Fished the flukemasters tourney with some excellent guys on the sticks yesterday. Started locally and had to hunt before we started to get it going. Tbone, Brother Jay, and Silent Assasin filled out the crew. Plan was to stay near the hook for the duration but had to shift gears as we only managed a half dozen fish that would only qualify for the local fish fry. Fish we had. Plenty of shorts and some keeps but anything with weight kept their distance. Pnutz worked very well as did killies dressed with gulp or not. Our only big fish came to us courteousy of the Assasin in the sticky stuff (lesson learned!) on the bucktail/skirted with fluke belly. A very decent fish coming in shy of 7 lbs. The Assasin also landed a pair of excellent cbass one of which was a double header. Jay worked the hell out of his new stick (Paulie special) and he picked up the feel real quick with constant action and contributions to the dunk tank. Speaking of dunking.... Tbone almost saw his custom stick for the last time. While we were in the sticky stuff and the south wind started to come on, we had to stem the current with some power drift. T was fishing the port side corner and as tough luck and long day would have it, his braid catches the prop. In no time, his rod is yanked out of his grips and is bobbing every so slightly out of everyones reach. Davey had designs on it! So... the motors shut down. The prop hub is spun like a spiders web and an open bail releases 300 yards of braid on a $350+ custom setup.
Somehow, somewhere, we get a break. The motor trimmed all the way up and T-bone on the bracket, he starts the slow process of first trying to retrieve his gear. Hand over hand over hand and we'll be damn but the mono knot tie off to the Avet never gave way. Think he should head back to the shop that spooled him and tip the man.
Then, we have the good fortune to pull the braid off the hub like an old fashion start cord on your parents first gas briggs and straton mower. Time to throw in the towel and head back towards the barn.
After checking in our fish at Leonardo, we make a quick exit before that super low traps us like it did some other boats. On the way out, Jay notices four people on a catamaran with the mast laying across the hulls. We make a quick loop around to find out they're stranded with a busted mast. Threw them a line and towed them back within a 100 yds of the beach. Hopin some good karma comes back around.
We had ourselves a good day finishing up with 13 keepers and two nice CB's but we going to have to change it up big time to compete with some of the sharpies that fish these tourneys regularly. There's still a lot to learn and just hope we continue to get better at what we do. Regardless, the fishin and the company is always a blast.
