Fishing and Severe weather

This weekend Todd and I went to my father-in-laws cabin for a Bass fishing tournament. It's just a little made up tournament between friends. We all toss in 20 bucks and fish for the money and bragging rights.

Friday.
Todd and I left my house at about 8:45am. We got to the cabin just before noon. It was windy. White caps on the lake and a constant 30 mph wind. So no fishing. We just hung out and as more people arrived, the wind started to die off. By dinner time the wind had calmed down enough for a bon fire.

Saturday.
4:00 am. Up. Dressed. 4:30 drive to the launch. Put boat in water. Drive boat to Al's dock. 5:00 am. GO!! Todd and I took off only to watch everyone else in their fancy new and fast boats blast past us. So I told Todd that we may as well head to the farthest point and work our way back. That's what we did. We headed to the adjoining lake and got two fish in the live well right away. Off to a good start. Worked our way back to the main lake and hit our next spot. Boom. Todd catches a 20" walleye on a bass jig.

By 8:00 am we had our 6 fish + 1 walleye, and we were off to measure up and clear some space in Todd's live well (an old cooler with an air-rator suctioned to the bottom). We found Al and measured our fish, took off for the cabin to put the walleye in the live box at the dock and take a potty break. Back out we go. By 12:00 pm, when the tournament had ended, Todd and I had a total on our 6 biggest fish of 88 1/4 inches. I thought we were doing pretty good. We loaded up the boat and headed back to the cabin. We came in 4th out of 5 teams. The winning team's 6 fish measured 105 inches.

Saturday afternoon.
Lunch and a nap. A few beers, and it's time for a fish fry. After dinner, everyone decided to head back out and hit the evening bite. 6:30 pm boat's in the water. Headed to the first spot and noticed that there was a pretty heavy cloud headed our way. We didn't think any thing of it. We thought maybe we'd get a sprinkle. About 7:15 I turned and looked at the sky and noticed that the cloud had turned into a pretty significant wall cloud, but it was off quite a ways yet. The sun was still out and Greg was still fishing next to us.

7:30ish. I look at the sky again and see that it has moved closer and that there was now thunder and lightning. Todd says, "I'm ready when your ready." I say, "lets go then." Off we go. The ride in Todd's boat is not fast but I figured we'd have a chance to at least get to the launch before the rain. Wrong! We got about half way to the launch and I looked up and the cloud had caught up to us and I could see that it was moving faster than us. I then turned and looked back to see if Greg had left yet. I didn't see him. Then I looked forward again and he was in front of us. I then looked back across the lake and I could see the wind coming. Turned back around and we hit Greg's wake. Soaked! Then the rain came. It wasn't raining that hard, but when the wind hit, it was blowing so hard that it was actually sucking water off the lake and blowing it at us. The waves would only make it so high and the wind just ripped them apart. We were heading straight for the dock, and I told Todd to just beach it. He came in full throttle and turned the key off at the end of the dock and we still slammed into the side of it. The wind blew us off our forward course that quick. I would estimate that the wind's were easily a constant 70 mph. We pulled the boat up on shore as best we could, and waited it out. It was short lived. Maybe 15 minutes. When we went back down to the boat it had filled with water. It was almost submerged in the back. We bailed as much as we could and then hand loaded it on the trailer. Got it out and pulled the plug. It drained for another 10 minutes.

In the mean time Al had drove to the access to make sure that we all got off the lake OK. He said that a tornado had touched down in New London, which was about 4 miles from us. He also said that he watched the funnel cloud forming over the lake from his cabin.

Once the boat had finished draining, we put the plug back in, backed it back into the water and reloaded it onto the trailer. Pulled it out and made our way back to the cabin. By the time we got back the sun was back out. I'd say the whole storm lasted 45 minutes tops. I changed clothes and had a beer or ten.

That was by far the most intense weather I have ever been in. At no time did I really feel my life was threatened, but looking back, had we stayed 5 minutes longer in that spot before leaving, things could have been a lot worse.