The next day around 2:00 P.M we arrived at Waconda Lake. We spent some time in the campground as the wind was blowing around 30 m.p.h. In the evening Dad, Mom, Leo and I drove over to the marina to fish for some crappie.
It was excellent fishing and we got a half a bucket of 12-14 inchers for a meal. We threw a lot of fish back due to not having freezer room to freeze fish yet.
We were going to celebrate Gavin's 2nd birthday but he fell asleep so we had to wait until Tuesday to celebrate.
That night I did not put up my tent due to the storm that was blowing in. A little before dark it finally reached us. We had been watching the lightning and the wall cloud as it approached. It blew in with some fury and we were scrambling to finish getting everything tied down. The wind kicked up to about 60 mph. June bugs were getting blown out of the trees and they kept whacking me upside the face over and over again along with the blowing sand until I finally made it into Mom and Dad's 5th wheel.
The next morning the wind had died down and we eventually made it out to the lake. We caught a ton of crappie and a few short walleye trolling. We came back into camp when it got hot then that evening went out for another hour before dark.
Again at dark a storm was rolling in. This one had produced a tornado a ways away at a town named Gove. We decided that since the wind was not blowing as hard the storms wind would not be too strong. Wrong! We woke up with the tent slapping us in the face due to broken poles and lightning striking all around us. We grabbed the kids and scrambled to the camper. I grabbed some bedding and dropped the tent so the poles that were not broken would stay that way.
The next morning the camp was waterlogged. I put the tent back up and drained the massive amounts of water out of it. There was also a lot of bedding and air beds to dry out.
We went out fishing again and Mom caught a nice 21" walleye and her and Dad both caught a crappie that were almost 16". We kept several other crappie since we had the walleye to clean. Dad caught a 4 pound drum and I caught a 4 1/2 pound drum in the same spot a while later. I also got a 2 1/2 pound catfish casting a bomber with a spiderman pole for bass along a shoreline in the creek. I had a good cast between a couple bushes in the water. There was a wake as the fish took off toward the crank. That was quite a fight as he kept diving under the boat and stripping line off the little reel. There was a funny moment later when Dad had a hard time getting back in the boat after we stopped on bank for a break. Mom was laughing so hard she couldn't breath and Dad was stuck in quite an uncomfortable position. I had to get a picture instead of helping him in.
Christina drove to her Mother's house to do some laundry since her and the kids bag of cloths had been left in the tent the night before.
She brought back my nephew Peyton to do some fishing with us. I got into some white bass off the bank along with some crappie, walleye, and smallmouth before dark. I took Peyton back down there just after dark and did not have any luck.
The next morning we went back to the point and I hooked into a large gar that I fought for almost an hour with my microlight crappie pole with 6 lb test. I would get her close to shore then he would go on a run and strip most of my line off. Peyton had time to walk back to camp to get the net. I finally got him into the rocks and Peyton went to net him but the net was way to small and she would slide right out of it. The group of boats that had gathered to watch the fight were a little disappointed when my line finally broke on the last attempt to get the fish onto the rocks to get ahold of it. I have to say I was a little disappointed too. It was one of the larger gar I had seen all week and would have loved to have gotten my picture taken with her.
Peyton was able to net a few of the other gar that swimming around the area and I had a few more bite my tiny dancer but couldn't get a good hook into their toothy snout.
We didn't make it out in the boat since my Grandparents came out to stay with us. Peyton and I tried the Marina again, this time with less luck. The east wind was changing the fishing.
The next day we got out in the boat and caught a lot of fish again. Peyton caught a nice 18 1/2" walleye. We all caught a lot of shorts and tons or crappie and white bass.
The following day we did a lot of catching fish to keep as it was my last day. It was hot and windy but we still caught a lot of fish trolling and drifting.
The last morning we awoke to a strong North wind blowing in a storm. The tent was slapping us in the face again. This time was leaking water and the poles were not holding any more. We quickly packed up all of our stuff and got in the camper while the storm passed through. I rolled up the tent we have had forever and got it ready for the trash bin. It was leaking water and the poles were annihilated. It battled with the Kansas winds and the Kansas winds gave it a whoopin.
We left the lake around 10:00. There were a lot of stops made on the way home. The drive back is just so long. We visited Bass Pro and picked out another tent. We stopped in Terra Haute and got a motel for the night then continued our drive the rest of the way home on Monday.
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Those are some huge crappie! Looks like you had a good time, bummer on losing the gar.
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