I think most of you read my somewhat ongoing report in the “Lake Powell Fishing” area but if you’re like me, you like to research the dates of your trip and it’s a lot easier when all those reports are on in one place. So, I decided to put a more detailed report here.
I ditched out early from work Thursday to beat the snowstorm over northern Utah and I’m glad we did. The next morning I checked the cameras and it looked less than ideal, especially towing the boat. We had made it to Green River, UT to stay the night, so when little man woke us up Friday morning at 5 AM, we were a hop, skip, and a jump away from the lake.
Going a bit slower in the dark/early morning light to dodge the black cows on the highway, we got to the lake about 8:00. Of course everyone was moving pretty slow, and after making sure we had everything for the day, everyone had their bathroom breaks, etc we launched after 9:00. Friday was our best weather day so I wanted to be out there earlier to make the most of it, but such is life.
We were on our way to where we spent most of our time, last year, by tapestry wall, but I stopped at the sunken island across from Moqui, as I had regularly seen people trolling it on my travels. I pulled got to about 30 fow and there were stripers stacked everywhere. We trolled over the top of them and tripled up, only to return and drop anchovies on them. We would have to periodically hunt for the fish to drop anchovies again. Sometimes we would deploy the trolling rods again while we searched. We had a great day catching fish at will until about 1:00 and had 24 in the live well with a few released. (I was starting this sweat how long I’d be cleaning fish)
The W had come up a bit and the baby on board, he was getting fussy and I could tell everyone was a bit tired from traveling and the baby keeping all of us up, basically all night. So we popped into Moqui canyon and my dad and I cleaned fish and played fetch with the dog, while my wife and little boy napped in the boat. A lot of times, just enjoying the sunshine is good enough for us!
We hung out until about 5:00 enjoying the sunshine before deciding we’d head back to the hotel and cook dinner. I was thankful to have all the fish cleaned!
The next morning we were again up at 5AM but launched shortly after daylight. I asked my dad and wife if they wanted to change things up. The answer was a resounding “hell no. Let’s go catch those stripers by that island again!” So that’s what we did. Back to the island but we started with bait. Catching was okay. The fish seemed to be less fired up. The forecast was for the W to come up at about 11:00. Again, not wanting to chance anything with an 8 month old on board, we chased those stripers until about 10:00 before I lost them. We tried trolling for them and couldn’t turn them back up. They either slid off into 70+ feet or way up high to 10-20 feet. Unsure!
I mentioned “well the wind is supposed to come up soon. What do you guys say we just head to the back of bullfrog bay”. Everyone agreed. The mouth of the bay had some pretty good rollers but when we got to the back of the bay it was almost calm….for about 3 minutes. We started to troll and were immidately met with high winds and rollers. We trolled for maybe 45 minutes. That was it for the day. We released all fish that day and figured we caught 15-20.
The next day we woke up to windy and cloudy conditions. Not really much rain like was forecasted. My dad and I waited until about 9:00 before we couldn’t take it any more and had to give it a try. I had read the reports and wanted to try halls creek bay. Leave no stone unturned you know. We got to the back of the bay, flipped the boat around and started trolling. We trolled all the way to the mouth of the bay without ever seeing any concentrations of fish on the finder. Just 2 or 3 every once in a while. When we went to real up, we were tangled beyond belief on our inside rods. Some very fishy spots produced nothing but maybe that had something to do with it! By the time we got to the mouth of the bay we were froze, so back to the ramp and called it a skunk! I was a little bit angry I had taken all of the ice fishing gear out of the truck to pack for this trip. If I wouldn’t have a pair of bibs and a big coat I would’ve been fine! When we got back to the hotel the sun came out of course…. But the wind ripped all day, so we never made it back out.
Monday we didn’t fish, just woke up early and came home. Got the boat completely covered in salt from the roads. I got deconned in Wyoming and was hoping for a free boat wash but they didn’t do much…. Don’t know why I expct much different!
Lucky craft pointer in shad color worked well when trolling. Mine was blue backed and clear bodied. Upon searching for it, appears the color is “Aurora black”. It almost always caught fish but at one point a Rapala deep diving husky jerk (at least I think that’s what it was) in chartreuse/white/orange really caught fire. We tried a purple flicker shad and a red Rapala jointed shad tap to no avail. That was about the only two lures that didn’t catch fish, although we didn’t try too many. But, it was obvious when going over fish that we needed to trade out baits when not getting bit after multiple passes when every other bait did.
We also deployed gulp minnows instead of anchovies a couple times. They had mixed success. It was nice to catch a fish and immediately cast back out but they didn’t seem to want it as much as those stinky anchovies…which sucked lol.
Video to come.
Here’s some pics, including the best performing cranks.
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We made it!
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A great site!
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2 of the biggest
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Grady wondering what that is…
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One from Saturday
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Dad and I freezing…
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Cruel and unusual punishment for a bird dog!
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Our Easter pic!
Lures
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