Fishingdate – Saturday April 27, 2013
It may not have been number one on Rick’s bucket list but i had a feeling it was near the top. Ive been fishing with Rick for about two years. He is 75 years old and a retired IBM engineer who knew my dad. One of many things I admire about him is that he shows up on time at 4am if I offer him a spot on my boat. Saturday, the weather was great on the main lake. With the summer wind pattern kicking in, the lake was blowing hard at night and staying calm for the afternoons and building. The fog had been burning off on the coast early and we got to the boat ramp around 7am and noticed about 10 boats out already. Early out, we hit the Bay of Pigs trolling around like we use to do in high water and we picked up a couple. We cast flies in the bay to metered fish with not much luck.
Rick had been practicing with a t14 Sniper line on an 8wgt Predetor but has yet to hook a striper casting. He’s trolled many stripers but I have to say, he has made over 100 casts and he’s due. I felt like today would be the day and I concentrated on putting him over fish. We decided to zoom over to Romero and try the rocks. There were about 4 bait fishing boats gathered in front of the trash racks real close and Dan Blanton was fishing around the pilings inside and close with his grandson. I started metering large schools of fish in 130 feet of water outside as I pulled into the east side of the dam. We stopped, IPILOT Anchored over a school of fish 25 feet down. On my first cast, I could feel the fish hitting the fly on the drop. Caught two right away and Rick missed two fish on the set. The area was full of schools of American Shad also. We could see them shimmering by occasionally. I felt like maybe they were hitting our little size one yellow clousers but I wasn’t able to hook any. On monday , I will bring a shad fly rig just in case. Another flyfisherman, Vaughn Willet, was doing well drifting further out from us in deeper water along the full length of the dam. He was hooked up constantly and it looked like he had a few doubles as well. The fish were averaging 22 -24 inches and strong in the 64 degree water. Rick finally managed his first fish on a cast fly at around 2:00 PM when the solonar tables suggested a peak time. He ended the day 4 for 8. Not bad for a 75 year old guy. We ended the day with 2o fish and the jinx has finally ended and I dont think Rick will ever want to troll again.
I doubt anyone can imagine the surprise and skepticism when Dr. Meng Syn said he was going to put me in position to catch my 1st stripper on a casted fly. It took approximately 2 years years to happen because I was a complete dork when it came to casting a 28 ft T14 shooting head a distance of 65+ feet. There are multiple parts to a long cast. At my age I found it extremely difficult to put all the steps together. I still can’t mentally track what I am doing! The greatest joy was not in the hook-up but rather it was in seeing my thrill, amazement and sense of pride, reflected in Dr. Syn’s face. He had confidence in me where I had none!!!