Pacemaker Fishing Forum

So on my maiden voyage on the MD Fishing Machine, it was either going to be Black Hills or Mattawoman. Stopping by George's on 210 kind of sealed the deal for me.
I spent the morning removing the VA registration stickers...anyone want to take a guess what the earliest year Curly's VA registration sticker was? I'll just say, it took me a while to go through all the layers.
Then I just double checked what I needed to do in my mind to launch/load the boat at the dock, I did not want to be THAT GUY.
We left around 1:30PM, and hit a lot of traffic on the VA side of the Wilson Bridge, I guess a lot of people go to leave work early or were already heading for the beach. Finally got some ribs and chicken, and then made it onto the water by 4PM.
No issues launching the boat, engine started on the third try after I opened the choke a little. A picture of a very happy father:


High tide peaked around 5PM, so I started by hitting the pads across from the Beach. Totally forgot how to launch the trolling motor, had to call Curly got that squared away. Wind was gusting, I'd guess a steady 10 mph, gusting up to 18-20. Water was chocolate milk, I saw the main river while crossing the Wilson bridge, and it was awful, I was hoping it would be clearer in the back of the creek, but I guess there still isn't enough vegetation to filter it that quickly. Nothing at this spot, so next spot was the pads across from the trail wall. Went into the cut through that Dave likes, since it was so muddy, but sunny, I figured top water was out. I switched to a chatterbait and got one hit, but never hooked up. Was still casting it, but I was using fluoro and I didn't check the line and whoooosh it flew about 100 yards after breaking off...bye bye $15 jack hammer. That was the only chatterbait I had brought, pre-tied to a rod. So next up was an weedless underspin with a colorado blade. Cast it beyond a spatterdock point, and it got slammed as it came across the point.


My dad is a stubborn guy, he'll fish whatever the hell he wants. Well, I guess that works because he was using a texas rigged white super fluke, which is something I wouldn't even think about in these conditions. He caught a similar 3lber about 10 minutes after I did. His smile says it all. I bet he won't stop talking about that fish for months.


The tide was rolling out now, about 5:45PM. Stayed with casting to pad points from the channel, and I got 2 more bites. One was really close to the boat, I was reeling in the underspin and fiddling with the TM speed dial, and it got whacked about 5 feet from the boat.

Did I say my dad will throw whatever the hell he wants?  Yeah at this point around 6PM, he was throwing a spoon in the channel. He got thumped and thought he had a snakehead. Turned out to be a good eating blue cat.



Stayed through golden hour, wind died down, but I forgot my poppers. Not as much signs of fish compared the trips I go out on with IHC. We started to head back in around 8:15PM, I didn't want to be at the dock while it was dark. What a beautiful ride back, that never gets old.


On our way back, there were already bow fishers in the pads, 2 here, and 1 in the channel setting up. Then saw about 3 more getting ready to launch at the dock.



Had a small snafu loading the boat, nothing major, but it was 95% successful. 5% fail for leaving the engine on and the prop glazed a dock post and shut off...I guess it has an auto shut off. Started right up again when I power loaded the boat though.

Last edited by Junger (May-25-18 10:49PM)