This past weekend R was lucky enough to get a spot in a competition at Florida Lake. Many hours of planning and thought went into his strategy. I couldn’t be happier for him and offered my cooking skills to help and assist with the actual preparation.
At the last minute a change had to be made due to a competitor falling ill. Suddenly he was without a peggy and needed to fill that spot. Obviously, he decided that I would be a good fit. Despite all my nay saying and my doubts he convinced me that I should do it. I accepted. Now I wasn’t assisting with the cooking, but cooking particle like my life depended on it.
We had the misfortune of picking the peg that was the weigh master as well. So now, my first proper comp and I have to weigh, I have issues with distance casting which is all I would have to do, and I am doubting so hard that I think I may have convinced myself I couldnt fish at all…
Despite all of that I tried to be positive for his sake and arrived on Friday with a little confidence and a ton of feed. I had to learn quickly and get rods out. I had help from R and the other members of Team SNZ and felt a little more confident in myself, when mother nature decided to slap me a bit and send a gale to interrupt my casting efforts, just when I started to get more confident.
Friday night was slow going and R had to spomb in so much feed as my efforts were completely in vain. But we sat turning ourselves into human pretzels for luck. After a while fish after fish staring coming out around us. Granted most of them were non-weighers but the fact that we had to weigh all the fish that we weren’t catching was a little disheartening. The wind howled around us all night and we were constantly woken by someone saying fish on. I can assure you that on Saturday morning I was one grumpy gal.
Eventually late into the afternoon I finally caught a fish. Probably the smallest one of the entire weekend but by God did that fish feel great and R followed with another decent one shortly after. Hallelujah! Suddenly I felt a little less humpy. We worked together to pipe in a few kgs of boilies from SNZ and Agie Baitworks because spombing in a gale force headwind was horrific.
Once again mother nature gave us a big surprise and sent one of the worst storms we’ve ever had to weather in a bivvy. Our floor turned into a waterbed! We were stuck inside and unable to go out as the lightning was downright scary. My receiver kept beeping. By the time we were able to go out again there was nothing on my hook. We decided an early night cuddled under the Sonik Thermal was a better plan and settled in for the night.
We finished up our weekend cozy in the bivvy until we had to pack up. The whole experience was humbling. We got taught a rather harsh lesson by The Lake but I still would not change a thing. Even though we didn’t place we had an amazing time on the bank surrounded by some awesome people.
Carpy Dreams 