Launched by myself out of Mazurik's yesterday morning before the sun came up. There were three other boats heading out, who all went west, but I went east because I got into some good fish recently near the CP dump. The water was glass, and it was misty with no sign of the sun making an appearance through the clouds. I didn't see much near the dump, so I went SE where I had some waypoints saved. It didn't take too long before the graph was showing good marks so I stopped and went to deploy the Ulterra. Lately it's been refusing to start, with the annoying single beep and light flash. Never fails on the trailer but is moody on the water. I decided not to deal with it and used the kicker by itself. The water was so calm and there was zero wind so it was pretty easy to control the boat. I put out bandits on offshore boards, managed to keep my speed 1.6-2.0 and had a limit in less than two hours. During that time I also lost THREE at the boat, and one was huge. Fish story, I know, but I did land one that was 8# and the shoulders on the one that decided to not go into the net were remarkably broader. Anyway, Bandits with white body and red head were irresistible. Twice I was letting them out and as soon as it got to 75' (unassisted), I went to put the board on and realized they already had a fish on. I was marking fish between 15-30' down, in 36 FOW, and the biggest ones came at 75 back, unassisted, farthest from the boat. Watching two flags go down as I am reeling in a big fish is a rush that I hope I never develop a tolerance to.
Thanks to all of you on these forums who share your experiences and wealth of knowledge with those of us who are just getting started. Heck, are fortunate enough to have charter boat Captains (Juls!:)) on here who basically share their recipes with us for...free. I hate to think that the one a-hole, who had the nerve to demand more details than were given in a post, chased off Capt Pork Chop for good.
