mzrealfish

I agree Al. I’ve definitely caught better fish here in Missouri. My dad lives outside Charlotte. My girls are in Charleston and Columbia SC. I seem to have to go that direction if I want to see them🤔

Sorry for not having the best of my smallmouth catches documented. I blame my wife for requiring me to be able to check in every hour on a river in the middle of nowhere or she’s calling search and rescue. Peace

Every year I take my dad on a canoe trip for Father’s Day. The past 3 years we did canoes on the New River in NC. West Jefferson area. Tons of fun. Caught some small smallmouth all under 2 lbs. We did, however, catch quite a few rainbows on lures. Craw cranks, shad cranks, shad swim jigs. This year we moved down river into Virginia. Day 1 and 2 day trips with Paddler’s Creekside Campground. Brian and Ryan, husband and wife owners were awesome. Brand new to craft rental but exceptional! My sister and my 2 daughters joined us. The 4 of them in canoes and I, in a kayak. This is a new thing to me. I am accustomed to canoes because my old crew always camps on the banks. I am now a yak fan and day tripping fan. M O B L I T Y ! Collectively in 2 days we only caught about 25 fish. Almost all were smallmouth A few goggleyes. 1 Walleye. This river is almost exclusively slab bottom. Some ruts down facing. Others, up facing. I spent a lot of time running “riffles” ahead of them to scope best canoe crossings. The riffles were mostly class 1. Some were class 2. Dsy 3, they all had to return to the real world. School, annual physical… I had a grueling 14 hour solo drive back to KC so I said to myself, “self, I think it would be best to do another 10.5 mile kayak run further down river before attempting that drive!” I was correct. Monday I put on with Shawn and Noah at Tangent Outfitters in Pemboke, Virginia. These guys were stud. Shawn looked at my tackle and said “those offerings are great but this water is mostly 2-5 feet deep in the fishing zones. You should grab a couple of square bills off my wall of goodies.” I grabbed an iridescent red craw, a spring craw and a white shad black back. I never even threw my green on green jig and worm that caught most of my fish day 1 and 2. 1st cast I saw a stand alone boulder in slack water and hit just above it with the iridescent. Gave 2 quick tug tugs and game on. Nothing fancy but a 1st cast smallie gave me a half roll of quarters instantly. In 5 hours I completed my 10.5 mile journey. Gave up counting at 30. All smallmouth. Best estimates 50-55 fish. 15 easily over 2 lbs. All in incredibly fast and lengthy mostly class 2 “riffles”. I spent most of my time paddling back up to the good runs that were incredibly wide. Some over 200 feet wide. My best runs were the 2nd and 2nd to the last. 8-10 fish out of each. Pictures were the challenge. To get the phone out of my chest pocket under the IMO very necessary life jacket and out of the double ziplock bag took valuable time from staying in the best water and catching. I guess next year, waterproof camera is required. I shall return! Both hosts were amazing. If I could only do 1 I’d book Tangent 6x trip again 🫡

