Discovery 2015: A Multi-State Journey
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When |
September 2015 |
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Where |
Syracuse, NY |
New York
It was all very improvised at the last minute, but I ended up deciding to take my new Subaru, and go drive from Boston to Chicago to attend the CCC. While I was frantically gathering my things on Sunday, it dawned on me that I was going to traverse 4 states (NY, PA, OH, IN) before getting to Illinois and it would be cool to try to catch a carp in all states. And hey, why not make it a discovery trip! So I boiled a few buckets of maize, and left Monday morning with next to zero homework on where I was going to stop. My itinerary was simple, take the I-90 most of the way, and see what happens...
I did plan the first stop, Lake Onandaga (NY) where I never fished before. I had in mind to fish Lake Erie from the aptly named Erie (PA). Then fish somewhere in Ohio (I had a vague idea where), and somewhere in Indiana (absolutely no clue where).
After a few hours of driving (this was my first road trip *EVER*), I reached the NY border, then Syracuse, then Lake Onandaga. I did hesitate to change my plan and fish the Erie canal (very visible from the highway), but stuck to my original idea.
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I knew fishing Onandaga wasn't quite a discovery according to the rules (I do remember successful CAGI events organized in there a decade ago - didn't know who fished the lake since then though), but it was at least completely new to me. So let's say this was a warm-up! I arrived at the park entrance, feeling that it should be easy, pile up bait, come back in the morning and catch. Er, first off, the lake was WAY bigger than I thought. Next, weeds were everywhere in sight.
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I checked the marina, saw the usual unfriendly signs, and finally drove to the end of the lake, Willow Bay and the river going out of it. Now, we're speaking, a nice park, a beautiful bay, several openings on the river's entrance, and a local angler who told me he saw carp jumping a few minutes ago. So I threw half of a bucket of maize and bird food in the river, and painfully spodded (forgot my spomb! dumb!) a quarter of the bucket in the bay, had dinner and found a motel room to get some sleep.
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On Tuesday morning, I was there bright and early. Well, not so bright and not so early in truth. I thought I would throw some maize in the river, set up two rods in there, make some method mix, and while waiting for a possible bite, spod the bay. I did set up the first rod, went back to my second rod and... got a run! Now that was fast! Quick pic, I released it, did succeed to set up both rods, didn't succeed to do my mix, and landed a big teen. I scrapped any plan about the bay, and never even did a mix...
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I got multiple other runs, lost a couple of fish, and did land a 20 pounder (22-8lb) after an incredible extraction from deep weeds - I really thought the fish was gone. It was not, and the fish was even kind enough to pose for more pics in the water after I released it. Runs kept going, I spare you the details... Finally, time passed by, and boats started to come by the river, and fishing slowed down. While I was wrapping up, I had one last run, and this one felt HEAVY, but alas, the hook pulled.
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Finally, it was 11am and I had to drive to my next stop (Erie, PA). Well, this was quite the warm-up. I knew I was lucky to have found such a great spot, and didn't have that much hope of reproducing my success with a much, much bigger lake (!!). Stay tuned for the next part of this story...