Together In The Wild

The outdoors is my love; maybe that is no surprise to many of you who read regularly…still a toss-up whether I would rather be fly-fishing for….well, about anything-or pheasant hunting with my dogs. I guess it’s a good quandary to be in, as long as I stay healthy and there are plenty of pheasants and fish to be had! Well…I do have one more love…one that has grown more and more important over these past ten years; Vickie is a part of me just like being in the outdoors is. Truth is having someone like her around just makes nature that much more enjoyable as often I return home and bore her with my stories of water, grass, woods and animals. Such was the case earlier this spring…minutes after driving in at our home I was showing photos and trying to describe the beauty surrounding me as I fished for smallies on the waters of Sugar Creek.

I asked on a couple of occasions for her to free up enough time in her schedule to come along with me and kayak Sugar Creek…finally, after some coercion and assurance that she would be fine and there were no major rapids for her to traverse, she agreed. Dad and I were already located comfortable within Shades State Park…in fact we had been there, in the same exact camp spot just the week before. Vickie left work, grabbed us all a sandwich and headed north in time to arrive for supper. Supper and some quiet time led to early sleep; knowing that we would be up and at em’ early the next morning on our way to float a five mile section of Sugar Creek arriving just east of Shades at Deers Mill Public Access Point.

I know that there was some trepidation involved with the idea of floating down five miles of water that she had never been on before…but that is where trust came in and to her credit Vickie hopped in her kayak and off we went. I rowed ahead of her in my Voyager and stopped and took a few photos as well as some video of her paddling at me; we had put in at the Davis Bridge access point, and just the day before there was a crew of guys working diligently at removing a logjam of epic proportions. As I paddled by they had told me that there were several snakes that had been ran out and to keep my eyes open…this kind of thing doesn’t bother me at all, but I figured I would just keep that small tidbit between me and the river!

Like usual I started fishing and was curious as to what my river partner would do with her time…I knew she had packed a book and while I had made about 20 casts, and caught one smallish bass…she had cracked open her book and was slowly floating at me while reading. It was a sight that really put into place what I truly had; not only did I have a great wife…I had a partner, someone who was willing to come along with me…to share my love of the wild regardless of own desires. Now…I am not saying that she doesn’t love this type of thing, I know she does-but she knows how much I love to be on or in water while catching fish and this makes for a very special bond when you want to share and share with, what you truly love.

As our day progressed I even gave Vickie my camera and had her film a bit of me fishing from my Voyager for a future YouTube video on the many ways to fish from and use one of these awesome frameless pontoons.  I would love to say that I landed a giant smallie with the camera running…that may be the case on the Saturday fishing shows, but in the real world it doesn’t always pan out that way. What I can say is that she gave me enough good video to stitch together some useful footage for anyone considering buying or fishing from one of these new water crafts. Oddly enough I did land two nice smallmouths, both about 15 inches…and did so while she was just ahead of me and had just given me back the camera…that is the way it goes sometimes?

I had told Vickie that she would have to get out and portage her kayak through some parts of the river as the water flows were way down from what the average or usual flows should be…this is where the funny moments of the day came in, watching as she stubbornly scooted and scraped along, until finally realizing that there wasn’t any other choice; she was going to have to get out, get wet and drag her boat to the next high water mark.

We arrived at Deers Mill right on time and I negotiated the low water just above the take out ahead of Vickie and grabbed my camera and filmed her wiggling, jostling, going backwards, then finally getting stuck sideways; all in an effort to get through the run. I can honestly say that if the water levels were where they should have been…this last stretch would have taken about one minute. To her credit she persisted and the one minute turned into an entirely funny 5 minutes that I have on film and we have both laughed at on a couple of occasions.

As the country song says, “I’m a lucky man”! I know that and won’t be forgetting it anytime soon. I hope that you have a special someone in your life that you can share your outdoor times with; maybe all it takes is some persistent inviting? Give it a try and I am betting you will both Enjoy the Great Outdoors.