Well folks, after 3 years of wanting to go......and after missing this year's Quinte Adventure weekend...I finally made it. What a blast!!!! Where do I even start? OK then, right from the beginning....mabey even the night before.....
After returning from a business trip to Toronto for two days, I was pumped and ready to take a day off to go fishing. Big-O called me the week before and asked if I wanted to go to Quinte for some monster eyes. Well who could refuse an invitation like that? I promised myself I was going to go to bed early the night before so that I was ready to get up whenever Big-O was leaving. (I heard he leaves really, really early). After nailing down all the details of meeting on River Road at 5:00am, I set the alarm for 3:30am and hit the hay at 10:00pm. No sooner did my head hit the pillow and I was dreaming of the next day. Well we all know that internal alarm clock never lets us down.....right? I woke up at 10:05pm wondering if it was time to go yet, then again at 11:00....and again at 12:15, and finally once more at 3:15am....CLOSE ENOUGH...time to get ready!
It was a cold November 4th morning. I pack the van and scrape off the frost that was preventing me from just givin er down to the 416 highway. Big-O showed up right on time and away we went. We headed down to the 401, past Brockville and into the Kingston area. There was a Tim Hortons we were going to hit to fill up the thermos, but I think we missed it we seemed to have taken the scenic route to get to the launch at the Glenmore Ferry. It was OK though, beautiful drive and there was no way we were going out there without our Double Doubles.
As we draw closer to the water, I looked out into what I thought was the Atlantic Ocean....man did we ever drive far.
Oh, sorry, that was Lake Ontario, but you might as well have put me in the middle of the Ocean and I wouldn't have known the difference. What a body of water.Finally, we arrive. The water by the Ferry looked good and the wind wasn't too bad..........yet!
As we're getting ready to launch, I hear Big-O with a few choice words. Turns out the main battery was dead...dead...dead. Ooops, how are we gonna start the main motor with a dead battery? That's OK he says, I'll just use my jumper cables and hook them to the electic motor batteries in the front....so we did. We'll just let the main get some juice and away we'll go. We'll use the kicker for the time being. No problem.
After launching the boat and getting dressed in our warmest clothes, we pushed off and headed into the wind. Big-O drops the kicker and give a couple of pulls....away we go.....but not too far. The kicker appears to be frozen and doesn't want to take the gas.
After about what seemed hours of pulling that rip cord, Big-O in a lather of sweat, and one arm now about 2 inches longer than the other, it finally starts and stays going. Meanwhile we've drifted quite a distance in the wind and decide we'd be better off boosting the main motor with the truck, and using it. The wind was coming up and that kicker was just not going to cut it. Back to the launch we go to get the truck. Big-O tests the 4 wheel drive capabilities, then drives the monster into the water just beside the boat so that the cables would reach and we could get some juice.
Actually, he had to drive it in 4 times. Everytime he stopped the truck in the water, the hood closed. It was all I could do to not break out into a foolish laughter and fall into the water. A few more choice words and the solution was found. Big-O reached down into the woods and pulled out a tree that was lying on the ground. He jammed the darn thing under the hood to prevent it from closing and tryed again. It worked this time.
A little positive here.......a little negative there..........a turn of the key......and the main came to life.Finally, it's about 9:45 now and we head to our spot, full bore. Next thing I know, Big-O's sunglasses are flying through the air and out the back. Ooops. Oh well, I've got about 6 other pairs in here somewhere he says. We start to rig the planer boards and rods. We find our spot in about 60 ft of water and begin the troll pattern looking for those illusive black marks on the fish finder. Not too many could be seen here so we continue our troll to find them.
We head futher up towards the gap and now find ourselves in 100ft of water and what do you know......marking fish. It's time to get serious now. We already have two planer boards out with about 200ft of line, so we also decide to flatline a couple of deep divers out the back as well...so we did. Trolling along nicely now, marking fish, and just waiting for the big strike. I asked Big-O, so.......if we get a hit is he going to pull the line out of the clip? since they don't fight very hard anyway. For those of you who don't know, this is the first time I've used planer boards.
He indicated that sometimes they do....and sometimes they don't, we just need to watch the action.....so I did.Suddenly, I look at the port side planer rod and it looks a little different. Well, with my second to none angling skills and ability to just know when I've got a fish on (actually is was more like my second to none anticipation of just hoping and praying it was a fish and not just the 2 foot waves bouncing the board around.
) I take the rod out and begin to reel in. A little head pull on the end and now I really do know I've got a fish on. FISH ON Big-O, fish on. 
The eye heads straight for the other side behind the back of the boat. Now remember I said we had 2 boards and 2 deep divers out the back......that's 6 lines. Oh Ohhhhh. I could see it now...a collection of 600 ft of line all wrapped up in a big ball with my fish looking out of it thinking...........What the??????? It was OK though, we managed to get the fish in with no other fatalities. Here she is.....my very first Quinte Walleye. She was a long, thin one. 28 inches. What a blast.
After high fives I prepare to set the board again and look back at the rods we were running deep. Big-O...I said...that rod looks different too! Could it be....could it really be? As Big-O was manouvering the boat so as to not turtle the boards and tangle the lines I go back, pick up the rod and give a little feel. YEP, there is definately something on the other end of this one too! Big-O says to me, "Well reel it in". This is the kind of guy he is. Would much rather see someone else having a great time and him just showing us where to go. While it was tempting.....I also wanted him to catch fish as well. I gave him the rod, kicked him out of his captain's chair and now Big-O was doing battle. Yaaahoooooo! I knew it was a good one when I hear from the back of the boat....."Holy Crap!" (in not so many words). The wind was really coming up now, and it was becoming difficult to keep the boat straight and still watch the fish being reeled in. I grab the net...do the big dip...and Big-O has a beautiful fish as well, not 10 minutes after the first. A beauty she is! 32 inches and fat...fat...fat.
All excited now, we reset everything......2 planer boards and 2 deep divers (remember those 6 lines out the back). Well it all went down hill from here. The wind came up, the rain came down, the swells got bigger, the boat was all over the place, and my worst nightmare came true.......one of the planer boards turtled. It swept across the stern of the boat and headed for the other 5 lines that were out there. I could hear the board now, as if it could actually think.......Got one......got two......got three.....got you too.....Everything was tangled up, I was reaching over and under trying to reel in 200 ft of line, and making sure rods were not going to snap. I almost felt like I was playing a game of Twister in Big-O's boat. A big gust came up along with a big swell and pushed us sideways, one of the lines got wrapped in the prop and snapped and we lost our lure. After finally settling down and clearing the lines....we reel in the last rod (the deep diving one). The lures pops out of the water and we're good.....but what's this????? There's a line on the lure I just pulled out. We grap the line and start pulling. I know...you think I'm going to say there's a fish on there, but no I'm not...that would be too cool....we did retrieve the lure from the broken line of the other rod though. Go figure.
We head for cover for a little bit as it calms down slightly taking a picture of this other boat who has hit what looks to be a Sheephead.
Here comes the rain and wind again and we decide to call it a day. On the drive back we took a couple of shots just to show you what would have hit if we had stayed out there.
Apparently this is calm, with waves not as big as the Adventure Weekend...but stronger wind. What a day!!!!!
I'd like to take this opportunity to say thank you Big-O. You're a helluva guy, a great guide, and hopfully you've dryed out by now. While we didn't catch a huge amount of fish...we did catch fish...and the adventure was one that I'll remember for a good long time.
I bring a couple on board for just such an emergency. It also works good to plug your cell phone into as the battery drains fast when not in digital mode. Glad to see you finally got that double digit 'eye. See you soon.
