest of the transom and then fiberglassed it and smoothed everything out with thickened epoxy. Then I had lots of holes to fill with epoxy and smooth. Now I've begun to paint the boat. I am painting the boat with my version of Mossy Oak Shadowgrass. So far though I just have the tan base coat and I have prepped the stencils I made by taping plastic around the edges. I'll be using spray mount adhesive to keep the stencils close to the boat when painting and I'm not going to spray heavily with the other colors. I can't wait and I need to get to work before it gets too cold. I've got everything else ready to slide into the boat. I made a fore and aft deck with epoxied marine plywood. On that I'm putting stainless seat mount bases, 2 side by side in the "cockpit" area for travel and one in the middle of each deck for fishing out of. The seats are a grassy camo to match. I bought a 35 Evinrude for the boat which I think will be perfect for it. I made a side console based on the ones I've seen on classic Whaler 13's using marine mahagony plywood. I mitered the corners so you can't tell it's plywood. On the console I've got a new steering kit, a little tinted plexi windshield I cut and bent myself, and a little fishfinder. It looks awesome. Once the paint is done it all comes together. I can't wait. Transom Replacement - I decided to replace the transom on my Wellcraft. There was some rot around the scuppers and drain. I was working on it during the heat of the summer and I ended up just about having to chisel it out bit by bit because, although I'm glad I did it so I can have total confidence in it, it wasn't as thoroughly rotten as I had feared. Now it is as thick as before, but instead of fir ply with polyester resin coating, it's meranti ply with a complete epoxy encapsulation and heavy duty fiberglass wrap. It's lighter and stronger than when it left the factory. Now I need to get the stringers and deck done, and then I can do the fun part of mounting the restored console and all the other nice stuff that are taking up space in my garage. |
| 2008 Fishing Wrapup It's been a hectic year. I've been busier than ever with work and our 3 young children and with gas prices at over 4 bucks a gallon, I didn't make it out fishing as much as I have in the past. However the quality and variety of my 2008 trips made up for it. In the Spring, James Wilkins, Robert Sykes, Bobby Bracey, and I made it to Bobby's place on the Chowan. We caught some nice bass as we had on the last trip, but we soon realized the white perch were in and we had found a few spots where they were plentiful. We decided to target them, having missed them by a week or two on several Spring trips. I had never caught one so I was able to add the species to my lifetime species list at number 49. We used mostly white beetle spins and had a blast. In June, my wife Tracie and I went to the mountains for a much needed vacation. We stayed at a friend's log cabin near Todd, NC, which is on the south fork of the New River. It's also near Boone and not far from Blowing Rock. Todd is just a little community of small homes, a church, a couple of shops, a neat general store with a grill, and a rafting/flyfishing shop. I bought a couple of flies and got some advice on where to fish there while we were just touring around. The Sunday before we had to leave I made it down to the river for a little flyfishing. There was a hole near the canoe access and I fished that steadily for a couple of hours. I tried my trusty olive beadhead flashabou bugger to no avail, then the chartruese one the kid at the flyshop recommended. I caught a sucker fish and a pretty green sunfish with that, but no smallmouth. I waded and fished upstream a little and then downstream but couldn't see any good holes to fish either way so I went back to the hole. This time I tried a purple version of the same fly and on the first good cast caught a smallmouth. It fought heartily as smallmouth are supposed to do and I was thrilled as I brought in the colorful glossy, gold, & green fish and released it. A few more casts and I hooked into a much bigger fish and had more of a struggle on my hands. The fish wrestled its way under a rock ledge as I fumbled with the reel, trying to get the line onto the reel. Worried my tippet would snap on the rocky edge I moved toward the fish trying to get the rod tip on the other side of the rock so I could pull him clear. It wasn't easy to get there since there were two more rock ledges with nice dips between them that I had to traverse. I managed to do it without completely submerging or tripping and I was able to bring the fish around, though I did lose a shoe. It raced away from the rocks and made one great, sunlit spraying leap into the air before I was able to subdue it and bring it to me. It was a beautiful 2-pounder and my shoe floated into an eddy where I could easily retrieve it, so it was a perfect exciting ending to my little