Fishing Lake St. Catherine in Poultney, VT

This past week, I took my boys camping up at Lake St. Catherine. It was supposed to be a Monday - Sunday trip, but I loaded up my car on Saturday because I was rather energetic with nothing to do and figured I could relax on Sunday and my car door locked but would not open. Given the difficulty of finding the rods and latches for a '92 Brougham (I had been looking for parts for a while to fix the power locks and interior locks) and that I had been wanting a truck for a while, I went out and bought a '14 GMC Sierra. I was fortunate that a local dealer had a very nice one in stock and made it up there mid-day on Wednesday.

I didn't get to fish a lot. I had a flashlight die and had to get medicine for an earache and had having to buy ice daily was also a time-sink. But the time I did get to fish was great and we had a lot of fun despite all of the inconveniences.

On Wednesday, we setup camp and fished a couple hours until it started to get dark. I had a bite but set the hook to early and lost it, but my kids got three between them one of them getting his PB.

Thursday is where the magic began. Our good flashlight died and I needed earache medicine so I had to go to Rutland where I could find any real form of civilization, which ate up a good chunk of my morning.

Seeing how well they chased the night before, I decided to throw a crankbait. During the first hour and a half, I caught a rock bass, largemouth, smallmouth , massive northern pike (which I should have weighed). When I caught the largemouth, I actually hooked two fish that cast but the larger one broke off as I was trying to pull him on the boat. Had my oldest son grabbed the line, I would have landed both. I also hooked another fish in the general area I caught the pike but hit my oldest son in the face trying to set the hook. It ended up towing the boat around like it was nothing for a few seconds, swam under the boat and set itself free. I did get a look at and based on the height, if it was a pike, it was a once in a lifetime catch but I think it was a bass that would easily have been my PB. It was only 72 degrees when we hit the water, but would eventually reach the low 80s by 5pm, and by 4 the bite was dying off.

I spent Friday taking my girlfriend around Poultney to the yarn store (she crochets) and showing her the boat I hope to someday buy. I got up early on Saturday morning, so I went and fished from the shore and caught one more largemouth. Later in the day, we rented a canoe but by the time I got the fishing spot, I was too tired to continue as I was up very early on Saturday and Friday and I'm currently undergoing chemo so a lack of sleep really wipes me out.

Given the little time we had fishing, we all caught a fair amount of fish, my youngest son (who usually catches more fish than the rest of the group we're fishing with) got his PB and I nearly smashed my PB while getting a giant pike. I will definitely be doing this trip again when I'm done with chemo and have more energy.