Far Beyond Driven

Easiest to set up in mac but pretty much you pick an opening and fall into formation. Turn north out of the channel. Loop size depends on boat traffic. Small spreads are better. Hint, watch where other boats hook up and try to get to that spot if you can.

I just searched "channel" in my fish log. In the last 10 years I've hooked over 200 fish in the channel or at the pier heads. I've had one gear conflict with another boat, that was an old guy fishing solo when we were the only two boats in there and he turned on my lines not once, but twice. Pretty good considering I usually pull planer boards if I think I can. Mojo hit it on the head. I lost my diver and plug when I had to slow down because a guy three boats in front of us choked up.

I hooked the bottom last night too. Instead of causing issues with the boats around me, I just broke the line and lost a plug and diver. You don't stop, you don't turn out of formation, and you work as a team. If you can't fish to those rules, you should probably not play in traffic. Losing gear is part of the bit.

Don't forget the monster Intrepid with 500+ Hp that was trolling UP the north side of the channel against traffic. Money doesn't buy talent....

3/7 on kings in the channel, 5/5 on sheep.last night. Had to shut down for about 20 minutes to pull a hook out of my nephew's finger. Quick trip this morning and went 2/4 on kings. Mostly ran sticks and some j's. Heavy fish, kings were a 4# jack, 3x @ 17 and one flirting with 21.

PS has pike, but I've never cracked that nut.....

Way too heavy outside the piers. Kinda heavy inside the piers. Much nicer in mac. Hoped a few kings trickled in but no joy, stayed busy though going 6/6 with two sheep, two kitten fish (small channel cats), and a pair of 5# walleye, one coming on a green glow j plug. Oddly, this is not the first walleye I've taken on a j plug.

Nice.

Lost a net, found a net, somehow it didn't balance things out....

Who catches more fish? There's a short list of people on my boat where I just stay at the helm and let them do their thing. As of late the swr with a j has been 10' above the big spinny, putting it about the same level. The spinny isn't getting hit but the swr has been steady so that's not getting touched.

This time of year the matures are staging and getting ready to run and the other fish are usually out deep. That said we had a 13# immature hen in the mix Friday night in 80'.

Mine got a 21# last night, made more embarassing as she saw the hit before I did. If I don't top that ne this year I owe her a new purse. Whatever it takes to get her on the boat....

Once again go looking for heavies and again come home with three coho. First hit 75' mdew spinny 125' out wire diver good fish but soon gone. Pick up coho in 100' same rig. 300' copper with 10" white spinny tears off, lose that. Finally turn north due to quick building waves and half way through the turn same wire goes again. Ten minutes later big coho on swr down sixty green glow j. Trolled to tunnel park and pulled them. Wife and girls did not enjoy bludgeoning into them for nine miles.... Last fish all in 100' outside of the herd.

Luck of the draw really.

3/3 same water fishing solo. Took one at 7 then a whole bunch of nothing, other than fixing the webcam on the buoy. Went back to 60' and worked the hooks on the bottom, finally getting a double at 11. All nice but not huge coho. Not kidding about the heat.

My wife drove our new to us four winns onto the beach while we were fighting a double on Brown's our first trip out. Because I pointed towards shore and told her to turn that way. Going balls deep in 41 degree water to shove a 4500# boat out of the surf is one of my finer moments. Thanks for the fun read.

68 fish this year. 2 came on copper. Collectively they weighed 3#.

You gotta set up on fish this year or you struggle. I went 2/3 in half an hour running 3 rods on my row boat yesterday and did better than some running 12 lines, but I hit a group of active fish. Then I trolled fort wo hours wo a bump. Part that sucks is you can run the same gear in the same depth in the same direction as another boat and get nothing while they pull them in.

Plan: get salmon spectacular fish on board with daughters crewing in row boat. Reality: one daughter too tired, ripped oldest out of bed at 4:30 and we're rolling at 4:40. Man the line at the launch is long. Well, it is if you stay behind all the people rigging their boats off to the side. How cool is that, other than me sitting there. Chug out to 60 and set up, marking nothing. At 79 a wire diver gets popped, nothing special. Work it up behind the boat and can't figure out why the tail is about 5' behind the spunky. Wake up daughter to net it, she can't reach ( long leader) so she sets the net down so we can swap rod and net. Net lands on fuel hose clip and pops it off motor. Slap that back on, comes off. Slap that on again and somehow it keeps running. Grab leader and line king to boat, fly is buried so I drill it with a maglite and tail it. Big kings are slimy, back into the lake it falls. Pull it back in and gill it. Nice fish. Look up and the rigger down 75' is funny and trips, fight a heavy fish tobthe boat. Go to net it, net catches on pull tab on motor. Fish thrashed around and pops lose, I lift the net and throw it over the fish, pull it back, and it's there. Beautiful dark 13# laker. With no need to kill it, it was carefully released and shot away. It pulled harder than the king. At 105' a mag Mongolian beef on a full core tore off for 15 seconds and was gone. First two fish on white spinnies with mirage flies. Trolled south then into 60', marked a bunch around 85' but no hits. Packed up and ran in for perch, fail. Pyle's was great about logging my fish into the derby, 19 7.4. They did put 8/23 as the date though, which I didn't see. Then I chased some kids around the parking lot with the fish, causing one to almost fall on his bike. Fun time with my girl, with our biggest ( but not 20 ) for the year.

We fished deerlick from 10-11 am with 2 misses. Got to the empty launch, docked my 14' perfectly with my 10 year old holding the rope. Only other boat there launching has to launch next to me and not another dock. After about 6 tries he gets it in the water somehow not hitting us. Guy drops one of the ropes. When we left he was flagging down a kayak to get the other rope with the boat sideways across the end of the dock. We stuck around to see if he needed help but that's how they fired it up and took off.

Coho can be like that...

Just the general condition all around will tell you a lot. Look for rust on the outside of the engine, which can tell you there's been water in the bilge. Any boat that was slipped will require extra attention, so when we were shopping anything with bottom paint on it was shot down. The three glass boats you listed are all pretty good boats and there's enough of them around that you can be fussy.

My four winns just turned 26 and is rock solid as well. Stored under a covered shore station, then in rack storage, then in a barn with no windows. By all means budget for a survey, then figure about a grand a year in maintenance.

Great report. Sorry I could not phone a fish for you. Wish I was out there instead of mowing the lawn.

Thanks for making it to the tournie. Those are some nice fish.