On the nudest marred trip to Lake Powell we had a massive wind storm
one night and we were all forced to hide in the campers and in tents.
The wind whipped sand around all night and shook the camper but by
about 4:30 in the morning it was completely calm. My dad came out and
asked all of the boys that were camping out if we would like to go
fishing but only my cousin Blake and I wanted to because everyone
else was still exhausted from being up all night. It is like they
didn't have their priorities strait, tragic. Blake, and my dad and I
got loaded up and drove the boat out in the predawn light to a wall
that dropped off into the water and went strait down 120'. We were
slowly getting our poles rigged and out when I put mine in first, it
had been in the water for only a few seconds when I had a good sized
stripped bass on. Blake put in his pole and he had one on my dad had
two poles in and they both had one on all in less than a minute. We
got the fish off and quickly re-baited and the second time was just
as fast as the first. Right then we realized we were into something
special. My dad abandoned his second pole because there was just not
enough time in between strikes to use it. We hauled in fish after
fish after fish laughing and joking the whole time. We had been using
anchovies for bait and had started the day with several pounds but by
the time we had caught over a hundred fish our stocks were running
dangerously low. We started the day using half of an anchovy, then an
quarter, then an eighth and that was the minimum that would actually
fit on a hook. By the end of the morning we were trying to mash up
any little scrap of anchovy that we could mush onto a hook. Finally,
with hundreds of pounds of fish in the bottom of the boat and no bait
left we went back to camp. It was about nine in the morning and all
the lazy-bums had decided to roll out of bed and they came down to
the boat the see how we had done. When they saw the hundreds of fish
in the boat they were sick with jealousy and quickly helped to unload
the boat so they could go get more bait and head back out and get a
little slice of the fishing glory pie. They headed right back out
with new bait but the moment had passed the fish gods had moved their
benevolent gaze away from the wall we had so much success at and they
only caught 5 or 6 fish in four hours. The lesson here is clear; no
matter how you feel always go fishing, always. You never know when it
will be the best day fishing in the history of the world and why
would you risk that? Why?
