It’s Called Fishing; Not Catching!

It’s Saturday at 4 am, dark out, and I’m not sure of what the plan is other than we’re going fishing with the in-laws at one of their favorite spots. I’ve already prepared Friday evening. We got all we need…bait, cooler, ice, water, jon boat and snacks. Planning for an all day outing, as the in-laws are retired and have both been fishing since they were kids. They’re the reason my husband loves it so much.

Even with looking forward to the fishing outing, I’m still not sure what’s the plan. I didn’t even feel like asking at this point because I really hadn’t fully woke up. At any rate I see that we’re driving about 30 minutes to the in-laws’ opposed to meeting them at their favorite spot. The place is called Cold Creek and apparently they always do well here. The drive is close to an hour and a half surprisingly to me and my husband. Plenty of time for me to wake up and for my excitement to increase.

We finally make it to the county to which we were traveling. A little daylight is arriving but at this point we still don’t know how far away we are from the water. Lol. I’m trying to not ask too many questions because I know it’s been years since my husband has gone to Cold Creek. After passing the huge white painted prison…we soon arrive!

We pull in behind my father-in-law and we all get out to check the water out. Suddenly my mother-in-law mentions a lake up the road. So it’s decided we’re going to bypass Cold Creek…just for now and go try the other lake first. It’s a long narrow gravel road to get there so we’re moving slowly due to having boats and potential oncoming traffic. The road seems wide enough for only one vehicle at a time in either direction.

We make it to the “lake” to try it out before Cold Creek. And, just beyond some litter including a few empty bottles and an orange t-shirt on the ground was one of the most breath-taking views I’d seen. Right there…not too far from my own backyard. Just goes to show, you don’t have to travel far and abroad to experience such beautiful nature. I later learned this beautifully cedar-lined body of water is called Heathright Pocket near Covington, TN.

We each get in our boats and start to venture out staying close to the bank and casting near the trees. The water is calm and it’s body is a lot wider and longer than my first jon boat experience. Maybe about 5 minutes or so of having started something bit. It felt huge! I casted outward away from the bank but was really just buying a little time to get to another spot closer to the trees. As it bit and I started to feel it move and hear the line squeal I started to slowly pull it in. But, I missed it! I was so hurt.

After that we continued on and decided to cross over to the other side while seeing what could be out there on the way over. And right as we started to go, the in-laws decided it was time to go to the originally intended destination—Cold Creek. Since that day I refer to it as gar lake. We were not ready to leave this intriguing body of water that we had no idea at the time of its name. There was no cellular service available which included maps. Otherwise we could have just opened a map app for our current location.

At any rate, we headed back to Cold Creek. It wasn’t that impressive in looks but hey that’s not the most important thing when fishing. But after having just left somewhere that was beautiful and where there was a gut feeling of SUCCESS…Cold Creek was underwhelming. There we were…we went in the opposite direction of the in-laws. We got some good bites but quickly learned they were mostly Gars. And, as I mentioned in my first boating experiencing, it is not so easy to hook a Gar due to their anatomy. But, we were not going to give up at good fight! We actually landed a couple using the net to get them on in. But aside from those two…it was mostly fighting Gar for at least 2 hours.

After a break we decided to go in the opposite directing hoping to find something other than small Gar. But by now, I was so tired of fighting with Gar…big and small…I’d decided Cold Creek is not my spot. Had we been prepared with some rope and a good technique to hook’em we would have had too many Gar. But, it was still fun and just a great reminder to this new timer that it is called fishing for a reason opposed to fish-catching. 🙂 Between us and the in-laws things weren’t totally for naught. Good family time and some yum drum for a good pan fry.