Foreign Larry Hunting; Part 1- "Bonus Time"
I headed up to Meredith, NH this weekend to do some serious angling with my main man and pure angler, Jeff Valpey (angler21). His family owns a rustic place on Lake Waukewan, which is a 928-acre body of water with hands down the cleanest water I have ever seen. You could see down to at least 15ft of water with a perfect view of the terrain and fish lurking. The fish were healthier looking and put up a bigger fight due to the cleanliness of the lake. There were several coves, islands, rock shelves and heavily weeded areas to fish. The place was ideal. We had originally planned to get there on Sunday, but headed up a day early. So this was referred to a "Bonus Time."
After a ruthless drive that took longer than my drive to Canada, we wasted no time in getting on the water. It was around 4:30 and still about 90 degrees when we headed out for our 1st trip. The water was glass already, so we went right to the cove near the bird sanctuary. The weeds were extremely high and thick. Very different than MA weeds, as they were similar to over grown grass. Ideal place to jitter bug, but due to the time of day and temperature we chose to use Yum Worms and spinners. As we were heading into the cove, Valps spotted a 6 to 8 pound Large Mouth lurking in the cove. He could see it as clear as day. A great site to begin our afternoon. Within 10 minutes Valpey tossed a cast in-between a dock, boat, Jet Ski, and a lady drinking a wine cooler. An angler esq cast to say the least. Instantly he nailed a nice Large mouth on a Black Gary Yamamotto worm. Weighed in at 1.5lbs and 14inches. Very solid way to start bonus time. The weeds were very difficult to avoid and it caused a lot of issues despite hooking the worms to make them weed less. We shifted over to one of the islands and angled at what Valpey referred to as “the Log.”
The Log was a location in the shade with 2 large trees submerged in the water. It was an ideal location. We angled for about 20minutes with no luck, so we were about to head in when I tossed out a Green Tailed Yum worm to the far right of the log. SLAM, my drag is getting taken for a ride. I end up getting the fish close to the boat, but it keeps diving, going under the boat as well. I was fairly nervous my line was going to snap despite 12lb test. Valps ended up netting the bastard and there it was. A 3 lb, 17 inch small mouth bass. Nice fat belly and healthy looking. Very different look than the Larry Smalls I caught in Maspenock. I will be honest; it fought like a 5 pounder.
Bonus time was a success, and the trip hadn’t even officially begun. We still had until Tuesday to conquer this lake. Oh, and this was the start to a NH state record for consecutive hours with at least a buzz.. An incredible feat by Jeff and myself. The beers would flow throughout this trip.