1983

I know it's 1983 because it's hanging in his bonus room with an engraving, "caught by Neil Joyce 1983".  From '83 until about '93, my bro had the biggest bass in the family (~5 lber out of Kernersville Lake, caught on a spec of worm on a diawa pack ultralight with 4 lb line). I think he went fishing 3 or 4 times total with my dad and I during our childhood and he held the record for 10 yrs! Meanwhile dad and I went on hundreds of fishing excursions. Fast forward to our adulthood, he rarely fishes and only this year started to get into it. I've been teaching him the basics and he's been itching to catch a big largemouth.

We've planned several overnight floats but have been unable to execute them due to poor weather for about 2 yrs now. On our last overnight adventure, his first overnight ('09 on the James river), we had pouring rain from 3 pm on day 1 'til 6 am on day 2. To top it off, our campsite was horrible, I was afraid we were going to be washed downstream all night, and overall the fishing wasn't great.

Finally, the stars aligned. This past weekend we floated a local river and camped on the water. The weather was awesome, the campsite was nice, and the fishing was pretty good overall.

Water temps: ~60F (morning), ~66F (evening)
Ambient: ~40F (morning), 66F (afternoon)

Day 1 - Put in around 10 am with sunny skies and virtually no wind. Fishing was slowwwwwwww. My brother caught the first and best bass of the day on a zoom horney toad (one of his first bass on a soft plastic). We hit every laydown and eddy pool on the way down and I caught 4 bass on 3 different lures (buzzer, fluke, spook).

Campsite - After some mild bushwacking, we had a flat spot for our tent and some driftwood to start our campfire. Apparently we placed our tent in the middle of a game trail. I think 15 deer walked past our tent between midnight and 4 am. When I was able to sleep, I was dreaming of being trampled by a big buck. Thankfully, they steered clear of the tent and left us alone.

Day 2 - After a chilly night, a morning campfire, and bacon & eggs, we pushed off in search of some better fishing. Within an hour or so, the ambient temps were very nice, and again very little wind. We saw 6 doe swimming across the river ahead of us as well as a group of river otters.  Although we couldn't get close, seeing the otters was a rare occurrence.

After we made it past the biggest rapid on the trip, the fishing picked up considerably. My brother tied on a $1 white/blue walmart spinnerbait after getting no action on the buzzbait and other lures. Within a few casts, he landed a ~ 2 lber. I had the same lure in my box and tied one on as well. We each caught several nice fish. He landed his best fish since 1983 (~3 lbs) and I landed a 4 lber. Fish were caught on the bank, off the bank in open water, in sun and shade. We caught no fish on laydowns.

We wrapped up around 2 pm and lugged our gear and canoe out to the truck. Good trip with my brother and a pleasure to see him catch a few nice fish.  Congrats bro!  Looking forward to seeing you land many more.

Dave Schlidt, if you're reading this ... this is the same section we floated last October.  I'm sure you can imagine how difficult it was hauling our gear up to the truck :-)

-Jeff