French River

Monday, July 27 to Thursday, July 30, 2009
I left Monday for a much anticipated Musky trip to The Lower French River at the invitation of Andrew Marr, one of our Bass Pro leads. I picked up co-worker Bernie Zweerman in New Market and we made our way to Hartley Bay on the Lower French where my boat was launched. Andrew was at the dock to greet us along with his buddy Mike Short and Mike's Dad Bob. We found out that Mike had caught (and released) a 43" Musky the day before. Andrew led us out to the Ochtwan Hunt Camp of which he is a member. The group has been in existence since the 1880's!!
The camp is located on a small island (see green arrow on map) in Wanapetai Bay, home to some very large Muskies!!

We fished most of the water that you see in the picture.


View Larger Map

The camp was fabulous!!


Something right out of a Red Green episode. It had so much character and history. There were pictures on the wall of some of the early members from the 1800's!!


The kitchen was huge and well supplied. They hire a culinary chef during their hunt week in the fall!!


There were 5 bedrooms n the main cottage and a bunky that slept another 6. Bernie and I stayed in the bunky. This was the view from the foot of my bed!


Here are some of the highlights:

Its great to have a tall guy like Bernie around when you catch "Tree Bass"!


My best fish of the week, a 30" Pike.


Bernie with a nice Pike!


On Day 2, our Walkie Talkie went off and we knew that Marr had lit into a big one. Andrew nailed a 45" Musky, but by the time we got there it had been released. I asked if they got pictures and they assured me they had, but to my amazement, they were taken with a film camera (just like Mike's 43"), so I will post them once I get them. I can't believe people are still using that old technology!!!! 8O)

On Day 2 we went downriver to the Dallas, a major set of rapids downstream.
Our Official Group Picture!


Bob, Mike, Andrew, Bernie and Me

We beached the boats and hiked to the down side and fished from shore.
Bernie spotted a Massassauga Rattler, the first one I've ever seen (and heard!!).
Bob started things off with this nice Walleye.


Marr nailed a beauty Walleye in the fast water.




Mike wasn't far behind , landing this pretty fish shortly after.


Mike and his Dad spending a bit of quality time together.


Andrew and Bernie trolling by some interesting rock structure


Andrew pulled in this nice 35" Pike.


Andrew monitoring Bernie's filleting skills. That's our Bunkie in the background.


A dragonfly bumming a ride!


Bernie with a monster!


Bernie is a Walleye specialist and taught me how to use a few different setups. This was the best I could muster on a worm harness !!!


We spent two great nights out on the dock watching satellites, meteorites and the Milky Way...

...............while Bernie, Andrew and Mike fished for walleye and catfish off the dock.


The rocks reminded me a bit of Sedona during sunset.


Mike was a workhorse in the kitchen and we ate like Kings the whole week!!
Some great conversations, better than expected weather, awesome surroundings, great company and some hard fishing made for an awesome trip!
The only sour note happened while I was attempting to tarp the boat for the ride home, slipped and fell sideways into a real stinky ditch and just soaked myself (picture to come). Thank God I had spare clothes!! The good news was that I didn't soak the side that my wallet and iphone were on and I didn't hurt myself (except for me ego).

A great trip with a great bunch of guys and some fabulous scenery.
Thanks for the memories boys!!

Still in the Money!!!

Wednesday, July 22, 2009
The second stop on the Bass Pro Associate Tournament Tour was Rice Lake. Paul was able to fish this one, so I took the boat to Bass Pro with me on Tuesday and went to Pogger's house after work. Rachel was already in bed when I got there, but I spent some fun time getting caught up with Evan's latest adventures at camp etc.
Rice Lake was not very high on the confidence scale. I've only fished it once before in our tournament there 2 years ago and Terry and I struggled all day and only came in with 7.08 Lbs. for a poor finish. Rice is like a home lake for a lot of the Associates so the cards were stacked against us. Our goal was a top ten finish with 18 boats entered. We tried a totally different strategy this time and shot the 20-25 miles to the other end of the lake, up the Otonobee River almost all the way to Hastings! We were on the water for 25 minutes before we wet a line! While others were targeting Smallies, our initial strategy was to work the heavier weed areas for Largemouths.
We had marked about a dozen spots on the GPS that we wanted to try. The plan was to start at the top of the lake and work our way back through the day.
We stopped at a good looking spot and worked the pads and quickly put two in the boat. We worked our way through a few spots and by 10 am we had our five fish limit and spent the balance of the day trying to cull out the smaller ones.
The lure of the day was a Watermelon BrushHawg. While we continually changed up with various presentations, the BrushHawg consistently got the hits. We did a good job of landing everything we hooked. The afternoon proved a little frustrating as we were unable to cull any of our smaller fish as the day wore on.
Surprisingly at weigh-in, others were not doing as well as we expected. We thought that it would take 16 - 18 pounds to win, but in fact the winners only weighed 13.56 Lbs. We weighed in at 11.52 which was good enough for 4th place and $150!!!



