Bozz Goes Bass Fishing

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A while ago I was sitting around talking to @a4xjeeper and he said to me, "we need to go fishing". Given the fact that I love to fish I replied with "sounds good to me". Then he explained that he had won a couple of charter fishing trips through some charity raffle or silent auction thing and he was able to take one or two people along with him.

I told him to give me some dates and I would look at my calendar to see if they would work. It was probably a couple months after that when he called me out of the blue and said are you busy next Wednesday?

It was the first week of school with teachers back in the building, so I kind of was busy, but given the fact that @diamonddave had just went through a medical scare where we nearly lost him, I figured:

When a friend asks you to go fishing, you drop everything and go fishing.

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It was a chilly morning in August when we pulled up to Henderson Lake near West Branch, MI. It's a private lake with a small community of homeowners around the lake who do what they can to keep it in good condition. You can literally see one end of the lake from the other, so it isn't large at all, but it is nice.

I had planned on wearing shorts for the trip, but the night before my friend said I might want to bring a jacket. At that point I realized I should maybe wear jeans, and I am sure glad I did. As I said, it was downright chilly. Especially once we got on the boat.

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I wasn't really sure what to expect as I have never been on a proper bass fishing trip before. I did know that I didn't need to bring my own rod and reel which was kind of a relief because my stuff is nowhere near top quality. I didn't want to embarass myself or my friend by showing up with some 30 year old rod and reel combo.

The guy running the charter was a local guy who is actually a realtor, but he loves to do outdoorsy type stuff in his free time. From what I can tell he must be pretty good at the real estate job because he already has a house on one lake and then this cabin we met him at on another lake.

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Actually, the full story is he had a house on another lake, but when the area got an insane amount of rain, the dam broke and that lake is basically back to being a river. With the lake gone he needed somewhere to fish, so he bought this cabin we met at. He said that if/when they finally get the dam fixed and the lake comes back, he will likely sell this cabin or trade it for another piece of property to avoid capital gains tax.

It wasn't long before we were out on the boat and the sun was starting to come up. I tried to take some shots in between casts. We were the only ones out on the water and it was kind of awesome.

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As I said, the guy we went fishing with is a pretty avid outdoorsman and he clearly does quite well with his real estate business because his bass boat was pretty amazing. I've never been on a bass boat before, but after seeing this one I definitely wouldn't mind owning one. It was a lot more stable than I expected for being so small.

It's also amazing how much technology has changed over the years. Instead of having to drop anchor in each of the fishing spots we visited, he had a trolling motor rigged to a GPS system so it just always kept us in the spot we wanted to be in.

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I've caught bass before, but I have never been bass fishing specifically. He had a handful of rods that he kept having us switch between. He would put a different lure on and say "here, try this for a bit.

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It was quite the educational experience as he explained what each of the lures was supposed to do in the water and why for whatever reason the bass seemed to dig that. We actually talked pretty much the entire time we were out on the boat. If it wasn't about fishing it was about the outdoors or finance or work. It was actually a really cool experience and a lot more talking than I had expected to do that morning.

In fact, it turns out @a4xjeeper is able to do certain kinds of inspections that the realtor occasionally needs but can never find someone to do them, so it turned out to be a business opportunity for my friend as well. There is a good chance he will more than make up for what he spent on the trip via the increased business.

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In the end, we didn't catch nearly as many fish as I had expected. I expected us to be pulling them in right and left since it was a charter, but sometimes that just isn't the way it goes. The guy explained that some days he can hardly keep them out of the boat and others they just aren't biting.

I could tell he was a little disappointed for us that we weren't doing better. I didn't mind though. I've always said a day getting skunked fishing is still better than a day not fishing.

In the end, I pulled in one which you see above. I had a few bites though where they got away. @a4xjeeper pulled in two I think, and the occasional time that our guide threw a line out, he pulled in maybe three. Since this is bass fishing, we threw them all back. Let them grow bigger for the next guy to fight them.

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The trip only lasted about 4 hours, but it was a heck of a lot of fun. I had my friend drop me back off at work and I finished the day taking care of issues that had popped up during the day. Somehow I managed to clock almost 20,000 steps, which is pretty impossible since I was on a boat half the day. Turns out I wear my fitness tracker on the same hand I was using to reel in the line, so that motion must have been clocking steps for me. @mrsbozz was not impressed by my step count!

I think my friend still has a walleye fishing trip he has to book, so assuming I am lucky enough to get invited on that one (I think it's a lock), I look forward to seeing where that takes us!

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Sports Talk Social - @bozz.sports

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All pictures/screenshots taken by myself or @mrsbozz unless otherwise sourced