Hey everyone. I hope you are all doing well. I catch a plane tonight to head for Ohio. Tuesday I will be going out with a guide to fish Lake Erie for Smallies. I am hoping to catch a couple of those monster smallies we all hear about out there. My cousin there also has arranged a walleye charter while I am there. I will be heading up to Brooklyn Michigan on Wednesday night to go to the ASA race Thursday. The camping World Trucks race on Saturday and the Sprint Cup race on Sunday. So needless to say I will be having a blast. Smallies and NASCAR, what more could a guy want? I will have my camera in hand to when I get home I hope to have some pictures to share. I will try to get on and leave a post Wednesday before we head up to the races in Michigan. Talk to you all then. Have a great weekend. I know my next couple of weeks will be awesome!

Mark

SO I am sure some of you have been wondering how my trip to Erie went. It could not have been better. I had hired a guide and his name was Marty Salchak. If any of you are coming to the Akron/Cleveland area and you have a day to go fishing I strongly reccomend Marty. We went out in a brand new Ranger 520 a really nice boat. The day we went out was fairly windy and the water was similar to what we see in the Columbia Gorge at times. It was 5 to 6 foot swells at times. Marty did an awesome job in driving the boat and I felt totally comfortable. He did not beat me up in the passanger seat. I found it interesting that he had a 5 blade prop on and I asked him about it. He said he put it on the night before just for that day. He said you need the big bow lift that a 5 blade gives you to keep the bow up high in waves like that. We did manage to get the tip of one wave and got a bit of a shower but it was very minimal for the conditions. We went out into the main lake and got on a gravel flat that was quite literally miles long. Marty used one of those big drag socks to keep us in a slow drift. The one he uses he told me was for a 30 ft. boat. It worked wonders and I learned something new to try at home. Our first drift we made in about 13 to 15 feet. We caught a couple of what they call sheep head. Those of you that have ever caught a drum in the south would know it as that. They are hard pullers, fun to catch but not worth anything else. So we moved out a bit and did a drift in 15 to 18 foot. The result was the same a couple of drum. Then we moved out to about 21 feet. We came over a ridge that came up to about 16 feet and then quickly back to 21. As we came accross the top I had a hit that felt different than those drum hitting. I swung and connected on a smallie about 4 pounds. Then Marty did the same shortly after. We continued on the drift but not much else happened. We motored back to where we started and did the same thing again. Hit that rise and pow fish on. So we continued drifting that spot over and over and nearly every time we went accross it one of us would hook up with a smallie or a drum. We caught some drums that were over 10 pounds. They were fun. We caught all our fish there on a tube bait rigged on a rattling jighead. Once we made a few drifts with no fish we motored into one of the bays. Much calmer water and there were some fish bedding. There were also a lot of other bass boats there. We did not see any other bass boats on the main lake only walleye charters. We were sight fishing and Marty spotted a bed. I threw in there and the fish turned on it but did not hit it. Marty set me up with a drop shot rigged with a goby. I chucked that in there and that fish jumped on it as soon as I shook it. I caught one more that way and then it was time for us to head home. Between the two of us we landed somewhere around 20 smallies. The two I caught in the bays were smaller about 2 1/2 to 3 pounds. All but one of the fish we caught out in the main lake flats were super quality fish. Most of them were easily 4 pounds and several over 5. I caught the biggest and it was just over 6. Marty said there were places we could have gone and caught a lot more fish than we did but the quality would not have been as nice. He thought after our original conversation that I was looking for bigger quality fish and not so much quantity. I could not have been happier.
Tomorrow I am heading back up to Erie again to go on a Walleye charter with some of my realitives. It should be a good fish catching time. I will let you know how it went.

Here are a couple of links to photos. One of me with my 6+ and another that was pretty close to 6.
The other is of my guide Marty with a fish over 5

For some reason I could not get the pics to show up here


http://s276.photobucket.com/albums/kk17/racing1nascar/?action=view&current=100_0...

http://s276.photobucket.com/albums/kk17/racing1nascar/?action=view&current=100_0...

Those are some awesome fish. But the legs uncovered those need some serious help.

Mark make sure you cover them legs up on our next outing they are down right scary

Russ

I was looking at the smallies, but the legs stick out like a "SORE" thumb.

R