Was It A Fluke?

 June 12, 2023

After my last trip Luc went out again with Justin and had him fish the fly I gave Luc.  The night before I looked through my inventory and I told Luc I only had two of those popper bodies left.  I get a text that afternoon and Luc tells me if I ever want to fish with him again I'll need to bring at least half a dozen of those with me.  Justin apparently managed 3 five pounders with that fly that day.  Marriott's didn't have any of those foam bodies in stock but did have the hard body versions.  I picked those up but also placed an order online for some soft bodies as well.

I tied the last soft bodies I had and a couple of the new hard foam ones as well.  I ran out of mylar tubing so I'd have to wait until my order came to tie anymore but I had enough for the day.  The morning started out with a bang.  I already had four blowups within the first 10 minutes.  Missed the first three but connected with fourth with a four pounder.  Four minutes later I had another blowup.  After that Luc started to get in the actions. 

Early in the outing Luc commented that he liked these flies since the seem to rarely go unbuttoned.  I tended to agree as on the last outing I had a hard time removing the flies from the bass.  On several occasions I had to use pliers to get it out.  Not sure if Luc's comment put the jinx on me as several good fish of mine would become unglued after he mentioned that.  Not sure if it was the jinx or if it was because I had dremeled the barb off the hook this time to aid in a quicker and safer releases.  After the first two hours the fishing slowed down a bit but we'd get fish here and there.  I rewatched the GoPro footage I shot for the day and I counted 19 blowups before my batteries died and that was before we crossed the lake to fish the other side while making our way back to the launch ramp.

Between the two of us we'd get another half dozen or so and that was with Luc sitting most of that fishing session out to rest some nagging injuries.  It was one of the best outings we'd had in a long time.  Fish were upwards of four pounds.  All quality.  All hard fighting.  On the way home took to a new burger joint to try it out.  Wasn't bad.