The plan was for my buddy Chris and I to fish ~8 hours in the rain from 6:30am to about 2:30pm, Nor’easter be damned. We started out the day at Lebanon Bait & Sport, picking up 4 dozen shiners…what the hell were we thinking? Also got a couple of Sutton Spoons. Our plan was to troll the spoons and shiners then drift to pick at lake trout.
As we motored away from the boat launch I realized in complete amazement that my Lowrance x135 was not turning on. I had problems with it two weeks ago at the RVTA tournament, but thought it was a battery issue. No such luck. Tried a soft reset, hard reset, wiring it directly to the battery, and finally punching the thing. It’s dead.
I’ve fished this reservoir many times, so we weren’t completely SOL but come on…really? I just had my motor fixed and now this?! We trolled a Sutton spoon and live shiners slow around the perimeter of the boat launch, over to the north tower, made a big circle and came back to the north tower. We didn’t get anything with this technique so we switched over to drifting.
Our first drift, the wind was coming out of north so we set up a drift just to the west of the north tower, sent our lines to the bottom and waited. We were using 2 oz. barrel sinkers to keep our shiners on the bottom. Caught first fish out in the middle of nowhere in about 70feet of water. It’s the smaller of the two pictured and measured 18 inches. The rain didn’t really start until about 11am and for a few hours we thought we actually might stay dry!
We didn’t stay dry. The rain came and just got harder and harder. We continued fishing though and for a few hours there the wind switched direction completely and came out of the southwest. It was at this time Chris caught the second Laketrout, a nice 20 incher that actually put up a decent fight.
Even though we still had 2 dozen shiners in out livewell, at about 2:30pm our hands were raw and we were starving, so we headed in. It was a decent trip, besides a kayaker we spoke to at the north tower I only saw one other boat and they left fairly quickly. The yak had one laker when we spoke.
I guess I’ll be looking for a new sonar soon, maybe one with a GPS?! Up until now, I’ve been using a 99cent app on my iPhone called Compass+ I’ve actually been recording lat / long of catches and then placing them on Google Maps on my computer when I get home. It’s very cheap, but tedious as hell. OK, cheers, next time less rain please!
are made from solid brass and are available in silver or gold plating – with or without a white skirt. Kastmasters range in size from 1/12 ounce all the way up to 4 oz. 
