The Severed Cortex

Yes, I know it has been a good long while since I posted last. Part of that is because I've been fishing in Florida. Specifically here and here. The other part is partially due to laziness and partially due to me having too many fires in the oven at one time. I've even shamelessly let my baseball draft go to crap.

The Drive Down

I head to the farm on Friday night with the boat in tow. I was hoping to not have to pull my boat with my undersized truck all the way to Florida, but it's inevitable. I got an oil change, a rear differential change, and a transmission flush before leaving town.
We leave on Saturday the 15th around 8:00 am, picking up Brad at the FS (or Fruit Belt as I later learned) at the corner of IL 145 and Big Bay Road. Brad, Chester, and John lead the way pulling Chester's Pro Craft 175 with John's truck. Will and I follow along in old Bessie. The first stop is Ft. Campbell, KY at the Waffle House. Our waitress was pushing 300 pounds, appeared a bit inbred, had no upper teeth, and was sporting a tongue piercing. All I kept thinking was, who in the fuck is having freaky sex with this beast? I couldn't enjoy my cholesterol bomb.
The rest of the ride was pretty uneventful. Instead of driving all night like we normally do each year, we stopped in Lake City, FL to sleep. Chester said he heard the desk clerk tell a black customer there were no rooms, and then she promptly rented us three. Welcome to the south.

Fishing Rosalie

We arrived at Rosalie shortly before 11:00 am, and within thirty minutes they had our cabins 'cleaned'. Hey, it's a fish camp, but they have at least remodeled the cabins since our last stay here. They were the nicest we've stayed in since I've been going on this trip. The worst were these same cabins 5 years ago.
The water in Rosalie is at least 4 feet low. Rosalie, these days, is completely rain fed. We bumped bottom in the canal out to the lake and then proceeded to barely have enough water to run the big motor tilted all the way up for at least the next 500 - 800 feet. Basically it was the same way all around the lake. I was the only one who caught anything all day and that shouldn't count. It was a small bluegill. I did that completely on sight in 3 feet of water, so it really shouldn't count at all. You could see the bottom of the lake out to about 4 feet deep and we witnessed plenty of bass, an overload of gar, and several middle sized gators, including a nice little two foot one laying completely still on the bottom. It looked like a black tattoo standing out on the bottom of the tan lake floor.
We burned up the trolling motor trying to find fish, drift fished for awhile in the deep water (8 feet), then headed back to the canal where we again bumped bottom.
John, Brad, and Chester had already given up, loaded the boat, dropped the trailer, and headed down the road to Camp Mack to see the water level at Lake Kissimmee.
They pronounced it very fishable.

Lake Kissimmee

Basically we fished for crappie first, bass second, and bluegill/shellcracker third. The crappie were really scattered everywhere we went, but we managed to pick up a few here and there throughout the day. It would come and go in spurts. All in a sudden you'd pick up two or three and then it would be dead for a couple of hours.
Monday it was windy and we spent most of the day trying to figure out what worked and what didn't. Tuesday it was windier, but in the afternoon we started picking up a decent amount of fish. Wednesday it was relentless with the wind, and lake advisories were out for pretty much all the lakes in central Florida. Fishing actually seemed a little like a chore, but fortunately I don't mind just sitting on the water, drinking some suds, and watching the world go by. At different times during the day it called for that. Thursday we got rained out in the morning. Yes, I suppose we could have still fished, and if my brother in law had made the trip you can bet we would have. I didn't object to waiting the storm out either and we were on the lake by noon anyway. We caught pretty much the previous days' average of fish in just the afternoon. Friday's weather was gorgeous. Sunshine and 80 degrees. Fishing, however was spotty. I picked up some fish, but it was a tough day for Will. Saturday it was crowded. Will and I headed out early and in general had a pretty good day. I missed twice as many fish as I caught, some of them quite nice. By 3:00 in the afternoon we got rained out. I prepped the boat for the long ride back to Illinois in the rain. They never tell you about all the prep work that goes into owning a boat. You see the riding and fishing in the brochures with none of that loading, unloading, cleaning, battery charging, blada, blada, blada. That part kind of sucks. Be that as it may, I wouldn't trade it for the week I enjoyed on the water fishing with Nancy's uncle Will.

The Drive Home

I drove from Lake Wales, Florida to Edwardsville, Illinois in one day. Old Bessie performed admirably, especially for a truck with 132K miles on it. I think I'll reward her with another oil change.
John says next year we're fishing Lake Nickajack.