Detroit River: No autopilot. No plan. 3-man limit.

We are officially back! And by back, I mean after a stretch of absolute misery, we finally remembered how to catch fish. This morning had a little bit of everything. Mostly bad…until it wasn’t.

Enter Cory and Jake…First thing I notice…beards. Solid, committed, walleye-looking beards. It got me thinking…is there such a thing as a walleye fisherman beard? Because Farmer Joe had one too. I might need to start scouting facial hair as part of my pre-trip checklist.

Alarm goes off at 4:30am. I’m at the gym by 5:00am in heavy rain, 42 degrees, and lightning. Most people would look at that and say, “Yeah, not today.” Not me. No chance. This is how poor decisions get made.

The boys show up early with a six-pack of McDonald’s breakfast sandwiches like absolute professionals. Meanwhile I’m standing there pretending I have a plan. Reality? I had no idea what we were doing. Didn’t know where to launch. Didn’t know what water to fish. Didn’t even know if we should be going.

So I did what any confident captain would do. I set the GPS for Delray and said we’ll figure it out when we get there. If it’s open, great. If not, we head south and sit in a 30 to 90 minute line at Bellinger like it’s April in Detroit.

We crept down Jefferson toward Delray like we’re stalking a deer. Is the gate open? How many boats are there? Are we about to make a terrible decision?

Bam! Gate is open. We pull in. One trailer in the lot. We are boat number two. We have the entire launch to ourselves. That alone felt like a win.

Still raining. Still cold. Wind still ripping. Thank God for Frabill ice gear because this was not “spring fishing.” This was survival.

We idle out and see a few boats working near the Gordie Howe Bridge. Classic water setup…the ON side looks like chocolate milk, MI side is that nice blue water. Somewhere in between is where dreams are made.

Remember how we “fixed” the trolling motor last weekend? All calibrated and ready to rock some walleyes! Yeah…no. No autopilot. Again. At this point I’m just accepting that I own a very expensive manual trolling motor.

Thank God for the electric handwarmers. Absolute game changer. Some random dude on YouTube reviewed like 20 of them and picked a $20 pair as his favorite. I now own multiple sets and honestly might buy more. That was the MVP purchase of the trip. Perhaps Minn Kota should talk to the $20 hand warmer quality assurance people?

We start with a long drift toward the steel mills. Saw one fish get netted. Not us, obviously. Time to move. We run north under the Ambassador Bridge and instantly regret it. Wind is worse. Waves are worse. Everything is worse.

We tuck in just south of Belle Isle with a small group of boats and start another drift. I’m cold. I’m wet. Boat control without autopilot is a full-time job. Cory manages to snag my jig for the second time and is now performing surgery on my best pimp daddy setup.

I grab a bright yellow and orange jig…mostly out of boredom. Drop it down to kill time and caught an absolute hammer. Jake nets it like a pro. That one fish flipped the switch and the trip was complete!

Now normally, one fish doesn’t mean you run that drift again. But when you’re coming off four skunks in three weekends, you run it again…Cory switches to bright orange and sticks one. Now we’re thinking! Then, no more bites, we decide it’s too cold, too windy, and bail south.

Game plan is simple. Find calm water. Catch one more, hopefully. Go home with three fish and pretend we’re happy.

We slide back down near the Gordie Howe Bridge…right where we started. Wind lays down.

Sun starts popping. And there are now 40 to 50 boats piled into the exact same area…Hmm.

I set up in literally the exact same spot we started in. Not close. Exact. Drop the same bright jig that I was pretty sure I shouldn’t be using. Lift once. Fish on. Now we’ve got three.

For those of you who don’t fish, that’s called “things are about to happen.” Cory sticks another on orange. Jake finds something orangey…sticks one.

Now we’re all looking at each other like idiots. Why did we leave this spot?

We stay on it. Make pass after pass. And it just keeps going.

Final tally: 18 for 21. And we only counted misses if the fish actually came off on the way up. No phantom bites. No imagination fishing.

The day started as 40 degree, raining, windy misery with zero confidence.

It ended at 73 degrees, full sun, 18 hogs, and a whole lot of Detroit River high fives.

That is fishing in a nutshell.

Taking Easter Sunday off because apparently people have plans and responsibilities. Next weekend is likely the last walleye run of the spring…unless Ludington blows out and Detroit stays fishable.

Either way. We are officially back.

PS: Wonder what will happen if that Logan meets the Detroit River, or would it be the Detroit River meeting Logan? Chill up the spine thought!