2017 Oct - Last Fishing Trip of the Season

I can't believe it is fall again and time to close up our camp on the lake.  We did have a beautiful weekend and the weather was more like September than October.  We were amazed at how good the fishing was. The warm weather definitely made the fish active again.

Frank with one of his largemouth bass

Esther with her bass

We also caught a few pickerel. 

I saved the best for last and Frank ended the season with a Bang, catching the biggest largemouth bass of the year!

Frank with a 3-1/2 lb largemouth bass

2017 Sept - Bear Spring Camps

We could not resist going back to one of our favorite fishing camps again.  This camp is located on Great Pond in Maine and it gives us the opportunity to catch Pike.  We only stayed for a weekend and the weather predicted a chance of showers everyday.  One day right after a sprinkle we looked out and saw a beautiful rainbow.  I said this was a lucky sign and it was pointing to where the Pike were hiding!

Let's follow the rainbow!

We headed out to that spot but didn't catch any really big pike. Overall we caught a dozen or so medium sized pike.

Esther with one of her pike

Looks like Frank caught the biggest one of the trip.

Frank with one of his pike

On our second day we really wanted to catch a trophy pike, but we had a very unusual day instead.  We had just settled on a weed bed to fish, when we noticed a boat within our sight with many people and they appeared to be swimming.  After awhile we thought we heard something and sure enough, they were trying to get our attention.  We went over to see what was going on. They had caught a rope around one of their propellers and could not get it free.  They also did not have any tools to help and no one else was around on the lake.
Frank did have a tiny 1" pocket knife which they gladly accepted.  It took them a long time because the propellers were under the boat and they had to take turns going under, holding their breath.  In the process, one young man unfortunately stabbed his hand with the knife! They finally cut through all of rope and went on their way home to get their friend's hand bandaged up.
So much time had passed, we decided to move on to another weed bed.  We had no sooner settled in when a speed boat came across the lake and stopped not too far away.  Again we heard "HELP!"
 I looked over and the older man was all alone and he was trying to paddle his large boat. We pulled up anchor and went over to help.  His engines wouldn't start and he was asking us to tow him, which didn't look possible since his boat was much larger.  Frank tried to help him troubleshoot the problem and that was when the older gentleman realized he had gotten a rope around his propeller! He was able to tilt the motor and I freed the rope so no one had to get into the water.
We could not believe our luck. We have never had to rescue anyone and to have 2 incidents in one afternoon was too much to believe!
By now the sun was setting and we hadn't caught any pike.
I guess we will have to come back and try again for that trophy!

Great Pond sunset and end of our fishing trip

2017 Aug - Summer Fishing with my Niece

 Here is my niece, Caitlin enjoying the boat ride with her friend Jeremy in his fishing boat he named "Fury".

Fishing is slower in the summer but I did manage to catch one nice Smallmouth bass.

Esther caught a nice Smallmouth Bass

 I didn't get any pictures of Frank's fish but I did get this one of him when he borrowed my hat for awhile!

Frank in my hat!

It was a slow day for everyone, but Jeremy caught his best fish when we got back to our dock.

Jeremy with a nice Pickerel

When we are not fishing, we are always amazed at the wildlife you can see when you take the time to look around. The wildlife tend to come out at night to hunt for food. Here we found a crayfish and a snapping turtle.

2017 Aug - Fishing in Steamboat Springs Colorado

Esther with a Colorado trout

We had a wonderful vacation in Colorado and we spent a fair amount of time fishing.  The town we stayed in had the Yampa River flowing through it.  This river is known for it's abundance of trout.  Most people fly fish in this area, but we wanted to travel light so we did not pack all of our fly fishing gear.  This made it more difficult to find spots where we could cast a lure from shore. I am not a trout fisherman but I did manage to hook into 5 trout and I landed 3! The best one is pictured here.  I believe it was a cutthroat trout because it had 2 reddish lines along it's throat.  At first I thought the fish was bleeding, but I was glad it wasn't because this river is catch and release.

Close up of trout

Frank with a fat Colorado Pike

We also fished in a few ponds where I did not have any luck, but Frank did! He landed 3 Pike during the week.  They were not the huge like the Pike we are used to catching in Maine but he had fun landing them anyway.

2017 June - Smallmouth Bass

Esther with a nice Smallmouth bass

Fishing in Maine has been pretty good this spring. It is always nice to catch a Smallmouth bass because they are not as plentiful as they used to be on our favorite lake in Maine.

2017 June - Fishing with George in Maine

My brother came to visit for a fishing weekend and the fishing was great! We didn't keep count and I wish we had because we caught so many fish. The weather was so much better this year than when he visited last year. We had so much fun, I think we spent at least 8 hours every day in the boat fishing! Here is just a small sampling of the fish we caught.

Esther with largemouth bass

George with largemouth bass

Frank with largemouth bass

Frank and George had several Double Hookups all day!

We saw lots of wildlife too. We saw a deer swimming across the lake. And we saw a beaver up close. He was not very happy with us and smacked his tail loudly on the water trying to scare us. I did get a couple of pictures of the beaver.

Beaver swimming underwater close to our boat

Beaver swimming away

2017 May - Maine

We have started to go to Maine for some fishing. Unfortunately the weather has been very cold and rainy this spring so I don't have much to say about the fishing yet.  We did get out for a little while and we had the pond all to ourselves! We saw lots of wildlife which is always fun.

Beautiful peaceful late afternoon in Maine

One of the 2 Duck families we saw on the edge of the pond.

Mink - I saw a little creature like this running along the banking.

American Bittern - first time I have ever seen this type of bird sitting in a marshy area.

2017 April - Barracuda in Bahamas

Barracuda

I was not fishing I was actually snorkeling when I noticed a large approx 3' long fish hanging just below the surface of the water.  Using my underwater camera I got some pictures, but I did not want to get too close!
There were so many fish to see, I felt like I was in an aquarium.  I also saw a sea turtle and a group of 3 Squid but that was before I had my camera so I did not get any underwater shots of them.  But here are the pictures of some of the fish I saw.

Meanwhile Frank was fishing from shore, but never caught a fish :-(