Oubassman and Dan Marino - Potomac Below Great Falls

[DanMarino]

Had a great trip with Oubassman today on the Potomac below Great Falls.

Tubes were the ticket for me. I'll let Doug discuss his fishing success.

I had a great time fishing with a quality guy.

Here's my photo report.

[oubassman]

Ok, now for my side of the story

Glad to get a morning in fishing with you Tom. It's been a little while since our last trip, so this was overdue. We got really got started about 7:30, after I had to go back up to Tom's Jeep & grab my life jacket. I knew something didn't feel right as we started fishing

We were doing a short float & had left my vehicle at the end point. We had till about 12:30 to go a couple of miles & look for those high percentage areas. We paddled probably less than a 100 yards upstream hitting ledge mid-river rock eddies & current seams & some shady shoreline areas. I picked up a little smallie on a War Eagle Finesse spinnerbait as we started downstream, but that was it for a little bit. Then as we started to go around the first mid-river island, I found what turned out to be the prime location for the day.

The narrower lane going around the island had alot of shallow, faster water with a couple of small rapids. I picked up another little smallie below the last little rapid on a Winco River Darter. Tom still hadn't got a fish, but that changed when we hit the backside of the same island. Focusing on the shallower, faster water below mid-river ledge rock gave us 4 or 5 smallies & gave us the type of water to hit. Here's Tom's first smallie of the day.


And my almost 15" smallie that NAILED the a smaller size (08) X-rap in shad color from the same area, but in shallow fast water.


So from there to the take out, we focused on that shallower, faster water below mid-river ledge rock and riffles. Although the interesting thing was Tom was catching most of his working the bottom with a 2.75" tube, while I was working the top of the water column with the XRAP on a fast, jerky retrieve. I ended up with about 10 smallies, with all but 3 on the Xrap.

I think if we had all day, we could have landed some more by working more of the river and the faster current areas. But it was still a great morning with a fellow KBF member.

[AnF]

Well done, guys. I notice the trolleys, so how far down did you guys have to go to launch?

[w2n]

Great trip you two!

[beard]

Looks like a nice trip guys!

[DanMarino]

Well done, guys. I notice the trolleys, so how far down did you guys have to go to launch?

The launch wasn't too bad, but you will need some sort of a kayak cart. Doug's C-Tug handled everything with ease. I had a small L.L. Bean kayak cart that basically had small training wheel type construction. Amazingly it worked well even with little ground clearance and much smaller wheels. There were some big steps that we had to bounce the kayaks and carts down, but once through those it was a little tow down to the river on nice pathways and across the canal.

The takeout was a brutal drag up from the river. We didn't bother with the carts at the takeout.

[Rut-N-Strut]

Congrats! Looks like y'all had an awesome trip

[BigYaker]

Nice job fella's!

That's some beautiful water!

[oubassman]

Nice job fella's!

That's some beautiful water!

It really is. Can EASILY spend all day on that short float, especially with going upstream from launch. If you're up this way let me know & we'll give it a shot

[BigYaker]

Nice job fella's!

That's some beautiful water!

It really is. Can EASILY spend all day on that short float, especially with going upstream from launch. If you're up this way let me know & we'll give it a shot

I may take you up on this!