All Day Rain Day

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July 25th 2018

 

Herman brought his family out today, on likely the rainiest one of the season so far! We hooked up at the usual time and headed out in rough water to our starting spot. Fortunately, it wasn’t raining, but it wouldn’t be long!

Just before we arrived, the rain began and as soon as I stopped, the roof went up. It would at least protect us from most of the misery today. With the winds blowing pretty hard though, it would still be coming in the sides. Rain gear would be needed as well, but mostly for the lower body!

With the bimini top up, I set the rods and instructed them on what to expect. We would be trolling once again and I needed them to be able to get the rods out of the holders without struggling too much! As usual, it didn’t take long before Herman reeled in the first fish of the day. He brought to net a decent pike as the starter fish. A short while after, another pike came aboard by his wife Laura and things were beginning to look up.

The winds were blowing from the SE putting a good chop on the water and the rain was coming down sideways. Although the top kept us from getting soaked, we were still feeling the mist from the rain at times and I had to give a pair of bibs to Laura, as she was mostly in the seat. Despite the rain, the fish seemed to be cooperating and I was picking at them pretty good. They had already gone through a couple of rotations in no time and a few of the fish were decent walleye too. Both Hunter & Cole had managed to land good sized northerns and were hoping for a few quality eyes now. Their mother had boated the largest eye so far but I knew it wouldn’t hold up for big fish of the day!

Today was a strange one for weather as extremely heavy cloud cover kept an intermittent rain falling throughout the morning. The good news was that at least it wasn’t cold, as the winds were pretty warm. High humidity had me putting on and taking off the rain jacket several times during the day, but at least the fish were biting!

The morning passed by quickly with lots of fish being landed by everyone. As we got into the afternoon I found myself covering even more water in search of bigger walleye & pike. Several double headers were seen with a few of the keeper walleye being put into the livewell . I wasn’t sure if they would be bringing them back but we could always release them afterwards, if not! It turned out later that it was their lucky day, as Hunter released all of them back to the lake!

Laura already had big walleye of the day so far and when her turn came back up, she managed to land an even bigger northern. Not to be out done, both her son Cole & husband Herman each landed one about the same size as well. Competition was fierce but mostly from their youngest son, Hunter. He was trying to lock up all the categories including big perch of the day.

With time getting on and the rain still continuing to plague us with the winds, I made one last attempt at getting some bigger fish. I headed out to slightly deeper water and worked an area that had put some huge fish in the boat lately. When Hunter’s turn came around again, he managed to bring a really good walleye to net that he thought might give him big fish in that division. He also had the last fish of the day, but his brother took him out with a pike shortly after.

I decided to take the top down with the rain stopping and we were even luckier to have had the winds lay down as well. This would make for an easy run back to the dock when we were done. With minutes remaining, Laura was up and one last reel fired! She wasinto the biggest walleye of the day now and it was also the last fish. Two categories in just seconds! I couldn’t think of a better way to wrap up the day than with her big fish. They definitely ended on a high!

The run back was smooth, but as we neared the ramp, clouds just exploded on us with violent rains. I had hoped to get back before the skies let loose but unfortunately we weren’t that lucky. It poured so hard that the auto bilge actually kicked on and most of them got soaked. The water coming down the ramp was like a mountain stream as well. This was some serious rain falling!

As with most of the day, the downpour eventually let up and allowing me to take the boat out comfortably. They may have been wet but they had the best fishing of their lives, catching all kinds of big fish today. Everyone left with plenty of memories along with loads of pictures from all of the great fish they landed. I’m sure they will be remembering this day for a long time!!