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While at Fort Stewart, Georgia for army flight school in the late 60's, my trailer park neighbor, last name of Outlaw (yes, that was his name) invited me to go fishing. He had a small 10 foot jon boat with not a whole lot of freeboard. We unloaded the boat into the nearby swamp (part of the Okefenokee) and started loading in our cooler with beer and sandwiches, our fly rods, and tackle boxes. We then put in two standard nylon over aluminum lawn chairs for seats. He got in very gingerly and told me to ease in. Somehow we were finally afloat and paddling back into the swamp. The boat seemed just a "wee bit" tipsy...
He said we were going to be fishing for something called "shellcrackers" so I tied a little yellow popping bug on my leader. He paddled way out and around to a set of cypress stumps and told me to cast as close as possible to the big one on the right. I swear that all I did was lean very slightly toward the stump as I flicked the popper out. We capsized so fast that I was still watching my bug touching down as I submerged head first into the cold, murky water. My first thought were alligators and then snakes. I knew the swamp was full of small gators that would strike your surface plug if you allowed them to reach it. It also had a sizeable population of cottonmouths. Then there was that story going around of the water skier falling into a massive nest of cottonmouths...
Well, I lost all my tackle (the box was open) and the lawn chairs, plus we got really soaked. We never were able to get back in the boat. We had to right the boat, grab the cooler and round up the floating beer, then our rods which floated by their cork handles. We got on the rear of the boat and kicked back the 500 yards to our launch point. Then we had a cold beer and a good laugh at ourselves realizing how dumb the lawnchair idea was... and, I still don't know what a "shellcracker" is...
Only funnier thing I've seen with those same old nylon lawnchairs was a homebuilt three-wheel Harley. It had two tandem mounted lawn chairs for seats. Very used up biker fella complete with mullet hairdo and his "old lady" behind him in shorts and a tank top with a small, black cigar dangling from her lips; both sans teeth... well maybe four or five total between them. It was that proud, straight-ahead look that caught my attention...
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I found your story hilarious, and perfect timing on posting it. I have a 12foot jon boat and the little woman was asking about a seat, with a back. I had told her I would get her a seat. Well she came up with the idea of a lawn chair in the boat for her to set in, I tried to explain why it wouldn't work, but after reading her your post, she seems to understand now.
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Ha. Glad I could help out. Not a good idea. Has something to do with center of gravity which I hadn't learned yet in flight school. That class came after the incident...
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Flygoddess: My flyrod back then was an old 50's Shakespeare Howald glass rod with a cork handle. Started fishing for bluegill and bass in the ponds around the valley I grew up in. Had that almost universal green floating line on a small Martin single action fly reel. It was pretty easy to grab. I may have never let go of it? The cans of beer for some reason were floating away and naturally that was a high priority. I still have that old red and white Shakespeare rod along with a collection of others from short 7 footers to the more typical 9 footers. I love the action of vintage glass rods and fish them almost exclusively; both fly and spinning. I only have one graphite fly rod; a custom D&S 5 wt. rod (Sage blank) given to me by my wife, daughter, and grandson at Xmas several years ago. I just put a Lamson Konic on it last year. I have over 20 vintage rods of various configurations. Almost all Shakespeare with a couple of odd balls like Horrocks-Ibbotson, Heddon, and Garcia Conlon. I think the glass Shakespeare is one of the most beautiful rods ever made. My personal favorites are the maroon and white or red and white wrapped 50-60's era colors. I now match many of them up with the old automatic fly reels of the same era. I just recently bought a beautiful maroon and gold Garcia automatic, unused in the original box. Still has it's original reel stickers plus the price sticker on the box from Longs Drug Store. I collect mint or near mint examples only.
An added note to all who appreciate vintage fly gear: While in Europe in the mid-70's I flew into various cities in England on weekly "milk" runs. We used to hit the old fishing and bait shops looking for vintage Hardy cane rods. Liverpool had a wonderful old store complete with some very salty old gentlemen. I bought 5 or 6 really pristine examples in the first year before the word got out that Americans fancied their old "junker" rods. The most I paid for one was around 15 pounds. Typically, they wanted 5 to 7 pounds. Then suddenly, they wanted 50 to 100 pounds for mediocre or broken tip rods and naturally the supply dried up. Sold off the beautiful Hardys to a fellow pilot before I returned to the states and have regretted that decision ever since.
