Struggling to fish

The last couple weeks have been very intense at work. I've been working out of town in Fayetteville, NC. laying ceramic tile 14-18hrs a day. The money is good so i cant complain, but I really miss the freedom to fish whenever i want. This past weekend i got the opportunity to fish so i took advantage of it. Saturday i fished with Rob Choi at the Elizabeth river hot ditch. It was a fairly warm day but the comfort of the warmth counteracted with the steady rain with occasional downpours. I sure am glad that i have the gear to keep me dry! I was very hopeful because rainy days are usually very productive for me...not the case this time. I mean don't get me wrong, it was nice to be fishing, but at the end of the day all i ended up with after 6+ hours of fishing was 10-12 small speckled trout. Not my worst day down there but just barely worth it after all the effort.  Sorry i didn't take any pictures... I didn't really have any fish that were worthwhile anyways

Later that night i went to my striper spot and immediately hooked up on some striper that were in mid 20" range. Pretty typical night of fishing except one of the fish had a 8" long lamprey attached to it. Its always nice to have something out of the ordinary happen while fishing. I think its the real reason I love fishing so much...its always something new. I only fished for a couple hours and i ended up with 4 striper.

 

On Sunday my wife and i fished for yellow perch. We got a late start and could not find any perch but in the 2-3 hours we fished i caught 2 bass. The first one was 13" or so then i hooked a nice one on my tiny 1/16th oz crappie jig. It was by far the biggest bass i've caught in that area. About 3-1/2 to 4 lbs 20.25" long. That bass was well worth the 45min drive out there.