Instead of giving you a fishing report this week I want to tell you about just how friends/fishing partners on Lake Erie help a lot more than just giving each other fishing information. Saturday I had my son Jason as first mate and some of the guys at KMU where Jason works came out for a walleye charter.  I was in contact with other captains that morning, as usual, and we all were completely covered with little black bugs hatching up from the lake; and everyone said the fishing was tough. The clouds of bugs were so thick you couldn’t breath. The bite was so slow even the junk fish weren’t biting. We did manage to boat 5 nice walleyes before everyone agreed they had enough of the bugs so we quit early and headed in.

I was cruising in at 25 mph when all of a sudden we hit something and the boat stopped dead in the water. It was probably a submerged log that we didn’t see. I couldn’t move forward or in reverse, so the out-drive was toast. I called my friend, Captain Ed (Eddy) Able of Tight-Liner Charters, and we were being towed in by him 20 minutes after it happened. Eddy towed me in to a visitors dock because I knew we would be pulling Noah’s Ark out of the water.

After I made it to the dock, I called another Captain I work with, Frank Kitrick of Y-Knot Charters, who also had quit early because of the bugs and was almost home to Litchfield. Frank said, “I’m on my way back. I will go to your house, get your trailer, tow you over to Hotwaters, and take you and the boat wherever you want.” I said I appreciated it but I wasn’t sure what I was doing yet and knew he had a long day already and had to be back in the morning for another trip. He said, “you call me whenever and I will be there. I can even tow you over in the morning before I go out,” which means he would have to get there at 4:30 am and then get his boat ready. I called one of my best friends and boat mechanic, Bobby Herbst, who he was on his way back with his wife from two weeks in PA with their family. He didn’t say he had a lot to catch up with, he said “I won’t be home until 6:30, and I will call you when I get there.”

In the meantime, my good friend Captain Rich Benoit of Intuition calls for a fishing report for the next day. I told him what happened and he said “Come on down and we will get you towed over to the ramp.” I don’t have a truck to pull my trailer so I call Cole Carlson who had friends visiting from Chicago. I said that’s ok I will get someone else. He said “No way! You can use the truck, I will get you the keys.” But instead of bringing the keys he came and said he had a break in the day and would come get me. We picked up the truck and came back and got the trailer and off we went.

Rich Benoit said he would come tow me over to the ramp with his Jet Ski so he could maneuver me right to the ramp that was about 300 yards away. I wish I had a video of what happened next! As we were hooking up the boat, I got on the back of the jet ski and almost fell off twice trying to maneuver. I held on to the rope sitting backwards on the jet ski as Rich towed me over. A jet ski pulling a 25’ boat had to look crazy.

We got the boat home and were cracking a beer at 7:00. Bobby was over the next day to check the damage after I texted him the boat was home. Bob Madden of Worth-the-Wait called me and said no matter what I need he would be there.  He offered to pull the outdrive off, fix it and put it back together. Seems the damage was a little more than any of us thought. The shaft on the outdrive came right up through the casing.

All in all it was a blessed weekend. These guys are all right there when you need them. Sean Boutin, Captain Bob Kresse of Bandit Charters, Captain Marc Bottone of My Bonnie Charters, Kenny Thiergartner with Double Trouble, Wayne Eastman and all the dock-mates are always helping me out when I need anything. Everybody felt bad that this happened but things like this are fixable and it’s really nice to know how genuine your friends are.

So Noah’s Ark is sitting in the driveway waiting for the Doctor. 🙂

Better to be lucky and blessed to have great friends like I do, than it is to be good at fishing. 🙂

Love you guys all up to God and back.

Captain Moses