Deep-Sea Fishin

While the rest of us were campin at Harvey, E, his dad, and some buds from their company took a trip down to Clute, Tx. to do some deep-sea fishin. They had luck. Lots of luck!! At the end of the day, all cut and cleaned, the meat from their catch totalled 100 lbs!!

Thursday, they met the captain in the mornin, then in the afternoon they hung out on the beach.



Friday they spent the day 40 miles off-shore, in 8-10 swells, on a small (by deep-sea fishin standards)catamaran boat. They caught the limit in red snapper and a few other kinds of fish. They reeled in trigger, mackerel, tuna, king, a black tip shark, and some other kinds that I don't remember.

When they boated up that mornin, the deckhand was helpin to load things up. Jack handed him a bunch of bananas, which help with sea-sickness. The deckhand jumped back and raised him arms sayin that he wasn't gonna touch the bananas and said it was bad luck to bring a banana on board a boat. E took the whole bunch and said, 'Hell no! Get these bananas off the boat! We don't need any bad luck!' He grabbed them and tossed them overboard. They sank to the bottom of the harbor floor where I'm sure they are still. At lunch-time, the captain opened up his box and found his wife had packed him a banana! E said the captain's eyes got big round as dinner plates! The captain grabbed the banana, stripped off the peel and quickly threw it out to sea. He snarfed down the fruit faster than a trigger takin off with 30 ft of line! Needless to say, they didn't have bad luck in the fishin department!















When they boarded the boat and chatted with the captain and his deckhand the captain asked if the guys had set up some wagers for trip. They hadn't but wished they would have after the day was through! E told the captain that before he left he had told Wyatt he would catch him a shark. Never did it cross him mind he would actually get one! Let alone two! One snapped the line right at boatside. The one E landed was a 30 or so pound black tip shark. He said the sucker fought like hell for a long time and when he got it boatside the deckhand had to hit the shark about 8 times in order for the gaff to strike through the shark's hide!





Mmm, mmmmm.....mm. I love to fish. I love a good fight with a fish. But in this case, I love to watch a good fight with a fish if it's my man that's doin the bulgin muscle thing. Excuse me. We'll get back to the whole shark-thing-on-a-line-threatening-to-pull-my-hubby-overboard here in a bit. I need a minute to get a good look-see at the bicep and forearm doin the thing they do best. Which, in turn, makes my heart and stomach do funny little things. Maybe we will have another baby.... Oh, sorry, this is supposed to be kid-friendly posting. I forgot there for a minute when I got a little light-headed.

Okay, back to the action at hand. The deckhand finally gaffed the shark. Darn, my secret show is over.



Saturday the spent on the beach again and grilled some of their fish for supper. Ben, Chris and E tried their hand at surfin and they all did a lot of boogie-boarding.

As you can tell, all in all, the guys had a great weekend! They are plannin their next trip in the fall of next year.

Camping Amidst Storms

Last weekend we were at Harvey County East Lake campin. Friday afternoon was great! Not cool but not hot. Saturday early a.m., before the 5 hours of rain hit us Aunt D and I fished. When the rain came we went into the camper and fixed a big breakfast.





In order to pass time we loaded up the boys and went over to hang out at Hunter's, the bait/tackle/antique store just up the road.

Saturday afternoon was bright and sunny!







JD was up to his neck in mud! He was in hog heaven!


Until he got hungry...





So Aunt D caught a turtle and we made snapper soup...


It was good...we all liked it!


Saturday night there were storms all around us. We were hit with one heck of a rainstorm. The winds were about 55 mph. All the counties around us were in a tornado watch. The counties directly to the south (Sedgwick) and north (MacPherson) of us had tornadoes. We missed them by 25-30 miles!

Sunday dawned bright and HOT! It is always sunny and hot the day we have to pack up and go home. Never fails!

Pole Fishin' on the Ninnescah

Yesterday we went to the Ninnescah (known round these parts as Cougar Country) to fish with the boys. We refrained from tellin Wyatt about the trip until Saturday mornin for fear that he would forego sleepin more than 24 hours in anticipation. Plus, he's only 2 1/2 and doesn't quite grasp the concept of time in minutes, hours, let alone days. When we told him that mornin, he was all about packin the truck.



I'm not sure why he wanted to drag the cooler all the way out to the road but I convinced him it needed to sit by the truck so we could pack ice around the food.

This is the view lookin upriver:

It was a perfect day as far as bein outside. We had cloud cover most the day except for short periods of sun later in the afternoon. Uncle Mike was the reigning king of catches. He caught 4 or 5 fish and one soft shell. Soft shells just look pre-historic. They look like you should be out runnin for your life from dinosaurs and hiding from pterodactyls. Straight outta Jurassic Park is the feelin I get evertime I see one of these. It's hard not to jump when a shadow passes over the ground and throw my arms up to fight off a homosapian-hungry flying dinosaur.





Wyatt was all sorts of excited about the turtle until the thing felt land beneath his feet and tried to bail. He went clawin right in Wy's direction to which Wy replied with a big scream, a scramble to get away and of course, tears. I'm sorry, but yes, I laughed. I also held him when he came runnin over to me but by laughin it got him settled down and pretty soon he was gigglin about the turtle tryin to get away.
Aunt Rene caught a fish and had the boss reel it in.

He was proud as punch!

Here's the boss, checkin on lines and patrollin the bank.

He did really well with the whole 3 foot-drop-off-into-the-river thing. There was just a couple times my mama's heart almost stopped beatin. I wore shorts and a light shirt just in case I'd have to jump in and drag him back to the edge. I didn't want any resistance with swimmin if I had to put my life-saving skills to work.
'Ole Hoss had quite a time.

He was pretty sleepy by the time we got to the river so shortly after we got set up I took him up to the truck, nursed him, and strapped him into his car seat for a little siesta with the music on. After his nap, and some lunch, he was a much happier kid. We tied off his walker to a sapling behind him so he wouldn't try wind-surfing off the bank and into the water.

I swear the kid believes that walker is equipped with floats, all-terrain tires with snow chains, wings and a motor!
We did some scoutin around for more fishin holes. The guys went down river, under the bridge, and caught a few and lost a few. Aunt Rene and I went upriver and found nothin but slick-as-snot muddy banks, spiders, thorn bushes and lots of life. Here are some pictures.

Now for the other part:



My camera kept focusing on the background so the spider is very blurry. I didn't think to put it on manual focus and I couldn't find a leaf big enough to hold behind it to bring the spider into focus.

Cricket frogs-try cathin those suckers on a muddy bank!

Yeah, it didn't work out so well for me.





It was either this fungus growth that stunk like feces or the fact that there was a fox den just beneath all these clumps of black fungus, but I'm tellin ya, it stunk!



The light wasn't the greatest when I took this shot. As I stood and looked up the tree the green foliage was a stark contrast against the dark bark.

Another den, this time from a smaller animal:

Last, but not least, the boss got in one more frightened scream when I tried to put this little guy on his shoulder and take a picture:

He wanted N-O-N-E of it! He was content to watch him in my hands and no closer!



Hoss wanted to grab him right away and without a doubt, put him in his mouth.



That, I didn't let happen, but he did almost eat a worm. Just kiddin. But he would, if we'd a let him!