I’ve got a couple of things to talk about today. First off is a family camping trip we took to a beautiful spot—Desert Lake near Kingston. My family, along with my wife Leisa’s friends Kelly, Kim, Marcy, and their families, took off on the long weekend and had a blast.
FISHING WITH TANK
Desert is a gorgeous lake with Lake Trout, Largemouth and Smallmouth Bass, Pike, and Crappie, so there’s no shortage of fish. It’s the perfect place for some weekend fishing. Every day I’d load the boat with tackle, rods, and kids, and we would set out trying to learn the lake and the fish.
My main fishing partner was a young dude called Matt. (His mom calls him Tink, which has to go due to the lack of masculinity. I think Tank would be better—like the great Tank Abbot.) Matt is all about the fishing. He’d be up early every morning—early enough to wake me up. We’d have a quick breakfast and be on the lake before all the tubing and jet-skiing mayhem ensued.
We concentrated on Largemouth even though it’s a better smallie lake. But I love Largemouth. Tank’s cool with anything that bites! The shallows had lots of fish, but nothing monstrous. If you fish the lake, almost any dock close to cover had a fish on it—just no real lunkers. I’ll bet early in the year they would be good because there are lots of great spawning areas in the lake that are easy to find.
FISH ON, FISH IN
We finally connected with a good Largemouth that was sitting on a little patch of crap along a shoreline. It hit a jig twice but never had it in its mouth. I finally threw back a Senko, and that was all she wrote. Fish on, fish in. If the fish had any gut at all, it would have easily been over five pounds, but her drawn-in gut took a lot of weight away. Good fish, though. The picture of Matt and me tells the whole story: two guys doing what we love!
It was a great weekend, and I look forward to doing it again.
WIN BIG OR LOSE BIG
My second story is about fishing a tournament with my good buddy Dean Thompson. The tournament was based out of Belleville which is on the Bay Of Quinte—water that Dean and I know quite well. You wouldn’t have known it by our results. Total blow-out! Nowadays we (Dean, Mike Burriss, and I) fish with an “all-in” attitude on Quinte tournaments. Win big or lose big, the latter of which we did very well.
We drove almost sixty miles by boat only to catch a limit of pound-and-a-half fish. It’s all about timing. Our backup spot, which we figured would save our bacon, was getting pounded by wind and, of course, the fish screwed off somewhere else. Typical of my luck, since days before it was completely flat. Oh well, that’s what tournaments are about.
The best part of the weekend, though? As we were ploughing through Big Bay’s brutal waves on the ride back towards weigh-in, the rub-rail on the boat started to peel off under the boat towards the motor. We essentially had to drive back in two- or three-footers off of plane, getting soaked by every fifth wave!
Wait a second. No. That wasn’t the best part. Since our boat wasn’t looking too healthy at the time (it ended up not too bad, just a lot of screws to replace), we decided to weigh in early and avoid the crowds. We loaded up the boat, said our goodbyes, and headed out.
While I was driving home, Dean called me up and said, “You wanna hear a real head game? Our names were drawn as a prize winner for three hundred bucks in gas!” The problem was we had to be there to win! Can you see the big L’s on our foreheads?