Back From Vermont Vacation - Awesome!

[VTFish]

Hey Guys,
Got back from a week in Vermont on Sunday. While the fishing was great, I have to say I dont think I want to do the drive again anytime soon (~12 hours). Here's some pictures from my trip:

Day 1: Stopped at my dad's Aunt's house for a party for my Uncle (getting shipped off to Iraq [sad]) and she happens to live on a lake, so I took the rowboat out and caught this 30", 8 LB pike.


Day 2: Fished the South Bay of Lake Memphremegog, an extremely weedy, shallow expanse that is full of pike, pickeral, large and smallmouth bass and yellow perch. Fishing wasnt all that great but I managed 2 get two nice fish, a 25 inch pike and a 17 inch, 2.5 lb largemouth.


Day 3: Dad and I decided to get up early and try for Lake Trout in Echo Lake. Turned out to be a good morning for him, with three fish between 16 and 20 inches boated, but I never even got a hit.
20 inch lake trout:


Day 3 (afternoon/night): Fished Pensioner Pond, basically a wide spot in the Clyde River, that is loaded with Smallmouth bass and yellow perch. We ended up with a nice mess of good sized yellows and a couple of bass.


Day 4: Fished Shadow Lake, which we had only caught bass and perch in before, but this time all we caught were trout. My mom got a nice laker (20 inches) and a rainbow on a Rooster Tail and I got a small rainbow on a Mepps.


Day 5: Fished Lake Salem (the lake the cabin we stay in is on) and did well on yellow perch and got one nice smallmouth (16 inches).


Day 6: Best day of the trip, we fished Island Pond and tore up the Brown Trout, ended up with 7 Browns from 11 inches to 16.5 inches, one rainbow (15 inches) and a couple of 2 lb plus smallmouths.

Dad with his fish:


Mom with her one little trout:


Me with my fish forthe day:


Day 7: Dad and I got up and fished Seymour Lake before packing up to go home, and I caught the biggest laker I've ever caught, 24 inches and 4 lbs.



This was an awesome trip and a much needed vacation. Most of the fish we caught were caught trolling Rooster Tail and Mepps spinners. We also did really well on the perch with live minnows. Trolling Rapalas was effective on the Brown and rainbow trout. The lake trout we caught using a method called snapping, where you troll as slowly as possible (we use a trolling plate on our Force 50), use lead core line to reach the bottom and big spoons, and actually hold the line in your hand and jerk on it to skip the spoon off the bottom. It is by far the most effective method for catching lakers up there, the only downside to it is that you do tend to get hung on the bottom quite often. It is definitely hard to be back at work this week [grin]

Tight Lines,

VTFish (Matt)

[Andyb]

Nice fish...........what size circle hooks are they?[grin]

[VTFish]

Andy,
I kinda wondered how long it'd be before anyone commented on the fact that we kept a lot of the fish we caught [smile]. Just wanted to let everyone know that we do eat all the fish that we keep and none of them are wasted. We do the one week vacation thing once a year and keep a good amount of fish that week, which will last my parents till Christmas time when I go home and do some ice fishing (my dad doesnt go hardly at all by himself anymore now that I am in Maryland). Besides, you gotta eat fresh fish when on a fishing vacation! [grin]

VTFish (Matt)

[RANGER690]

Very cool. Looks like some happy folks. Congrats.

Dayton

[seminar]

thanks for post, i have no problem keeping fish to eat

bob hook and cook harris[grin]

[Dual Force]

killer: makes me want to take a vacation too!
Slade: let's go catch some snack packs....

[herefishyfishy]

VT, I think he was referring to your earrings, not the fact that you kept them all! No prob with keeping every fish you catch so long as they are legal, and not going to waste. Nice report, and some good pics!

[VTFish]

Haha, I think you're right herefishyfishy, hadnt thought of it that way [grin].

Theyre 8's......

VTFish (Matt)