My new hunting and fishing boat.

[Ed L.]

How's it going Jim? I've been watching the river levels pretty close. I still have the house up there. It's rented right now since nothing is selling. That was something about the damn at Delhi Lake. That was a beautiful area. That's some gnarly bridge at Sabula. I didn't going over that thing in a truck let alone a bike.

Take care,

Ed

 

[Ed L.]

Mark,

After seeing your setup at the midwest get together I bought one of those solo loading canoe racks. Works perfect.
Ed

How do you get the kayak to sit on it's keel without tipping to one side or another? You put wedges of somesort on the Fulton Canoe Caddy? How did you attach?

I bought another gadget this past winte that will allow me to put my boat in the bed of my truck and need to find a way to make it sit on it's keel and not tip. I bought some wheel chokes at Fleet Farm and while they will work, they are not ideal. Looking for a bette solution.

Mark W

Mark,

I bought a kayak carrier kit with foam wedges that fit a roof rack. I cut slots in the foam that fit the fulton but I didn't like the rig with the boat sitting up. I decided I like it better flipping it upside down and carrying it like a canoe. That way I can keep it strapped and not worry about rain filling up the boat. What are ou doing different with the Hofgren?

Ed

 

[Ed L.]

Ed, my brother in law is from Tampa, and my sister lived there for a while. I used to head down to visit every year in March when New England winters begin to lose their charm. (They've moved to Chicago now--it's not quite the same.) Even without local knowledge, I found pretty fair fishing for reds and trout poking around with the kayak. There was an area around Fort Desoto that was quite good, and then a big mangrove complex south of Tampa that was a "no motors" refuge of some sort. I don't know if hunting is allowed in there, but fishing is, and I got my first tailing redfish in there. I can't remember the name of the place, unfortunately.

We also launched a couple of places off the Sunshine Skyway and found trout.

If you want to tempt the gators, take that kayak south a bit and paddle Myakka River from the state park down towards tidewater.

Just stay away from the tourists feeding the gators marshmallows.

Jeff,

I go over the Skyway bridge every day to and from work. Desoto is only 10 miles from there. I'm planing on making my way down there next Monday after work whilemy wifes at school and checking it out. Do you have any relation in Iowa? I used to work with a guy at John Deere in Dubuque, IA from the east coast who's last name is Reardon.

Ed

 

[Jeff Reardon]

No, the Reardons I know I'm related to all originated in central CT, and none of the known clan has ended up in Iowa.

Enjoy the new boat. You've got no shortage of water to test it on.

 

[Jim S]

Sorry to hear you haven't sold the house up this way yet, but at least you've got a bit of income from it. The real estate market is pretty slow up here at the moment. Never seen so many houses for sale in Atkins. 5 years ago a house would usually be sold within a week of when it went up for sale around here.

Saw some video on the news of Lake Delhi. Looks to be a stream about 10' wide right now. I'm fairly certain they will rebuild the dam, Gov. Chet promised help plus you know FEMA will probably get involved.

Enjoying summer down in balmy Florida? Probably not much different than Iowa at this point. Temp was 75 at 4 am with a 73 dewpoint when I got up this morning. Might bit muggy out there! Beats the crap out of the cold rainy weather we had last summer, we got hot rainy weather this year!

See ya!
Jim S