3 hours ago, A-Jay said:

I'm surrounded by a fair number of options.

On the road, times average out to be about 2.5 hrs for round trips to bigger water.

And half that for smaller stuff.

Could also be an hour round trip on the water as well.

The caveat to all of this is bigger water often means bigger brown bass.

So the distance I am willing to travel each way

is often driven by how intense my big fish itch is at the time.

#lakemenderchuck

😎

A-Jay

I spent a considerable amount of time looking at this map, and did not locate a Lake Menderchuck. Is there a possibility that Menderchuck is only a name locals use, or maybe the spelling is wrong. Either way I could not locate this famous lake. It would be helpful if you highlighted Menderchuck on the map, and a few waypoints marked on exact fishing locations would be appreciated.

12 minutes ago, king fisher said:

It would be helpful if you highlighted Menderchuck on the map, and a few waypoints marked on exact fishing locations would be appreciated.

😆

Yup, I'm working on this as we speak.

Can't believe I didn't think of this sooner.

#dontholdyourbreath

A-Jay

30 minutes ago, casts_by_fly said:

My closest lake is 19 minutes, but between 19 and 39 minutes I’ve got 10 or so lakes I could put on. And if I expand that out to an hour I add at least a half dozen more. Since I am time limited mostly and do shorter trips, I pretty much cap my trips to that 40 minute one way distance. I also follow the 2:1 rule- I need to fish for at least 2x as long as the drive there and back. That means for the lakes 30 minutes away I need 3 full hours- 30 there, 2 hours on the water, 30 back. Of course I try to do more, but that’s the minimum.

I thought I was the only one who had that "funny" self-imposed rule...

I'm fortunate enough to have ALOT of fishable water inside of a twenty minute drive. If you have the Google Earth app, take a peak at Spirit Lake, Iowa... it's not a secret location.

My primary lake is 50 miles round trip. Getting there only takes 35 minutes, but getting home can take 1.5 - 2 hours due to the 77 school zones.

My close to home lake is 10 miles round trip.

1 hour ago, casts_by_fly said:

My closest lake is 19 minutes, but between 19 and 39 minutes I’ve got 10 or so lakes I could put on. And if I expand that out to an hour I add at least a half dozen more. Since I am time limited mostly and do shorter trips, I pretty much cap my trips to that 40 minute one way distance. I also follow the 2:1 rule- I need to fish for at least 2x as long as the drive there and back. That means for the lakes 30 minutes away I need 3 full hours- 30 there, 2 hours on the water, 30 back. Of course I try to do more, but that’s the minimum.

I simply must do a version of this for survival.

I used to fish (as a younger A-Jay) until I was gassed.

First light to last light and beyond at times, and then the ride home was often, and I'm being kind, pretty sketchy. Super early wake-up and all day on the water followed by a long ride home

is a recipe for disaster. So I had to change my ways.

One third of my human gas is used to get to the water and fish,

and then I have 2/3 in my human tank for the ride home.

When I first started this, I always felt like I was leaving 'early.'

But truth be told, the bite had been over for two hours. Why was I still there ?

Half-day trips are more the norm for me now.

Much safer.

Also allows me to safely fish a few days in a row and stay on the bite.

If you are doing the head bob & weave while driving home, please reconsider your actions.

A-Jay

That's so true, being a little up there in age driving home is a real thing.

In my younger years I get what you say, sunrise to sunset fishing then driving home, the head starts bobbin' and the eyes close for a second, ya can't fight it, many times I've pulled over and took a quick nap or stopped at a rest area and washed my face.

15 minutes ago, herder said:

That's so true, being a little up there in age driving home is a real thing.

In my younger years I get what you say, sunrise to sunset fishing then driving home, the head starts bobbin' and the eyes close for a second, ya can't fight it, many times I've pulled over and took a quick nap or stopped at a rest area and washed my face.

Been there.

Hate it.

But even now, just the thought of drifting across the double yellow line and changing someone's family forever,

is gut-wrenching.

Stay Safe.

A-Jay

A round trip over to the park is about 5 miles. The farthest round trip I will drive in one day is about 198 miles. Those trips are only 3 or 4 hours long.

When I lived in Minnesota - I could be at 30 different lakes in about 30 minutes...

