A Red Letter Day
13 July 2014 | Texarkana, Arkansas
Jill
Thursday was a red-letter day for me, but I didn't get a chance to write about it until today. Two things happened to make it a great day.
First, Bud and I took my new kayak out. We went to Wright-Patman Lake at the far end of the bridge where Adler caught all his fish last March. Bud wanted to try fishing from the kayak. He figured we'd have to go to deeper water to find the fish as it's hot here; days have been in the upper 80's to mid 90's for a couple of months, so the lakes are all pretty warm. We found a place to launch the kayak and I had it set up in about 15 minutes. Bud rode in front as there's more room to store gear on the bow. He had his life vest and his tackle box and fishing pole secured with the bungee cords on the bow. I sat on my life vest and put our drinks between my legs.
The kayak paddled pretty easily. We went out and under the bridge and into an area where a creek must enter the reservoir. Bud tried fishing along the road embankment with no luck; we then headed across to where we thought the creek might come in. On the way we came up to a small island made up of a couple of trees and the brush around them. Bud cast up into the shade and caught about a 14-inch small mouth bass! That made him happy. We stayed out a couple of hours and that's the only fish he got. But we had fun and Bud likes the kayak, so I know he'll go kayaking with me. He also just bought a portable fish finder to use with the kayak and the dinghy. We can probably even set it up to use on Earendil, so the fish better watch out! Bud laughingly told me it would soon pay for itself with the fish he catches. (We haven't tried it yet, it came in on Friday.)
Meanwhile, before, during and after our kayak trip I was on the phone with my friend Erin who booked tickets to come and visit. She's flying into New Orleans. I'll drive down there and we'll spend some time touring and then make our way back here so she can see the awesome sights of Texarkana. She flies back out of Dallas, so we'll take her there. I'm so excited to have a visitor! I'll post the details of the trip when she comes in early August.
Besides some other pictures of our kayak trip, I posted one of Adler and his friend Alex up in the playhouse on his swing set. They played happily together for 5 hours on Saturday. That made Saturday a nice day, too.