I just got back from visiting my daughter in Columbia, SC. Left KC with a Samsung came home with an IPhone so lost some photos. Samsung quit taking a charge even on a pad. I walked the river walks and fished the Saluda and Congaree in Columbia. Pretty frequent access on both rivers if you are willing to walk. I had a blast scoping out sights for my daughter who just started grad school there. Caught 2 little stripers and 2 little smallmouth all on white swim shad on a Ned. I floated the New river in northern NC with my dad for Father’s Day. We caught some goggle eye, rainbows and smallmouth all on white tiger cranks and senkos. I then went to to French Broad and kayaked for the 1st time in my life. Chris at Lazy Otter was a great host. Sadly, the river was up and chocolate milk. Fun float, zero fish. I hit a couple of accesses between Asheville and Hot Springs. Water was better quality. Caught 8 smallmouth all on a rainbow trout print rooster tail. Lost a big 1 in the current. Bent out 2 of the hooks in the battle. I got to see her jump before she said goodbye. Easy 3 pounder. At that point, my Samsung died its last death. Headed to Knoxville and spent 2 hours at tmoblie. Not the highlight of my trip. Stayed the night in Corbin, Kentucky. Sat at the bar at a pizzeria by my hotel. Was almost involved in a bar fight. 2 guys, 1 on each side of me talking about the Piston’s coach getting fired but still getting paid 65 million left on his contract. The guy on my right was with his wife. He said “man, what I could do with 65 million!” Guy on the left said “you mean 32.5 million because she sure as hell would be taking half and leaving you!” I unrolled the silverware set and thankfully there was a steak knife. I casually placed it just to my right. I learned from that experience to always sit at the end of the bar. Always. Got on the Cumberland river with Sheltowee Trace Adventures the next morning. Mostly pastureland there. Not many riffles but good spots with big boulders. I didn’t catch anything big but had a great time. 18 smallmouth and 8 spotted. White senko weedless with no weight and top water mouse were very effective. Probably missed 60 strikes on the mouse but that is a me problem not the lure😏 I was supposed to head home the next day but decided to kayak the Elkhorn Creek outside of Frankfort, Ky instead. This was an expensive float but worthwhile. White swim shad on Ned and green senko weedless and no weight were the best performers. I did catch a few on white cranks and craw cranks. All smallmouth. 25 total. Tops of riffles were the most productive areas. Especially if there were weeds. I tried loading 2 other photos. Says my files are too big. There are lots of fun waters down that way. If you have the time, pull over. next year I am skipping the upper French Broad. 2 Junes in a row flooded. Might try the New in Virginia then work my way back west. Peace

Upper Little River is a good option as well.

Upper Little River is a good option as well.

Flatheads love crankbaits

Do not bring up: Should furries get litter boxes in their school?

Funny. Ruthless but funny. Thank you all. I needed this right now.

Polo fields off Kenneth Road ( not even sure if those are there anymore...might be soccer fields now) all the way to 95th Street used to be a ton of fun. We walked fished those areas from 1990ish until 2000ish. We caught and released some pretty amazing fish. Started seeing too many people with buckets keeping everything they caught. Good fish became fewer and further between. Boat landing behind the softball fields at 135th and holmes good put in for kayaks. Think about going back but I live at Lake Quivira now. I have all the fishing I really need seconds away.

Caught maybe 18 goggle eye. All on cranks. None much bigger than that 1.

So we spent the night at the Rodway Inn in Waynesville Thursday. Woke up and were at the Roubidoux access by 6 am to unolad. Watch your vehicle on the drive down and back up. Rutted and rough is the forecast even when dry. Ground clearance is an issue. My pathfinder loved the descent and the climb. My low front bumper guard did not have the same sentiment. So we unloaded the vehicle and my friends stayed to gear up the canoes. I went and picked up Andy at Rt. 66 canoe rental. He was ready and waiting. He dropped me off up top and I walked down. We were on the river by 8 am. River was up and moving but still had great color. We floated just past Riddle Bridge on Friday. Stopped at 4 pm. Overall fishing was slower then we had hoped for and expected though it was difficult to target fish. We literally caught them in every possible place just not regularly. Winning presentations were baby bass crank and texas rigged hula or Biffles. A few were caught on wild eye swimmers and senko style worms. Saturday we hung around camp until 11 and feasted on breakfast burritos and sipped on some coffee spiked with Dumond liqueur. Delicious! By 3 pm there was a significant discoloration and a ton of small debris in the water. Top, middle or bottom fishing resulted in something other than a fish on your hook 1 in 3 casts. Even weedless setups. We camped on a narrow bank because we were so close tl Hwy. 28. Tent was 8 feet from the river at bedtime and 2 inches from the river when we woke up. Still a great time. Friday I cooked burgers and brats. Saturday grilled steaks and gyro meatballs and served them all with a Thai noodle salad. We got to the bridge at 10:30 for pickup at 11. Andy was already there waiting for us.

Pictures will be up as soon as I can