Only things I have left from that venture are a few vintage fly boxes full of English hand-tied streamer flys that I used to pick up simply for the beautiful workmanship and awesome colors.
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You are my kind of guy. I remember jumping for joy last year while at Henry's cause I won the bid on a Browning...LOL
Most my glass are the newer E and S like Lami, Steffen, McFarland, and T.L.Johnson. Some are half and half.
BUT I still have the Wonderod plus a 5'3" Fenwick (and that is the way it was made) plus a couple of Shakes.
Love to see your collection...so for the side stepping here...still a great story.
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Amen, FG. Glass all the way. Incidently, my buddy was at Henrys the end of June. Shore fishing. Nothing much was doing with the boaters, tubers and shore people except he figured out a way. Large weighted Salmon bobber and a fly on a 6 foot leader. No weight on the leader or fly. He tipped it with a small section of worm. The pattern is a local thing given to us by an old guy that's been slaying trout at Strike with it for years. Looks like a steelhead pattern on a long shank hook with black and orange plus a flashy tinsel wrap. I think it resembles a perch minnow. We had several tied up and have been trying it in various applications. He landed 9 fish in three days including a 4 lb. Brookie, a 6lb. Cutt, and a couple of 7-8 lb. hybrids. All on his ultra-light 5 foot spinning rod near the state ramp. Go figure. He said the waves were 3 feet at times.
Kept sending me phone pics while I was at a wedding in CA. Couldn't believe the size of those fish. My best at Henrys is a 5lb. Cutt. I've never caught one of the large hybrids.
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I would love to see a picture of the fly if you have one.
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Right on. We just got back a week ago. Cold front really put them down, but I managed a few.
Black and orange is a great color. I use Denny Rickards seal, Lynn Scotts (great looking fly, but on Henry's I think more a Leech as the Cutts don't eat other fish) Softhackle and BS hot chocolate in orange and black.
My go to flies.
Not one to tip a fly with anything. If I can't catch it on just the fly then, I don't catch, but JUST ME. Whatever gets you through the night I say.
Normally deep nymphing is the ticket, but I go more the 10' range.
Try one of those 6 lbers on an E glass......WOW! The tip almost touches your reel!
Cool thing about glass is the Illusion. Other boaters think you have a WHALE with the bend. Land the fish out of their sight and have fun with them!!!!
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Great story. I don't feel so bad about my bar stool.
When I bought my 15 and a half foot Glastron tri-hull with an open bow in 1980, my son and I started fishing for bass. We put an electric trolling motor on the front and I grabbed one of our old bar stools. Actually worked pretty good but got tired of all the jokes from our bass club so we built a wooden platform with a seat. Then we got tired of everyone beating us to all the good fishing spots so we sold the Glastron and bought the fastest bass boat we could find. A brand new '95 20' Skeeter with a 200 horse Merc. Nobody beat us for 6 years. Then son went pro and got sponsored by Triton and I'm still using the Skeeter.
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Thanks for the great conversation.
BnB: The bar stool up front is a great visual in an old tri-hull. Really pulled out a grin here. Tri-hulls were the rage for years. Your Skeeter is way too much boat for me. I can hardly hang on with my Yamaha 60 belting out 26mph. (downwind) Feels like I'm flying but then there's a lot of illusion when your on the water; like when a power boat goes by you like you're standing still. Sort of like flying an old underpowered tail dragger into a strong headwind and then looking down at the ground just to figure out your actually at a negative ground speed.
FG: Yep, those worms are for kids with cane poles... but then my 48 y.o. fishing buddy is still living out his childhood in about every way possible. Refuses to grow up.
Tight lines...
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Wonderful reading thanks. I enjoyed the story and the visual.
Windriver
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