1 January 2018

ROD TIPS AND ROAD TRIPS

With the start of this new year it is time to plan out the year and put in for vacation day trips to take during 2018. So far, I’ve got it narrowed down to thirteen trips that I have to take; although I can say without a doubt that I won’t be able to make them all. Nonetheless, they go on my list for the year and accrue points and prioritizations as to what I’ll do this year. The ones that get bumped will move higher up the list of priority trips for next year. I do this mostly because my employer forces us to send in leave requests in January so they can squash morale six months early. So, here’s my skeleton list for a basic year, in chronological order:

1. Tributary to Erie walleye spawn. I’ve been invited to this one by Muddy for years. It is high on my priority list. Stream running ‘eyes over thirty inches…I’ve been dreaming about it. This is the last year I won’t go. (It occurs in late March or early April depending on temperatures.)

2. Salmon Run - northern Michigan. Another Muddy trip. I’ve been absent from this long running trip, never making one. I’ve heard every story of each year and laughed myself off a chair listening. I can’t wait to experience the trip in person.

3. Snook Run in Florida. Another late spring or early summer trip, I’ve been invited on with relatives for a number of years. Going high on the list next year as I won’t make it this year, although my heart will be in Florida, come spring.

4. Euchre Camp is not really a trip but I host the event. We turkey hunt, fish barbeque and, of course, play euchre.

5. Texas hog hunting. A good buddy is putting this one together and has made it hard, perhaps impossible to say no to even though it is penciled in for late April or early May. I may have to find a way to make time for this one, even though it is a new trip.

6. Kentucky hog hunting. I may make this one, too. I’m putting it together at a relative’s camp with my brothers and uncle as well as our boys. I keep finding out that the way I want to do it is frowned upon by the local authorities there. So, I keep asking, “Whaaaat? I thought you said you wanted them eradicated as a nuisance species…” I figured the way to really eradicate things was to bring the hate, not sell then raise tag numbers by ten percent and imagine coyotes are like wolves while walking around saying, “There just aren’t any hogs anymore.” It hasn’t worked here. No matter; I’ll figure out how to have fun, yes… the right way and use the trip wires and explosives for something else.

7. Chicken Broil, Michigan. I usually fish on this trip as well as help broil chicken for a community fund raiser. A short trip but a good one. I do want to steal an eight-foot chicken but not from or for this event.

8. Faster Horses trip. A good place for an eight-foot chicken. I don’t hunt or fish but I do a lot of other things while camping. Unfortunately, this is an every other year trip and this isn’t the year. We are receiving heavy pressure to make it annual and I’m about to cave.

9. Football Camp-another hosted event-not hunting or fishing related but a trip all the same. Not to be confused with Steeler Training camp which I’ve spent one day a year enjoying each August.

10. Wildwood New Jersey-I’d like to take the family to the shore to visit some good friends. This is a great multifaceted trip with a boardwalk, crabbing, fishing, jet skiing and wrestling. We didn’t make it last year and I don’t need any pressure to put this one back on the books for 2018.

11. Michigan Deer Camp. I’ve only missed this opening day a few times since 1989 and I don’t plan on missing this year.

12. PA Deer camp. There are several camps I visit during this hallowed time of the year and I plan on hitting each one of them again in 2018.

13. Kentucky Muzzleloader Camp-A new tradition started in 2017. I’m going to be there again in late 2018 even if the Good Lord is not willing and the creeks do rise.

There they are; the big thirteen trips I’d like to make this year. I do have a job so I won’t make all of them and others will be very short trips. Some are really just long weekends but sometimes the shorter the sweeter. Before you get on me for having too many trips planned; remember that I won’t make them all and I will be forced by trade to miss trout opener, bass opener, snake opener, walleye opener, Memorial Day, Fourth of July and Labor Day weekends and weeks. Nothing in this world is free.

See you along the stream