In South Carolina - there were about half a dozen lakes within 30 minutes, the better ones were 2-3 hours away.

In Florida - we are way in the southern tip and it's 2-5 hours away for most quality lakes. But they have the biggest fish on average of the 3 states I've lived in recently.

Life is a trade-off..

I drive to another state to fish, technically. I live on the NC/SC border and I drive from NC down to Lake Hartwell to fish. 57 miles about 1. 3 hours one way.

15 minutes to my favorite lake. 50 minutes to #2.

I routinely fish about 5-10 lakes throughout the season depending on what time of year it is and the species I’m targeting.

Nearest largie lake is 10 mins. Muskie lakes about 20-30 minutes.

Smallmouth fishing is further away. It’s about 75 miles one way.

4 hours ago, casts_by_fly said:

My closest lake is 19 minutes, but between 19 and 39 minutes I’ve got 10 or so lakes I could put on. And if I expand that out to an hour I add at least a half dozen more. Since I am time limited mostly and do shorter trips, I pretty much cap my trips to that 40 minute one way distance. I also follow the 2:1 rule- I need to fish for at least 2x as long as the drive there and back. That means for the lakes 30 minutes away I need 3 full hours- 30 there, 2 hours on the water, 30 back. Of course I try to do more, but that’s the minimum.

That’s a good rule. That is generally what I stick by, but never actually thought of it that way. Also I factor in putting the kayak on off the car. I generally only have 1-2 hours on my kayak.

4 hours ago, king fisher said:

It would be helpful if you highlighted Menderchuck on the map

It’s the blue one on the map.

I am blessed to be only 8.5 miles from a spectacular little lake where the majority of my largest bass have been caught. I am blessed to belong to a private fishing club that is 19.9 miles away. Another very good lake I frequent is 33 miles. My favorite lake (due to the variety of environments to bass fish on a single lake) is 65 miles away and takes an hour and five minutes one way. I am fortunate to be close to that little lake where I can run off to after work so I guess that's the lake I'm most thankful for.

22 minutes ago, Brycecover said:

That’s a good rule. That is generally what I stick by, but never actually thought of it that way. Also I factor in putting the kayak on off the car. I generally only have 1-2 hours on my kayak.

I usually do 6 hrs on the kayak.

@Team9nine - a much younger me would drive 2-3 hours fish for a couple, and then drive home. I was spending 2x the time in the car than I was on the water. I get it for the occasional ‘hot bite’ that you need to be there for when you have other constraints. But not anymore. If I’m only going to get 1 hour on the water and it’s going to take an hour of driving round trip, what else could I do with 2 hours instead? Get some honey do list things done instead and have more time another day. It’s the “is the juice worth the squeeze” rule.

I’d depends. Sometimes I walk thru my yard and fish off my dock, sometimes I drive 2 miles to a boat ramp, sometimes I drive 6 hours to southern Alabama, sometimes I drive 2 days to northern Michigan, sometimes I drive 13 hours to southern Florida

Ponds I fish regularly are literally 3-5 mins from the house depending which one in the chain of them I go to. The lake I plan to frequent now that I have a boat is 15 mins or so.

My local lake DNR boat ramp is less than 10 minutes/4 miles (one way) from the house.

Within 30 minutes/15 miles (one way) there are at least 6 more lakes.

In a 1 hour/40 mile radius (one way) I can get to dozens of lakes.

These are all lakes that I can drop the boat in to -- there are many other smaller lakes as well.

In reading the replies I am feeling blessed that I have access to so many lakes in close proximity to where I live. I just wish they were not frozen over for 6 months a year

About 30 minutes round trip when I take the boat out.

20-40 minutes when I fish on the bank or wading.

My local lake is about a 30min. drive. Unless I'm making a week-end of it, I try to keep trips under two hours drive one way. Most outings for me are four hours, give or take and I can't justify spending more time in the car than I do on the water.

I live about two miles as the crow flies from the Castaic Lake dam. There is a 180 acre lagoon below the dam that's about 1.5 miles to the entrance . Takes about 6 minutes top drive to the lagoon plus or minus depending on a couple traffic signals.

Pickwick is about 45 minutes from me. I have around 10 other lakes within an hour in different directions.