Unfortunate Circumstances....Just a bad day.

The original plan was to meet them for breakfast before heading to the ramp, but they were behind schedule, and I had heard the watercraft officers were at the park doing boat inspections. As I sat in the parking lot of the restaurant waiting for them, I thought it would be a better idea to go down to the park and get in line for the inspection and get that out of the way. They could stop and eat, or just get something on the way over, and I would just wait for them at the park. They opted to stop at Micky D's on the way.

I got down to the park and there was only one boat ahead of me getting their inspection done, so it only took about 10 minutes to get my sticker, showing I passed the inspection. Woot! Woot!

I called my guys and they were just turning into the park. "Great", I thought. "We'll be on the water by 9".

They pulled in and we got ready to launch....no problems there. It went smooth as ever. I idled out of the no wake zone and got her up on plane and headed towards G Can. There were a lot of boats over there, so when I got off plane I started looking for fish on the H'Bird. 

 

At that moment Steve's phone rang, it was bad news. His older brother had had a severe crippling stroke early this morning and was life flighted to the hospital. I asked what they wanted to do, and they didn't know. On one hand they wanted to go home, but on the other hand, they wanted to stay and fish, because there was nothing they could do, and they were already here.

So, to shorten up this story, we made a move to D Can when I didn't mark any fish by G Can and didn't see any nets being used, so we moved up there. We made a pass from D Can to Niagra and marked only marginal fish here and there. Nothing to write home about. We didn't even get a pull back there. In the meantime, they were getting call after call about his brother, and Steve was concerned and torn. He definitely was in turmoil and it showed.

I got a call from a friend to go out to B Can, so I asked them if they wanted to stay and fish or go home. "We can stay and fish", they said. So, we made the run out to B Can. I marked good marks out there, but before we set any lines, the phone rang again and this time Steve's oldest brother asked that they come home. So, we ran back in to Catawba.

BUT,  just before we got to the launch the phone rang again, and this time it was someone else saying, "just stay there, there's nothing you can do right now anyway. We'll let you know if anything changes". So, I suggested we go over to Starve where I was last weekend (and died), but it was close the ramp, and I knew there were fish there. Maybe they would go today.  They liked the idea and we headed over there...set lines out, and made a long pass around the "hole".

My buddy Capt Kevin showed up in the afternoon and again was able to pick at them and said he was getting them at 50-75 back on the DHJ's. He had a hot custom color that I didn't have in the box, so I worked with what I had. 

I don't get it...hundreds of baits and only one freak'n color works????  The rest of our program was the same...leads, speed, etc. Grrrrrrrrrr!

We had one pull back and lost it before we even got the rod out of the rod holder.

 After another phone call, they decided to cut the day short and go home to be with family. I felt really bad for them. I could only imagine what they were feeling today.

I was hoping to get them on some fish to help ease the pain, but it wasn't meant to be.

It was flat calm out there today, but it was a beautiful day. I even had the flip flops on, but was still wearing my Guidewear...lol

We all agreed the next time we go out it would be a much better time. :)

So, there ya have it. It was a tough day fishing and emotionally. I'm whooped!

The boat is cleaned and ready to go tomorrow. The forecast looks really good, with a bit of wind, so that should help the bite tremendously.

Oh, and I did go to the baitshop and buy that "Hot Bait"....just in case. lol

Capt Juls