Wow, That Was Fun

On second thought, it was OK. My wife had to be at work at 5:00 this morning. I got up with her at 2:45 so instead of meeting Yuki at New Melones at 9:00, I headed out of the house at 5:30. I could have left when my wife did at 4:15, but stayed home and spiffed up the house just in case someone wanted to look at it today. It's on the market again if I hadn't already told you that.

After a stop at Starbucks in Angels Camp, I got to the lake (Note I didn't call it a puddle. Explanation to follow) at 7:00 am. That is almost still dark. I think that Sunrise this morning was 7:01, but down in a hole the sun didn't touch me until about Noon. OK, maybe 8 or so.

As the sun was crawling down the mountain hill across the lake, I took a couple shots of it in different positions. Did I mention that it was cold?

Just the tip

Half way down

OK, hit the water

Then when it finally got up far enough to hit where I was sitting, I turned around and snapped this one.

Sun sitting on the hill

Back to fishing. One of the reasons I wanted to get out there early is I wanted the spot at the bottom of the launch ramp. It's a good thing I did too because between 7:00 and a little after 9:00 when Yuki arrived, there were more than 6 people who wanted that spot. Early bird gets the worm. A good thing if you like worms. No comments about worms please.

Before Yuki arrived, in fact between 8:00 and 8:45, I put three Rainbows on the stringer all caught on rainbow Power Bait with 12" of leader and only 20 feet out from shore.

Sometime between the time Yuki arrived and we left for lunch at Noon, Yuki put two on his stringer using chartreuse Power Bait and I hooked one more.

#4, the fight is on.

And fight some more did I.

After hours of fighting

Oh, you don't believe that hours stuff do you? I mean, after all how many pictures can Yuki snap with the camera while I was bringing in fish #4? Total fight maybe 2 or 3 minutes. maybe.

All the fish today were those 14" ones we've been getting at New Melones. Some bright pink, some not so bright. Some almost silver.  

The lake, with the torrential rains we had this past weekend, if you watched any National News California was washed into the ocean once or twice, the lake level rose what looked like a good 6 feet. Hey, 6 feet of water in that lake is a LOT of water.

Here at La Casa Kautz we got 9 inches of rain from Friday through Yesterday. The pond went from no water to running out the drain tube (about 2 1/2 feet deep) over night Friday into Saturday. This morning it was till running out the drain tube and we haven't seen that in quite a while. Had I blocked the drain tube the pond would have probably filled (about 8 feet deep), but it's one of those things you have to watch. It can go from empty to over flowing in just a couple hours and I was going fishing today. No time to spend watching the pond fill.

Yuki and I are thinking about kayak/float tubing it on Camanche on Friday. We'll let you know.