Pacemaker Fishing Forum

By now everyone knows I had the pleasure of fishing with Ernie and Carl over the weekend. Well after finally meeting the legend, Carl invited me to tag along yesterday, while he checked on the progress on his new boat. This trip would include an opportunity to fish the pond he built on a large piece of land he once owned.

First, about the boat. The hull is made by a company named Rhino, and it's easy to see why. She's 18' long and more than 7' wide, built of heavy gauge aluminum. Calling it heavy gauge doesn't do it justice, bulletproof aluminum would be a better description. The boat could probably handle 6 comfortably, so 3 guys fishing from her will be in heaven.

Now on to the property. First, I have no idea where I was. No, Carl didn't blindfold me or swear me to secrecy, it's just far, far away. I can say for sure that it's somewhere on the other side of Gordonsville, VA and maybe 3 miles from the nearest paved road. Somewhere in the middle of the forrest sits this 2.5 acre pond complete with either piers to fish from or close cropped grass if you'd rather walk around. The spring fed pond was clear as a bell, and you could see small wolfpacks of small bass swimming all along the shore.

These little guys that you all call punks were anxious to hit anything you put in front of them. I guess because of the competition to get there first, they didn't fight like punks. They were a blast on ultralight gear.

Carl lost a couple of real nice fish trying to lift them out of the water, and I saw several make half hearted passes at my crankbait. One of about 5# actually inhaled the lure and coughed it back out without me ever feeling a tap. I'm blaming the lack of bigger fish on the day's weather. The day ended with Carl catching a 20" channel cat and having his line snap pulling it up on shore. He jumped off the dock and stepped into the water to grab the cat before it knew it was free. Now, with 1 squishy wet shoe, Carl decided it was time to head home.

I've seen Ernie call Carl his mentor several times in his posts here on Pacemaker. I'm wondering what I'm going to learn next. Yersterday was a great day.

Here's a phone pic of the pond: