In the past this has been the last week end to get to our mountain lakes due to snow and I was really Jones'n to go. I got off of work 4:30 pm Friday night and headed for Frenchman's Res. To see if we could get boats in there. The road to the dam was clear all the way. I crossed the dam and got into a little snow which reached about 3" by the time I got to the boat ramp. Should not be a problem until I headed back up the hill. I did not account for the ice under the snow and found my self stuck half way up the road in 4 x 4 shucks!
It is dark out and not a person in sight. I am in my forties and this is no longer as fun as it was in my twenties. Thou I am a little smarter now a days so I had the proper equipment to dig myself out. Once into cell phone range I called the boys to break the bad news to them. No Frenchman's this weekend. Then I had a brain storm why don't we go to Pyramid?
Up a 6:00 am loaded the gear and met the boys at the shop at 7:00 am. The boys being Kevin's son Clayton Sterling and a kid that works for me Justin Williams.
We picked up permits on the way and hit the lake right at 8:00 am. There was a few shore fishermen and only a couple of other brave boaters on the lake. We launched as the waves splashed onto the docks. We then putted down to Windless Bay were we spent most of our time.
We trolled that area for about an hour with no luck and the waves getting rougher. I noticed the boys' eyes were getting larger! I did not know if they were worried about having to go home early or worried about drowning! I really thought we were going to get pushed off of the lake but we tough'd it out and the lake did calm some by 9:30 am
Obviously this was about the calmest place on the lake so I worked it over and over until I found the fish held in 60' of water. The outside temp felt like it was in the mid thirties and never climbed. The water temp was at 48' degrees and that is where it stayed the rest of the day. We never did see the sun and the wind blew about 15 miles per hour. But we did find the fish!
Clayton thought he had got the short end of the stick as I put him on the top line. Yes he was the first one to pull a fish and ended the day with the largest of the fish using my Silver Spoon http://www.guinfishntackleco.com "Pearl Black Back in Light Green". I ran the same lure in red to pull a couple of fish at the 35' range. I later moved Justin and I both to Father Murphy's new Copper Willow Spoon in "Black and Orange" http://www.fishingwithfathermurphy.com. We spent the rest of the day pulling fish from 18' to 23'. Clayton was probably around 18' as I had installed a 1 1/2 ounce weight 5' in front of his lure.
Note: The last few months you have read about some new lures of Murphy's and mine. These are next years lures so they have not been put on our sites yet. We like to run a new lure for a season to make sure you are going to get your monies worth out of it. If you would like to see them before they are posted just E-mail us off of our sites and we will be happy to E-mail pictures or just call to order.
We mainly found the fish at the middle to south end of the bay. I worked a ledge all the way into 20' of water. We made a hard turn when Clayton's rod laid over like it hung bottom. I leaned back on it and it came! I handed it to Clayton so he could reel in his fish. He did! a nice 3.6 lb. Cutthroat. We went back in for another when Justin's rod bounced but so did his downrigger boom. He caught a whole mess of bottom with the downrigger weight. We lost the weight but did retrieve all the other gear. That is why I install a snubber between the weight and cable. I know where to get more weights. Haha!!!!
Seeing how we spent $40.00 to come fish this lake we stayed on the lake until 4:30 pm. We left after a long day of fighting waves but ended up productive with 13 fish caught and released averaging 3 pounds and another 6 fish lost.
The bad news is this will be the last Captain's log of the year. The good news is there is only 3 weeks left in the year. January first we will be down at Topaz Lake for their season opener that is when I will start the Captain's Log all over again. Kevin and I had a great fishing year with a lot of new friends in Kokanee Power and MyOutdoorBuddy. We ended up boating 781 fish this year out of 65 trips at an average of 12 fish per trip. We pulled 6 Rainbows over 4 pounds, 1 Mack at 11.8 pounds, and our share of Browns with my personal best at 5 pounds all fish were targeted. We also were able to accomplish 3 top 10 finishes out of 6 derbies. Hope you had a great year and have great holidays. Always remember to enjoy the boat ride! See you next year.
West Guin
Guin Fish’n Tackle Company
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