Camping at Lenice - Kara's First Fish

March 24-25, 2017

Kara and her first ever fish!  A solid rainbow at that!

This past weekend my brother Scott and I planned a little camping trip to Lake Lenice.  There is an ORV area very close by that has free dispersed camping.  The plan was to meet at the camp spot before dark, get camp set up, and then bring the pontoon to Lenice so that we could get an early start the next morning.  Scott was also going to bring up his side-by-sides so we could ride around the dunes.  The kids were really excited!  Finally, I was going to take my sister-in-law Kara out to try to catch her first fish.  It was going to be an action-packed 24 hours!

We arrived at a very damp camp and got our tent up just before dark.  There was lots of standing water, but miraculously my kids stayed out of it, and Cheryl only had to sing them songs for an hour before they fell asleep!  Unfortunately, Scott had workers in his basement taping, mudding, and texturing his walls and ceiling, and he wasn't able to get out of the house until 9:00pm.  We were unable to get the pontoon out to the lake, but we were otherwise ready.   There was some less-than-considerate campers near us, playing music and talking for much of the night.  As is my normal, I slept like a baby.  Scott, on the other hand, was up all night, not even getting a wink of sleep.

The next morning was brisk, but I awoke to the sounds of drumming rooster pheasants and chukar clucking from the hills - good sounds!  Scott and Kara made a delicious breakfast of pancakes, sausage, and bacon, while I got all the fishing equipment ready.  As soon as breakfast was done, my whole family drove over to Lake Lenice, and we got Cheryl fishing.  I took the kids back so they could have a couple turns on the side-by-sides.

Cheryl did well fishing. She caught a fish trolling to our favorite spot.  Then, in the first forty minutes she caught 4 fish with the indicator.  She lost a couple more, but eventually had to head back to swap waders with Kara, so we could get out and fish.  I was pretty proud of my wife!

One of Cheryl's fish.  She said that she had to take a picture to prove that she actually caught something!

I let Kara use my pontoon, while I kicked around in the float tube.  We anchored up the pontoon, and tied the float tube to it.  Kara was able to get the flies out just far enough, and soon she had a take down!  After an exciting battle, Kara landed the fish!  It was her first fish ever, and she was pretty excited!  Not excited enough to touch the fish, but excited none the less!

Good job Kara!

We continued moving around, and in the last half hour we had some pretty quick action.  Kara caught another couple fish, and missed MULTIPLE take-downs.  She had a lot of fun, and so did I.  It was also fun to just small talk with Kara.  I don't think that I've ever had a one-on-one conversation with her, and I enjoyed it.  Sometimes fishing isn't all just about fishing.  It is about competition though, and I made sure that I caught five fish so that Cheryl didn't outfish me twice in the same week!

Yep, I was there too - teaching Kara the long-arm technique!

In the end, it was a whirlwind trip.  The kids did great and had a really fun time.  ALL of us were tired.  We were only gone for 24 hours, but it felt like a lot more!  It was a lot of work, but worth it. Next time I need to be more diligent about getting more pictures of the kids, and hopefully we can get some more fishing time in too!