12-20-2008, 05:30 AM
Well as most of you know, I was planning on hitting AF boat harbor this afternoon but my in-laws cancelled their plans for this evening which gave me 7 instead of 3 hours to fish.
So we changed plans and decided to risk it at Strawberry. The roads were dry on the way up and we decided to check CCW, CCE and the ladders for safe ice. Just before getting there at 1pm, the snow started and visibility dropped. We saw that CCW was frozen out to the main lake and that some people were fishing it. We decided to give it a go. MISTAKE.
I forgot how far we had to walk from the parking lot to the ice. There was already 8-12 inches of snow and pulling all the equipment was exhausting (but nothing like our return trip. We talked to the two guys ice fishing and they said that the ice was only 3inches and only 2 a little further out. They were fishing in all 4 ft of water!! But as we left they landed a nice 16inch rainbow.
I wanted to get into 10 ft of water so we heade out deeper. We drilled test holes every 20 yards and found a constant 3 inches but the depth stayed at about 5-6 ft. We found an area that read 7 ft and the ice was amazingly 5 inches. Weird that it was thicker in the middle. We should have kept going into deeped water. Lesson learned.
We set up the tent and started fishing and noticed that although we were in 7 ft, there was 3-4 ft of growth under most holes. LAME. But we decided to try it anyways and right away BAM, a nice 20 inch cutt.
In the next 10 minutes I pulled in two 18 inch identical cutts and we were seeing quite a few cutts swimming around. It was really neat watching them cutts enhale our jig. Our jigs were only 2-4 ft beneath the holes and we could see everything perfectly.
Then a huge 23-24inch cutt came and enhaled my ice cutter and I set the hook but it popped out right as i got it to the hole. Darn. @ minutes later another 23-24incher sucked in and I missed the hook set. Darn again.
I landed another 2 or 3 slot cutts and then the storm came. Wind and snow like nothing else. I had to go stake the shelter down as the wind kept collapsing it. And the fishing DIED. For the next two hours we didn't see one more fish. It was so weird to see a fish every 5-10 minutes to nothing as soon as the storm blasted in. We wanted to move deeper but no way we were moving in that crazy weather.
Finally just before dark we missed the hook set on 3 or 4 more and decided to call it a day. Since we will be back up on Monday, no need to freeze our cajelos off just yet.
We stepped outside to 8-12 iches of new snow. It took us 1.5 hours to hike our gear back to the car with snow drifts above our knees. I have never been so tired in my life.
After a quick Arbys meal in Heber we made the normally one hour drive to Provo in almost 2 hours.
I would say that the berry is still afew days off from having safe ice in most of the good areas in water that is at least 10 ft deep. Hopefully by Monday.
I took pictures but lef the camea in the car. Nothing to brag about.
And fuzzy, leave my tigers alone!![:p]
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So we changed plans and decided to risk it at Strawberry. The roads were dry on the way up and we decided to check CCW, CCE and the ladders for safe ice. Just before getting there at 1pm, the snow started and visibility dropped. We saw that CCW was frozen out to the main lake and that some people were fishing it. We decided to give it a go. MISTAKE.
I forgot how far we had to walk from the parking lot to the ice. There was already 8-12 inches of snow and pulling all the equipment was exhausting (but nothing like our return trip. We talked to the two guys ice fishing and they said that the ice was only 3inches and only 2 a little further out. They were fishing in all 4 ft of water!! But as we left they landed a nice 16inch rainbow.
I wanted to get into 10 ft of water so we heade out deeper. We drilled test holes every 20 yards and found a constant 3 inches but the depth stayed at about 5-6 ft. We found an area that read 7 ft and the ice was amazingly 5 inches. Weird that it was thicker in the middle. We should have kept going into deeped water. Lesson learned.
We set up the tent and started fishing and noticed that although we were in 7 ft, there was 3-4 ft of growth under most holes. LAME. But we decided to try it anyways and right away BAM, a nice 20 inch cutt.
In the next 10 minutes I pulled in two 18 inch identical cutts and we were seeing quite a few cutts swimming around. It was really neat watching them cutts enhale our jig. Our jigs were only 2-4 ft beneath the holes and we could see everything perfectly.
Then a huge 23-24inch cutt came and enhaled my ice cutter and I set the hook but it popped out right as i got it to the hole. Darn. @ minutes later another 23-24incher sucked in and I missed the hook set. Darn again.
I landed another 2 or 3 slot cutts and then the storm came. Wind and snow like nothing else. I had to go stake the shelter down as the wind kept collapsing it. And the fishing DIED. For the next two hours we didn't see one more fish. It was so weird to see a fish every 5-10 minutes to nothing as soon as the storm blasted in. We wanted to move deeper but no way we were moving in that crazy weather.
Finally just before dark we missed the hook set on 3 or 4 more and decided to call it a day. Since we will be back up on Monday, no need to freeze our cajelos off just yet.
We stepped outside to 8-12 iches of new snow. It took us 1.5 hours to hike our gear back to the car with snow drifts above our knees. I have never been so tired in my life.
After a quick Arbys meal in Heber we made the normally one hour drive to Provo in almost 2 hours.
I would say that the berry is still afew days off from having safe ice in most of the good areas in water that is at least 10 ft deep. Hopefully by Monday.
I took pictures but lef the camea in the car. Nothing to brag about.
And fuzzy, leave my tigers alone!![:p]
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] It is always a big thrill to see them fish hit through the holes. [/#000000][/font]