Saturday, December 15, 2007

Blown Out By a Cold Front

I had a great idea...

After attending the graduation ceremony on Friday at TAMUK for a certain nephew (that will remain unnamed), and driving home from Kingsville, how about getting up early and driving 60 miles to McNab Lake to see if I could beat the approaching storm and catch a few redfish?

Yeah, that sounds reasonable....

I left home at dark-thirty and drove to the launch with some doubt as to what I might find.. Believe it or not, the sky looked good and the storm still seemed far enough away for a quick paddle.

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I paddled out to the lake at dawn and had just found the fish when the cold front arrived complete with lightning and high wind.

At the first sign of flashes in the distance I turned back and paddled like crazy to the launch. I reached it well ahead of the storm and had the boat loaded and gear stowed before the bottom fell out. I saw a big black drum tailing in the oysters near the launch but couldn't interest him in my Gulp Shrimp.

I started home in the deluge only to remember that I had left the scupper plugs in the yak so when I came to a spot where the rain began to let up I hopped out and looked in to see about 15 gallons of water had collected. That wouldn't be so good for the mileage so I popped the plugs and let it drain out.

By the time I got home, the front had passed and with it my chances for a redfish.

They will be there next time!

2 comments:

Bawana said...

You can't mess with those storms!In the end they always wind.

Paul Batchelder said...

Nice way to wash the boat!