What an Idiot!!!!!!!

[usmcpaul]

I am speaking of myself. Yesterday I wanted to take the boat out real bad and finally go fishing. So called a friend if mine and we headed out. It seemed like a nice enough day, and I checked the weather forecast. It called for some wind later in the day, but I wanted to go real bad, so I said "Ahh what the hell, it can't be that bad". (Famous last words). So we headed up to Lexinton. It was a little windy when we got there, a few white caps but nothing too bad I thought. Well we got out about 1/2 mile from the harbor and started setting lines, and then BAM! The wind went from 10-15mph to 35+ just that fast. I decide to pull lines about 3 minutes after I set the last one and we started heading in.

I had my buddy driving while I was pulling the lines and he accidentally got the boat in a position where we were 90 degrees to the waves and we got hit by a big one. I thought for sure we were going over. It ripped the passenger seat out of the base and stuff was flying everywhere. I took over immediately and got us back on course straight into the wind and had him pulling the lines. It got so bad I nearly had him just cut the remaining line, but decided to have him pull the final one, while I drove.

I must say I learned a lot from this experience, but WOW I have never been so concerned (not scared, because Marines don't get scared.... but if it was possible for a Marine to be scared, I would have been ).

I am embarrassed about my utter lack of common sense yesterday, and hope this post will remind those other beginners out there to heed the weather forecasts, even if you think the weather man is full of it.

[joelsanders]

glad your safe and can tell us your story today!

[Priority1]

Paul, We all get wakeup calls everyday. The people that listen to these calls have a better than average chance of living a long life. Contrary to belief, courage is not the lack of fear. Be careful out there.

[JWheeler]

Been there done that. Sometimes when you only have a limited window of time to fish we use bad judgement. I've learned that if conditions are not good it's best just to call it and live to fight another day. Sometimes it's rough and doesn't make for a fun day of fishing, you get all uptight and somewhat anxious and on edge all day because of the less than ideal conditions. I was caught in a nasty storm on Holloway when I first bought the boat. Knew that inclement weather was on it's way, but we went anyway. Straight line winds, heavy heavy down poor and lightning. We were across from the launch, visibility went to hell and a handbag, the wind made boat control unmanageable, it was terrible and I was very nervous, that lightning scared the jeepers out of me. The way that wind whipped up yesterday was something else, went from a decent breeze to full force gusts like you said 35 MPH. I even thought about the people out fishing that were stuck in it. You made it, and from the sounds of things won't be back anytime soon in conditions forecasted like that....

[Adam Bomb]

Good post, thanks for sharing so that others can learn from it. Glad you and your crew made it in now worse for the wear.

[UNREEL27]

Welcome to Lake Huron Paul...

I thought you were just gonna fish the river??

[Hoosier_Steelheader]

Been there, Glad you're ok!

[usmcpaul]

Been there done that. Sometimes when you only have a limited window of time to fish we use bad judgement. I've learned that if conditions are not good it's best just to call it and live to fight another day. Sometimes it's rough and doesn't make for a fun day of fishing, you get all uptight and somewhat anxious and on edge all day because of the less than ideal conditions. I was caught in a nasty storm on Holloway when I first bought the boat. Knew that inclement weather was on it's way, but we went anyway. Straight line winds, heavy heavy down poor and lightning. We were across from the launch, visibility went to hell and a handbag, the wind made boat control unmanageable, it was terrible and I was very nervous, that lightning scared the jeepers out of me. The way that wind whipped up yesterday was something else, went from a decent breeze to full force gusts like you said 35 MPH. I even thought about the people out fishing that were stuck in it. You made it, and from the sounds of things won't be back anytime soon in conditions forecasted like that....

That is exactly what happened to me. I tried to force it. Trust me that wont happen again.

Welcome to Lake Huron Paul...

I thought you were just gonna fish the river??

Mark, I don't know where the river is and never even considered it. Probably would have made for a more enjoyable trip.

I was all hell bent on fishing, I had a boat, saw the lake and the rest is history. Luckily, my buddy kept his cool and things worked out. One thing I learned was those planer boards really look cool jumping 3 feet out of the water, and the releases on them work very well.

I am going to have to back them off cause I couldn't get them to release no matter what. I ended up reeling them in while they were diving, what a PITA.