What time is it? Time to get ill? What day is it? What year? Decade? My oldest Callee just turned 10 and my other crazy little guy will be 8 July 1st. The Headhunt is here again for another year and year 12 is something I never saw in my cards. Starting out with the tourney back in the day before kids and before knowing even less than we do about fishing 12 years later seems like a long time ago but not 12 years ago. Back then it was worrying if the boat would start that morning over everything else and wondering if those carburated engines could handle the low speed of the troll and the idle before getting clogged up and needing to blast the throttles and blow out the junk, burn some crazy fuel and keep our fingers crossed that she would keep us in the game. I have always been that guy worrying about the boat and the worrying about this and anything else which I put on myself for good reason in the past with the previous two boats but I have also always had a tendency to put all that crap on myself no matter what which is no surprise to my teammates.
Those first few years with initially three and then a few additional random boats were my favorite years. No pressure not to catch decent fish but no pressure to make sure everyone involved has a good time and no pressure to do anything but get the boat out to the grounds and back. I have never been the guy to want the rod and reel on the boat as I always want the helm and I always want others to have a good time. In fact, I like to troll any and at all times for any and all species and have others jig wire and set spreads which I understand our crew is not always thrilled about and I understand why. Holy shit, I feel like Sig on the Northwestern all of a sudden.
Ok, I felt like Sig for a second but last weekend I went out with my 7 year old and we are trying new 3 blade over 4 blad props to try and get the Jackal up on a plane quicker and to try and work on getting some better fuel economy. Going out with my boy Braden is always great as we cast and get mung weed on every retrieve which is my fault as is the fuel injection issue. To top it off I pull back into the slip for the 1st time this season which I have done hundreds of time successfully in the past and feel confident with nowadays and this day miss my spot three times backing in and out like an amateur. My little tough guy son made me feel like I did 12 years ago in our old boat. I was annoyed and stressed with the struggle as many of you know when you lose control of the docking but while struggling out of no where I was brought back in my head brought to the old days and I made it very clear to Braden that he was going to be dealing with this type of situation very soon.
I guess in 10 years my boy could have joysticks, numerous thrusters, and automated docking from an eye chip he wears on his eye ball but f that. I am not going to lie. I would love a bow thruster every now and then but more important than that and any of that other techno crap is having the time and taking the time and spending the money to get out. Time to get out on the water and time to afford and enjoy the rigs and the tackle that we realistically need and sometimes really want. If I could have anything new this year it would be a someone to help me organize my tackle for the boat and help me build a better tackle station set up of some sort. The JACKAL is a sweet rig but I need a tackle tackle station in the cockpit but I am not sure how to make that happen but if anyone out there is creative and wants to meet me up for a consult let me know?
Blah blah blah…… I am done with my blah blah blah….. Team JACKAL is all over the place right now which is nothing new and me as the Captain of sorts I guess I need to step it up. These days I am know as “Cabin Boy” which I was initially resistant to and now kind of like and I was also recently called the “Harwich Hermit” by HeadHUNT team member E which was perfect and a name I would love to fully embrace and have others fully accept.
The Team HeadHUNT/JACKAL current line up: A great group of guys who could not be much more dysfunctional. Year 12 and we have never won our own tourney. On the other hand being able to always fish our own tourney makes this event legit for us as it is for us what we want it to be for everyone else involved.
The past few years our team has gone from 4 to 6 members which if you see us on the water that day you will realize why we are working on better pitched props to get us up and running.
Those first few years with initially three and then a few additional random boats were my favorite years. No pressure not to catch decent fish but no pressure to make sure everyone involved has a good time and no pressure to do anything but get the boat out to the grounds and back. I have never been the guy to want the rod and reel on the boat as I always want the helm and I always want others to have a good time. In fact, I like to troll any and at all times for any and all species and have others jig wire and set spreads which I understand our crew is not always thrilled about and I understand why. Holy shit, I feel like Sig on the Northwestern all of a sudden.
Ok, I felt like Sig for a second but last weekend I went out with my 7 year old and we are trying new 3 blade over 4 blad props to try and get the Jackal up on a plane quicker and to try and work on getting some better fuel economy. Going out with my boy Braden is always great as we cast and get mung weed on every retrieve which is my fault as is the fuel injection issue. To top it off I pull back into the slip for the 1st time this season which I have done hundreds of time successfully in the past and feel confident with nowadays and this day miss my spot three times backing in and out like an amateur. My little tough guy son made me feel like I did 12 years ago in our old boat. I was annoyed and stressed with the struggle as many of you know when you lose control of the docking but while struggling out of no where I was brought back in my head brought to the old days and I made it very clear to Braden that he was going to be dealing with this type of situation very soon.
I guess in 10 years my boy could have joysticks, numerous thrusters, and automated docking from an eye chip he wears on his eye ball but f that. I am not going to lie. I would love a bow thruster every now and then but more important than that and any of that other techno crap is having the time and taking the time and spending the money to get out. Time to get out on the water and time to afford and enjoy the rigs and the tackle that we realistically need and sometimes really want. If I could have anything new this year it would be a someone to help me organize my tackle for the boat and help me build a better tackle station set up of some sort. The JACKAL is a sweet rig but I need a tackle tackle station in the cockpit but I am not sure how to make that happen but if anyone out there is creative and wants to meet me up for a consult let me know?
Blah blah blah…… I am done with my blah blah blah….. Team JACKAL is all over the place right now which is nothing new and me as the Captain of sorts I guess I need to step it up. These days I am know as “Cabin Boy” which I was initially resistant to and now kind of like and I was also recently called the “Harwich Hermit” by HeadHUNT team member E which was perfect and a name I would love to fully embrace and have others fully accept.
The Team HeadHUNT/JACKAL current line up: A great group of guys who could not be much more dysfunctional. Year 12 and we have never won our own tourney. On the other hand being able to always fish our own tourney makes this event legit for us as it is for us what we want it to be for everyone else involved.
The past few years our team has gone from 4 to 6 members which if you see us on the water that day you will realize why we are working on better pitched props to get us up and running.
