Brown-Farrell Trip 2 – Fish Cleaning vs. Preparing?

After the dust settled from Saturday’s chaos and fish slime, Sunday prep looked a little different. Some of us blogged, some hit the pool and hot tub, some downed Labatt Blue Lights like it was their job, some puffed cigars. No Lowenbrau sightings (would’ve been hilarious, though). Matt even “took a nap”—translation: closed his eyes for 10 minutes and then got hungry. Naturally, we ended up at El Rancho, where the food and service are always spot-on. Normally I wouldn’t advertise the place because it risks longer waits for me, but: 1) These folks can handle it. 2) Nobody reads this blog anyway, so I’m safe. On the way out, I saw Get Some’s Travis and got so excited waving that I forgot the one thing we went there for—meat rig toothpicks. Dipshit move, yes.

The Plan: Run south of Pentwater to the 46s, troll south in 110 FOW, and not pull up early like we did yesterday. Hogs only, baby. The condo crew was up and perky—shockingly alert for 3:30am. I even made sure the Farrells washed off their sourdough-buttered hands.

We left the dock at 4:41am, set lines by 5:20am, and… crickets. Zero bites. Again, WTF? Almost 30 minutes of trolling and nothing. Just when I was thinking “at east I’ll get a good sunrise picture” — Rods flying everywhere. No camera time. Too busy with chaos.

And just like that, it was two straight hours of mayhem. The dipsys were the stars, taking 9 of our bites. We started in Pentwater, turned around near Silver Lake, and then took the world’s longest, bumpiest boat ride back to Ludington.

Final tally: 10 kings, 1 coho, 11 fish on 19 bites. Not bad for a two-hour rod workout.

Hot Bites of the Day:

• DW Rhinestone Cowboy free slider, 50 down rigger – 3 bites

• Showtime meat rig, 150 high diver – 3 bites

• Red Tail meat rig, 150 high diver – 3 bites

• DW Paddle vegan rig chute, 69 down – 3 bites

• Charlie Special + Money Shot fly, 100 low diver – 2 bites

• Mr. Chrome Bluefin Magnum Glow on 10 color

• Mr. Chrome Fin Frog on 7 color

• Blue Slice meat rig, 100 low diver

• Mag DW Soda, 50 down rigger

• Moonshine JJ Mac TV on 5 color

What I Learned Today:

• Captain Dave (yes, that cooler-is-a-cart Dave) reminded us that fish cleaning stations are for cleaning fish, not preparing them. Thanks for the lecture, bud.

• If you want fish in the boat, put Nick on the rod. Calm, cool, deadly. So good, in fact, that Geoff asked him to be his best man at the condo after fishing. Big fish, big deal.

• If you want fun, put Geoff on the rod. Dude reeled in our dink of the day on a high diver—with the dipsy not even tripped. Rookie move, hall-of-fame laugh.

• Matt Brown is officially my right-hand man (just for this weekend Nick): setting lines, netting fish, even holding me steady while I surgically removed a fly from the transducer. Hero stuff.

Special Shout-Outs:

• Nick from High Point Outdoors for saving my butt at the cleaning table while Captain Dave lurked.

• Travis from Get Some for reports and chit-chat.

• Joe from Lie-a-Lot for the morning intel.

• Kevin from Finlander for the on-the-water phone call.

• Todd from Jackpot for sharing his honey hole (still didn’t quite match his haul, but who does?).

• Greg Magee, the salmon whisperer himself, for talking to me Friday. That alone basically guaranteed us a great weekend.

• And Ludington Nick… two weeks, man. We need to catch up.

That’s a wrap for the Brown-Farrell weekend. Back to reality now. Next weekend, the boat gets walleye legend Mark Martino. Fingers crossed for good weather, a solid crew of misfits, and maybe fewer lectures at the fish cleaning station.