9/4/26 - Lake Michigan - Whitehall
This is one of those reports that isn't going to be very useful. More of just to demonstrate that dumpster fire fishing days happen to everyone and can hit without warning. This would be one of those trips and of course it was one that was hyped up too.
We had a full crew on this adventure too. The girls had the day off of school so I took the day off and my dad came out also. The weather forecast was less than one foot and rain ending by 8 am at the latest. This is where things came off the rails. We knew a late start was going to happen but no where did we see the rain lasting 5 extra hours. Cameron had to go to White Lake to captain for a youth bass tournament anyway. So we still decided to give it a shot. Of course we stopped at Johnson's and let the girls pick out a few spoons first. The bite had been really consistent deep so that's where we were heading especially with the late start.
We launched the boat and the wind was concerning. I knew things were not going to look good on the big lake. We poked our nose out and headed back in. Not willing to just give up we put a small spread out hoping for some suspended drum. Shortly after the wind stopped blowing and we started thinking about the lake calming down. We popped a drum and June was on the board with a fish!
After that we pulled the spread and poked back out to a much calmer lake. We sent it deep anticipating it continuing to calm down and probably drove past where a lot of the fish had moved to. It was still rough enough that it was best if we went with the waves. We got a spoon heavy spread out and started fishing. The wind never increased but the waves started building. One kid got quiet and didn't feel good. It was time to go and we experienced sea sickness for the first time. The other girl was unphased. We did pick a little coho off a rigger while pulling lines so that was a win!
Cameron did a great job at giving us a smooth ride in (in 3 footers according to the PS buoy). They were legit good ones but there was a lot of space between them since they were coming from somewhere else. June was back to normal by the time we got in the channel and ready to try for some more drum. That didn't work well either.
It was one of those days that was just doomed from the start. I'm not really used to having wildly unsuccessful fishing trips but they happen. Despite all that everyone had a good time still. I'm extra impressed with the girls ability to handle the adventure and just how tough they are. That was the big takeaway for me!