Newport, 9-22-14

[Amish Ed]

Landwhale (yes, he's back in action) launched at 6:15. Clear skies and cool air. Water was 66º and very clear. Current was decent at launch time, and was completely slack from about 8:30 until we got off the water at 10:15. Boat traffic was pretty heavy all morning. You can tell the offshore action is still going strong.

I got a micro calico on my first cast. Then the rest of the morning was a very slow pick. No legals though a couple came close. I finished with 8 and Steve had 13, I think. I think that the difference came down to retrieval speed. I was going faster than Steve. He's really good at going super-slow. Me, not so much. I also did not throw the kitchen sink, perhaps i should have. Maybe I would have found a magic color.

The baits that did work were 5" Paddlerz in Rootbeer gold flake and Redbone. Also, the 3" Flurry in Minnow Magic caught some. Hot Sauce was of course used to make the baits tasty.

Biggest issue of the day was when on my 3rd cast my Cardiff 200 decided not to go into gear again. I took off the side plate, it turns out it never went all the way out of gear. Pushed the lever all the way and put it all back together. 3 casts later, same issue. Did this 3 times and decided that that reel was out of commission for the day.

Overall, you can tell that summer is over. Hopefully we get a few more weeks of so so fishing before it shuts down for the winter. So glad that Steve is back on the water and of course look forward to what ever next week brings us.