Way Late Report — Capt. Sally’s Women’s Retreat 11/08
Now that we're back from Capt. Sally's February '09 Women's Retreat, I thought I'd post this report from the November retreat for the archives. (I am now totally addicted to Port Mansfield and Sally's retreats…it's hopeless!) Here's the scoop on the Nov. retreat — Feb's report will follow when we get our pics together:
We arrived at Getaway Adventures Lodge on Friday (about a 6 hour drive from Houston with stops) for Capt. Sally’s Women’s Fishing Retreat (http://www.captainsally.com) along with a bunch of other Texas Lady Anglers and assorted female fishing addicts. The lodge is gorgeous and parked right on the water – fantastic layout, very comfortable, and owners Bruce and Shirley Shuler made us feel right at home. Several of our guides were on hand for yakking and general mayhem – great bunch, these guides, and quick to share their tips and tricks.
We had a nice mix of guided wade, drift and fly fishing available, and Michelle and I waded with Capt. Ted Springer, aka “Poppie”. It was an absolutely picture perfect day, but we were a bit worried about the high pressure that had arrived after a small front. We got off to a slow start but after an hour or so started getting some takers. We both started off with pink topwaters – skitterwalk and a top dog, jr. – and found that was all those fish wanted – no other colors were acceptable that day. Nice, hungry hits and blow-ups. Not totally on, but a hit or blow-up every half hour or so. We “ground it out” all day: Michelle had 6 big Reds and 5 or so nice trout, and I had 3 reds and 10 or so trout.
Poppie is a hoot to fish with, and we highly recommend him – we felt pretty comfortable working tops, so he just gave us the lay of the land, basically pothole heaven, and sent us on our way. We always knew when he had a fish on b/c he’d bellow “YEAH, BABEEEEE!!!” even if it was a dink, lol. And we always knew when he missed a fish b/c we’d hear “SHEEEEEEEEE-it!!!” Needless to say, we got a lot of mileage on that. In fact, we liked him so much, we requested him again to take us back to the same spot on Sunday. Some more waders joined us with Capt. Mitch. Sunday was cloudy and looked to be a fish-ON! kind of day. It was about the same pace as Saturday, and we went with our pink brigade. We did get some takers on black/chart, but they just loved that pink! The biggest excitement came for us about mid-morning when Michelle started whacking some BIG reds: one was over 28 and one 30”, 9 lbs. Right about when I started to feel left out of the big red action, I landed a 12 lb bull – we think it was about 32”. These big fish had us in hysterics b/c they kept swimming between our legs as we got them in. My big red had me so twisted up I thought Michelle was going to go under she was laughing so hard. He swam into my net before I got it unlatched it from my wading belt – I’m sure I looked like the biggest goofball trying to get that fish untangled.
Michelle finished with 6 reds and countless trout – we let most of them go – and I had 5 reds and 5 or 6 nice trout. (We each kept 3 redfish on the halfshell-sized reds each day, and a few trout. The freezer is much happier now.) The boat and fly fishers did better on Sunday with the pressure backed off a little. Everybody had a blast! After each day, we went to some great seminars on tackle, techniques and travel. This was my first fishing retreat, but certainly won’t be my last. It’ll be tough to beat this one. We’re now calling ourselves “Poppie’s Pink Posse” after this trip. (yeah, the other p-word was tossed around as a contender, lol)
I can't say enough about what a great experience this was — you've got the whole enchilada here, folks. Looking fwd to many more trips!
Julie