More info here: http://www.rogercraig.ca/bps/2009/20090722rice/rice.htm

We picked up some Swiss Chalet with some of our winnings and chowed down with Andrea, Evan & Rachel back at their place. Chris had sent an old cell phone for Rachel which turned out to be a great hit with Rachie.........

It was great to see Evan and Rachel again. Rachel is growing up so fast!

Crazy Kids

Saturday, July 18, 2009
We finally had the Crazy Kids over for an overnighter. Chris took Miranda and Maddy to the show to see the latest Harry Potter movie while I was at Bass Pro. When I got home we had a good visit and they brought me up to speed on their adventures at camp, Miranda's boyfriend!! and all the other latest developments. We then got down to playing some very competitive games of Bingo! We all designed our own Bingo Cards and picked our own numbers. I found a free Bingo application for my iphone that would randomly pick the Bingo numbers and also keep a record of called numbers to verify a Bingo. We played a couple of full card games for Toonies which Maddy cleaned up on. A lot of fun. We'll have to do it again.
The next morning they greeted me with a String Shower.


Between work, fishing and working on the basement, we haven't seen much of them. It was great to have them around.

Sooooooo Close!!!!

Wednesday, July 8, 2009
Today was the first Bass Pro Shops Associates Tournament of the season. This is a 4 Tournament Series that culminates with the top 10 teams qualifying for the Bass Pro Shops Associate Classic.
The tournament was held on Sparrow Lake and there were 14 teams (boats) entered. Blast Off was at 7:00 am. with the weigh-in scheduled for 3:00 pm.

I was without either of my regular partners, Pogger and Terry couldn't make this one, so I was fortunate enough to team up with Greg Butchart, a fellow Bass Pro Associate who was also without a partner for this tournament. Greg was the guy I put on the 5 1/2 pounder last week at Lake W.
We had a good game plan and by 9:00 am we already had our limit of Bass (5 over 12")!! We would spend the afternoon culling out smaller fish as we caught and replaced them with bigger ones. We made our way over to the backside of an island which had a nice weedy drop off. All of a sudden I've got a nice fish on (at least 4 Lb.), but before you know it he does a classic head shake as if to say "Oh no you don't", and he shook me off. I must say it was a thing of beauty as he flared his gills and walked across the water, a mental picture that I won't soon forget.
We made several more passes along this spot. Greg gets a nice one on, that we get right to the net. He takes one more pass and "ping" it breaks his line!!! This is another 4+ pounder!!!
Another pass and I get a huge fish on a dinger! This is a HUGE FISH and I'm yelling right away for Greg to get the net, Greg is right on it, we both get a good look at this pig and its in the 5-6 pound class, when all of a sudden "Ping"!!! We have probably just lost a total of 13 to 14 Lbs of Fish which would have pretty much guaranteed victory!!!! We both just sat there in shock! My knees were shaking. Knowing that we had probably just blown our chances of winning the tournament, we had to pick ourselves back up and try to get back on our game. We made a couple of more passes and then moved on planning to come back later after the area had settled down again (we did return later, but the bite had shut down).
We shot to the top of the lake in Maclean's Bay and got on fish again. Greg pegged a beauty smallie watching it come out of a clump of weeds and stopping his retrieve just for a moment and watched it inhale his jig and immediately set the hook beautifully, this puppy wasn't going to get off.
We continued to cull our fish and headed back to the south end of the lake and fished the river near the launch. We saw our co-worker, Hung Tran and his partner working the docks ahead of us. What we didn't know at the time was that they had had a tough day and only had 2 fish in their livewell when they got back to the river with a half hour to go. They pegged three fish off of the docks, the last one which we watched. What we didn't realize at the time was that we were actually watching Hung and his buddy Charlie beat us with that fish!!!!
At the weigh-in we were shocked to see how much others had struggled. Some of the favourites didn't even come in with a full bag (5 fish)!! Our bag of fish weighed in at 11.60 Lbs. Hung weighed in 11.72 Lbs. and also beat Greg's 3.52 smallie by 0.14 Lbs. (less than 2 oz.) for Big Fish and a $100 BPS Gift card.

