encouragements and more…

this morning was a sultry eerie spring morning when i stepped outside and it brought back the memory of one of the greatest fishing adventures i have ever had. a trip where an old buddy of mine and i spent an irreplaceable time together.

the year was ’96 and i was a bachelor then. not a care in the world other than, where i was going fishing next and who was going with me. back then i had all the toys a single man could want which included a bass boat.

the boat on this trip was my first bass boat, a 17′ bayliner trophy with a 125 hp force outboard engine.

that boat was ok, but the boat of my dreams and the boat that followed shortly after this one was the now defunct astro 18’ bass boat with a 150hp mercury or as we call it down here, a “merc”.

sorry, that’s the best picture i could find. that story is another blog, another day. i got that bad boy up to 83 miles an hour one time with just me in it and a little wind behind me. you might be askin’ why on earth would you want to go that fast on the water and it’s simple, i’m a man! we like power! it wasn’t real hard to find a partner to play hooky and get out on the water with this baby. it had every whipped creamed injector and hydraulic lift you could imagine! i had one rule for my guest; i provide the boat and gas, you provide the samiches and drinks and two beers for the take out. the two beers were to be iced cold and not to be consumed until after take out and load up. this is my favorite time of the trip believe it or not b/c this is when me and my partner for the day would kick back and talk about the day, tell lies, and go deep. if the convo led to it. i mean the whole day we would be yakin’ it up and jokin’ around and all. but the 19th hole, as i call it, is where the true fellowship would be.

anyway, a buddy of mine and i, we’ll call him scott b/c that is his name, decided to high tale it down to west point lake. that morning was in late february and a storm had just rolled through our area. the water temperature was still in the 50’s but with the warm spring rain some runoffs were warming some parts of the creeks to 70* almost instantaneously causing a reaction us rednecks from newnan, ga like to call hog callin’. this phenomena happens when the king of all bass species, the largemouth bass, chase shad and bait fish up the creeks to warmer waters and bust them literally out of the water to fill their big ole belly’s and we (the fishermen) would be sitting there callin’ them up! we say stuff like; “come on big boy, one time!” “what are you waitin’ on, a formal invitation?” “it doesn’t get to look any better than that; i mean i put it on a silver platter for ya!” you get the point!

ok, so scott and i put in at 6am and were on our first hole by 6:30. i pulled out (which happened to be a lucky guess) a chartreuse and white tandem blade spinner bait and wouldn’t change to another lure for the rest of the morning. first cast, seriously, BOOM! 3 pounder! second or third cast for scott, BOOM! a 5 pounder! this undisclosed creek we were in (we don’t share specifics when we have a honey hole)is no less than 5 or 6 miles long but we pulled up on this spot that was an elbow in the creek, the wind was blowing straight up against the bank, and runoff from a georgia red clay bank was pouring into the lake. someone had come along at some point and dumped christmas trees in about 15 foot of water and we were literally catching bass every 1 or 2 cast. we caught so many bass that morning that i thought my arm was going to fall off. this went on for 5 or 6 hours and never once did scott or i even take a break to urinate! we caught more bass that morning than quaker has oats. the only reason we stopped was because we ran out of battery life on the trolling motor!

that was a great day on the water! even if it hadn’t of been, it beat workin’! at the 19th hole, we carried on for what seemed like a couple hours. the conversation turned more personal at the end, as it often does, and scott shared with me and i shared with him. oh what a great day! so scott ole buddy, if you’re out there reading this, remember that day, and our time together because it was one of the greatest memories of my life for this fishin’ fool!