An Early Morning Late Start

Well, I planned to get out early and take the morning off yesterday. John
Apple was going to come along. We planned to run up the low section of the
river between Mexico and Laguna Dam.

John called me a bout 2:30am and said he was going to haev to cancel as he
was feeling like cr^p. I decided I didn't want to run a very shallow stump
and sandbar infested section of river inthe dark without anybody along for
moral support when I put her out of the water.

It was a good thing I didn't get out in the morning. I had forgetten about
a dental appoint to have a new procelain crown put in. You sh9ould se my
new smile. :^)

Anyway, as the afternoon started to roll around I gave John a call to see
how he was doing. Much better and ready to go if I still wanted to. Cool.
It was an adventure from the start. We launched at West Wetlands Park
ramp... well actually below the ramp as it was completely out of the water.
We took three passes to find a spot deep enough to float the boat. On the
first attempt we couldn't flaot the boat off the trailer. On our second
pass we missed the deep hole we wer aiming for and only one side of the
trailer dropped into the hole. The boat still didn't want to float off, but
trailer didn't want to vcome out of the hole either. I spun the tires and
we were stuck. I had to leave the traielr and boat in the river, fill in
the holes, and flatten the tires to pull the truck out. After I had the
truck on solid ground I pulled the trailer out of the river with a long
rope. On the third attempt we found a spot deep enough we could push the
boat off the trailer. After parking the truck we headed up river.

To start out I wanted to see if I could make it all the way up to Laguna Dam
in my 16' Waco jon boat. I think if I decided to make this a regular thing
I'ld invest in a big mud motor. I can't even begin to count the number of
times I bounced over a hump or sandbar or had to stop and clean vegetation
off the prop.

About a quarter mile below the confluence of the Gila River I spotted a
canoe sunk in three or four feet of water. Just for the heck of it I
decided to take a look. John grabbed ahold of the bow as I backed the boat
out. He was able to slide enough water out of it so that I could drag it
over to a nearby beach and dump the rest of the water out. It was a
fiberglass and wood canoe that had obviously been in the water for a long
time. Most of the wood had rotted away, but the fiberglass hull was in
pretty good shape except for the two big holes along the keel.

Now I don't have any use for a leaky canoe, but I got it in my mind that we
were going to drag that thing back down river on our way back. I found
chunk of somebody's old blue jeans laying in the mud. I soakedit down and
rinsed out the mud. We tore it in two and wrapped up each section into a
roll that we stuffed into the holes in the hull of the canoe. Looked ok. I
flipped it upside and on the beach, and we headed on up the river.

After wading over several sections I decided to put the Waco up on step and
try to shoot over the shallow areas. It worked pretty good, but a hump or
two did catch me unawares. At 20mph going over a hump isn't too bad, and I
still have a chance to cut throttle before the motor over revs. Soemwhere
along the way my prop hub gave up the ghost. Couldn't run it over 2000 rpm
without slipping. No big deal. I had put on an old beat up aluminum prop
figuring it would get trashed ona run like that anyway. According to the
GPS we were about a mile from Laguna Dam when I decided to do a little
fishing and drift back down river. The first place I tried I caught a
scrappy 12" bronze bac... er largemouth. He was so bronze I had to look
twice to verify it was a largemouth. In two other locations I had noted on
the way up we caught bass right were I figured they would be. Nothing
special. No keepers, but we did pick up a dozen 12" bass in a short time.
They were all on the bank or between a grass bed and the bank. I spent some
time fishing fishing the outside edge of one grass bed were a slightly
deeper current channel kept it clear, but didn't get any bites on the
outside. John did a get one bite tossinga senko int the openings inthe
middle of the grass bed.

As it started to get dark we decided if we going to continue tilting at
windmills... I mean salvaging junk canoes... we headed back down the river.
The rags we had stuffed into the holes had dried into semi hard plugs. Lets
see.... yup it floats. Off we went. Sadly the prop hub slip kept getting
worse and worse, and in the dark it was impossible to dodge all the humps,
weedbeds, and sandbarr/flats. Three miles or so above Yuma I had to switch
over to the trolling motor. Shortly after that we were passed by a pair of
couples heading down river in some Yuma Parks and Recs canoes. I had to
wade one more time under the fourth avenue bridge as the water got too
shallow to float the Waco with both our carcasses onboard. Shortly
afterwards we made it back to the "ramp."

Loading the boat was no big deal. We put in on the same line were we had
launched, and I waded out back to push it on the trailer while John cranked
the winch. Now what to do with that junk canoe we dragged back for no good
reason I could think of. John actually wanted it. He plans to fix it up.
Bah! That means I'll have to help. I'm the one who actually knows
something about building boats and working with fiberglass. I already havea
good canoe. Oh, well. Reworking his "new" canoe should keep him out of
trouble on a few of those hot summer nights.

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