Kids were Gone - So we Kayaked 5 out of 6 nights!
Date Nights
The kids were away at camp for a week this summer. My wife and I took full advantages of this and spent every night outside as much as we could. We did things that we might normally do with the kids, but we just went for longer, and explored more without fear of the kids getting tired or stuck somewhere.
We tried out several new kayaking spots and were able several areas that have wanted to try for over a year now. There have been some spots that I have seen while driving around that it wasn't sure how to get to without kayaking for over 10 miles.
New Locations and Big Distances
We tried three new spots over the week, and one of them we went to twice since there was a fork in the river and I wanted to go both directions. On average our kayaking over the four nights was over 5 mi, we did five, six, and I think seven and a half, one night was small and just relaxing in backwaters. That by far is the biggest kayaking distance I've done, and to the nights were quite windy where it really sucked going against the wind to get back to the car.
Finding Tons of Fishing Gear each trip!
The number of bobbers in lures I found this year what kayaking is simply amazing. In fact next year I'm going to make sure I keep everything I find in one container throughout the year so I can keep a track of how many bobbers and lures I find. At this point I'm probably over 25 bobbers and four to five brewers. I don't think I'll ever have to buy another classic round bobber again. Now I would like it if somebody would lose some of those really expensive and nice slip poppers. But so far none of them have seem to be lost
Only one night of fishing - But got Perch and Northern!
Only one of the nights at kayaking, did we do a small area we've done before and had a much more relaxing night. I did a little fishing, and exploit some areas of fishing and techniques I haven't tried before trying to figure out what I could catch. Towards the end of the night I hooked on to this guy well hoping to find a bass, but instead I found a pretty nice Northern
Nice Northern Pike - Not Net, Not Glove - Hand to paddle to shore to land it!
I unfortunately left all of my gear at the cabin the last time I was there, so I was fishing with my backup tackle that I keep in the boat, and a few of the things for my kids like forceps and scissors,. I didn't have a net or my glove or anything else that would help me land a big fish. So when I hope this northern, I have no way to safely get a board without high risk of getting cut by the gills I'm a bit, or my own hook in my finger. Since northerns are such a slimy fish I had no way to get a good hold. My only option was to paddle towards your and landed on the rocks
I think if you saw me paddling one-handed while holding the bent over rod any other it would have been quite comical. Jesus
Tiny Small Mouth Bass
I saw some tiny fish in the shallows, and wanted to know what kind they were. Trying to figure out what might be in the lake so I threw in an ice jig and take a look what I caught. This has to be the smallest bass I've ever landed. In fact it's almost comical how small it is but you can still tell what it is.
Perch #2
That's pretty excited when I hooked this perch, because I knew they were pertentious lake, I just almost never find them. If I found five to six of these it would be enough for dinner
Perch #1
This is the second prototype, I'm pretty sure I could have catch pulling up purchased size if I would have stayed in that area. But since I wasn't trying to catch dinner I decided to move along and see what else I could find elsewhere. I'm excited to go back sometime and try to catch 5 to 10 of these and do a fish fry.
great week, but glad to have the kids back
I enjoyed my week of dates with my wife, luckily still enjoy spending time with each other. It was also really nice to explore some new areas, and see where I could go on different fishing trips this fall. But I was ready to get the kids back, I miss them and realize just how quiet the house is without them there.
#sbi-skip