Decided to take my wife Jen, my mom, and Tom on a float down the Madison on Saturday...bad call. First off the water level was up so it was running fast. Four adults in an old 'high profile' Clacka is a tough deal especially with the wind gusting.
Put on a hopper and got Tom to make some casts towards the bank...nothing. He asked if he could row so I said sure. I wasn't into my 3rd cast when we were headed for good size boulder...sideways. I told him to point the nose at the boulder and pull back. You can only hope for so long before taking action so I dropped the rod in the boat and jumped back on the sticks. That was the end of my fishing for the day. Jen did manage to hook a few nice fish out of the back of the boat on a hopper.
An hour and a half later we got hit by an intense T-storm. To make matters worse we forgot the rain gear. My mom was covered in a cotton towel which was soaking up every bit of moisture. After maneuvering the boat to the bank, my mom almost fell out of the boat on the way over, all 4 of us huddled up under a tree and got out of the rain. After about 30 minutes the rain finally let up a bit so we got back in the boat and floated the last hour to the take out.
To top it off we got a flat tire on the drive home. Not what I would call an epic day of fishing but definitely a trip we will remember. Thanks for coming out mom...good to see ya.