smallmouth adventure. In August, I received an email from Phil Ambler. I had painted a remarque on one of my tarpon prints for him in exchange for a chance at catching tarpon sometime in the future several years back. I wasn't able to make it that Summer so he said he would let me know when the tarpon were in and we'd set up a trip. So the tarpon were in and my Brother-In-Law James and I met Phil at his dock on Dawson's Creek near Oriental at 6am after a very, very early trip. Phil retired from the NSA 18 years ago and has been tarpon and old drum fishing in Oriental ever since. Needless to say, the man is an expert. We pulled out the creek in Phil's no nonsense Parker 25 Walkaround into a much rougher Neuse River than I had expected at 6am. The hull crashed into the waves and the boat rocked and I wondered what we had gotten ourselves into, thinking it would get worse as the sun came up. Phil got out his rigs and started showing us how to do it. The boat rocked and we put huge chunks of mullet on giant circle hooks as they waved around in the wind like a prop from a Hellraiser movie. Astonishingly, Phil, a man a good bit older than me, let's just say, spryly hopped around the walkaround cabin with a heavy rigged rod in hand and slid it into one of the rodholders at the bow. Fortunately, the wind let up later in the day and I got my sealegs. After a day's instruction, James and I felt we could catch tarpon and drum on the Neuse. The tarpon, however didn't cooperate. They were nowhere to be found. We did catch some incredible drum, one of them citation size. Phil taught us the Owen Lupton Rig, which is a simple weighted circle hook rig that makes the circle hook even more drum-friendly. We also learned how to make an efficient chum slick using a meatgrinder on a board mounted in a stern rodholder. In October, during a 2 week period my sister might call Black October, James and I went on 2 extended weekend trips. James failed to mention his plans until a week before, following that controversial philosophy of asking for forgiveness instead of permission. James and I raced down I-95 in the pouring rain on a Thursday night to meet my cousin Will at his home in Macon, Georgia. The next morning we hopped into Will's truck and towed his 18 foot C-Hawk to Port St. Joe in the Florida panhandle. I'm not sure any of us had an idea of how much driving this was, Will had recently moved from Waycross to Macon. Fortunately the fishing was well worth it. Will knows what he is doing. St. Joseph Bay is a beautiful shallow bay and we carefully worked our way into good fishing spots. Areas 3 to 6 feet deep with a good variety of sand flats and grassy beds near channels seemed to be the ticket. Will tossed out a drift anchor that slowed our drift to a perfect rate, allowing us to cast to likely spots with the wind at our backs. All we had to do was line up fishy looking spots so we would drift over them slowly. Bites came consistently using crazy colored jigs and topwater super spooks. After the trek to Florida, a trip to the Chowan seemed like a cross town errand. This time I had the shakedown cruise of my Boston Whaler. During Winter, I finished turning a worn out Boston Whaler 13 into a mini-bassboat, while mostly maintaining the 13's classic Whaler look. I added front and back casting platforms, a Evinrude 35, front foot-controlled trolling motor, and a Boston Whaler-looking mahogany side console. After cleaning out the carburetor and putting it back on about 8 times, I had the motor running good enough to take to water, so we confidently took it, leaving behind James' bass boat. We backed the boat into the water once we got there and tried starting it up. We had a few anxious moments as the motor stubbornly sputtered and smoked until I had it warmed up. I gunned it once I got into the main river and the little boat responsively popped onto plain scooted out into the main channel. I was thrilled. I was amazed at the boats zippiness, handling and dryness. It turned like a jetski. Then once the rest of the crew got there and we rigged up for fishing, the real test began. How it work as a fishing vessel remained to be seen. I've been told it was a very stable boat, but it sure seemed small and narrow compared to what I was used to. We cruised out of the neighborhood canal and headed over to mud creek for a little fishing before dinner. Arriving at the mouth of the creek, I shut off the motor and climbed forward, dropping the trolling motor and setting up the seat and post. I could reach the fishfinder on the console and I turned it around on its RAM mount so I could see it from the front seat. The 36lb motor pulled the little Whaler around effortlessly and we fished without much luck but I was elated. I hadn't wasted all those hours working on the boat. It turned out to not be a great fishing trip as a cold front shut down a lot of the fish, but we managed to catch a few bream and bass. |
