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With a new marriage, new house, and lots of changes this early summer I was not able to get out for a full weekend of my 'typical' fishing till now. On Saturday I planned to spend the afternoon at Sandy Point, but on the way there I looked at googlemaps and saw all red on the roads leading there from an accident on the bridge. Scrub that, Weems here I come. Perch fishing was only fair there. As others have reported the mud in the water is as bad as I've seen it. It was also unpleasantly warm. I ended up with 3 keeper perch, and enjoyed seeing an 8 inch catfish and an 8 inch bluefish on my line during the day as well. Lesson learned about my kayak. I have to be much more careful when I have multiple lines out. I like to drag a drop shot rig with nightcrawlers from my back pole holder as I cast a lure to shore up front. Somewhere in the natural course of moving around my worm line got fouled in the rudder. I could still navigate, but I couldn't free the line. I ended up cutting it.
On Sunday I hit SPSP nice and early. I had luck catching some decent perch under the bridge and found one little one which I kept to try livelining later. Turns out that that was the only small one but having gone that far I decided to head further out give it try. With my fishfinder lighting up I knew I was on a pile of stripers and sent my little one fish army on it's way. When he veered away I brought him back in, had a little chat about my expectations for his performance, and sent him out a again. Soon enough I feel that little nervous twitch on the line, followed by the line running through my fingers. Five seconds later I flipped the bail to set the hook, and with drag peeling off and my rod bent in half I knew I had a decent one. Lesson learned on this trip: Be very careful about keeping the fish going away from the boat, not under it (as if I can control that). Long story short, this time the line was run in the fins of my outback. Fortunately, he had also run through my stringer of perch so I pull up my perch and was able to grab the line and manually land a 26.5" healthy rockfish. I'm not sure if I had kept reeling in with the braid rubbing against my fins if it would have cut the line, but I wasn't in the mood to peddle to reposition with the line there. I suppose I could have unleashed the paddle and used it to turn the boat, but I didn't want to set the pole down to do that.
So far I enjoy the Outback, but compared to the sleek lines (inside and out) of my previous Pescador 12 the Outback is taking some getting used to. There is a lot more 'stuff' hanging off the boat to get things caught in. But it was a good weekend and nice to be back out on the water again.
On Sunday I hit SPSP nice and early. I had luck catching some decent perch under the bridge and found one little one which I kept to try livelining later. Turns out that that was the only small one but having gone that far I decided to head further out give it try. With my fishfinder lighting up I knew I was on a pile of stripers and sent my little one fish army on it's way. When he veered away I brought him back in, had a little chat about my expectations for his performance, and sent him out a again. Soon enough I feel that little nervous twitch on the line, followed by the line running through my fingers. Five seconds later I flipped the bail to set the hook, and with drag peeling off and my rod bent in half I knew I had a decent one. Lesson learned on this trip: Be very careful about keeping the fish going away from the boat, not under it (as if I can control that). Long story short, this time the line was run in the fins of my outback. Fortunately, he had also run through my stringer of perch so I pull up my perch and was able to grab the line and manually land a 26.5" healthy rockfish. I'm not sure if I had kept reeling in with the braid rubbing against my fins if it would have cut the line, but I wasn't in the mood to peddle to reposition with the line there. I suppose I could have unleashed the paddle and used it to turn the boat, but I didn't want to set the pole down to do that.
So far I enjoy the Outback, but compared to the sleek lines (inside and out) of my previous Pescador 12 the Outback is taking some getting used to. There is a lot more 'stuff' hanging off the boat to get things caught in. But it was a good weekend and nice to be back out on the water again.
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