My biggest of the day:


One of Greg's smaller ones.


It was funny to think that we actually watched Hung beat us. He's a great guy and it was nice to see him win the first tournament that he entered. He walked away with $400, while we picked up $200 which was not too bad considering we figured we had blown the day with those lost fish.
Our biggest 4:


Charlie and Hung's fish:

All in all a great day on the water with a bunch of great guys. Pogger will have a bit of pressure on him in the next tournament on Rice Lake in two weeks!! 8O)
More pictures and results are here.

34 AIBC

Sunday, July 5, 2009
Well the dust has settled on the 34th Annual Invitational Bass Classic and I finally have found time to post. This is a very special time for me to spend some quality time with Good Friends and celebrate Old Traditions.
The weather did little to co-operate although the weekend turned out better than expected, and the fishing was tougher overall than it has been in years. Despite all this it was another great trip!

From left to right:
Orca, Six Shooter, Bear, Bobby-Rog, Twang, Yers Truly, Willy, Dell, FrogHawg, Pumpkin Head, Gill, The Chief, Big MAC, Big Red.

Friday night featured City Chicken and Bigos thanks to MAC and his wife. We also enjoyed our annual Fish Cookies thanks to Willy's wife Merrie.

Pogger, who has his hands full at work these days only managed to get up on Saturday morning to fish for a few hours with his brother before having to head back home.


FrogHawg & Orca were seen at the back of Otter trying to nail the big one!!


John Hughe's 3 Lb. 1 oz. Largemouth narrowly edged out Matt Anderson's 3.0 Lb. Largemouth to capture the Wilf Craig Memorial Trophy for the weekend tournament.




With the Tournament over I got one last chance to fish with Bear Sunday night before he had to head back home. It turned out to be a nice night, but the Big Bass still weren't bitin'.


Monday brought some unfortunate news as Roger Chrysler had to leave early as his daughter had taken ill and Steve left early with him to keep him company on the ride home.
Prayers are with his daughter.

The balance of the week is always more relaxed as seen by these shots.
FrogHawg


Orca


My former friend Barry 8O)


Mr. Science


Things started to turn around as Moe's son Scott arrived and had a good night catching a pile of fish over 12" highlighted by this 3 Lb. 15 oz. which overshadowed Barry's nice fish!


Ed's son Phil made it up and they got to spend some quality time together.


It was good to fish with my old buddy Orca (Paul). He is the only guy that I have never threatened to throw out. The fishing wasn't great, but a few were biting before we got chased in by a scary storm system.


The next day I had a good fish with Scott although we had to take refuge at a cottage on the other end of the lake to get out of a torrential downpour!
He came back with Barry that night with a Lifetime Achievement - 5 Lbs. 14 oz. HAWG!!
Way to go Scotty!!!! He really had it going this week!!!


Wednesday, Greg a buddy from Bass Pro came up to visit my mystery Lake. Despite the downpour, it didn't take long to put him onto fish! His first was a 3.7 Lb beauty!


which was quickly followed up by this 5 Lb. 8oz. PIG!! He also latched onto a 2.7 pounder before it was all over.


Another trip is finally over. Fishing was tough, but very productive for some. It was probably the worst fishing I have personally experienced for opener in years, although I must say that seeing the Hawgs brought in by Scott and Greg were just as exciting as if I had caught them myself.
Another Classic is over. Thanks for the memories guys.