Day One: The drive to the Potomac is relatively close, but you never know with the traffic on I95. Plus, this event is going out of the Virginia side, a traffic nightmare. I will arrive at my hotel for the week, only to learn that they do not allow drop cords run outside the room window. So it is off to find another hotel, a major challenge in this traffic while pulling a boat. After about 3 hours, I finally secure a room for the week. I had hoped that since we were going out of Va., the gas price would be not as high. It is still high at $2.20 a gallon. It will play a major roll in wether I will practice way south.
Day Two: Today is a scorcher of a day. The DC area will set a record for high temps, reaching close to 100, and with the heat index, feel like 120 ! By daybreak, my shirt is already wet from sweat just launching the boat. I have never seen the river water temps so high. I was here earlier for the FLW, and the temps are close to 20 degrees higher. And the river looks like a whole new river to me, I can't hardly recognize any where I fished in the spring. The grass has exploded, I guess due from the heat and clear water. But places I fished in the FLW are so matted over, I can't even get within 100 yards of the shoreline. I run to a couple docks I like, and the grass has choked them to the point I couldn't fish them if I had a lawnmower. Its really amazing, the pads are choked with grass, as is the bays, creeks and just about everywhere. Today will not go too good as far as size, just small keepers. And the heat was so bad, it was hard to even breathe. I think I drank 2 gallons of water.
Day Three: Today, I plan on going up North. During the FLW, reports that the grass was gone up there has me thinking perhaps it will be a better place to go, less grass. The heat is forecast again today. Its hard to focus when its almost 100 by 10 am. As I run up North, my alarm goes off. I notice on my PSI, I have limited water pressure. The area I put in today was basically a grass field, so I figure I got grass covering my intake. After a few back and forth, I'm back on plane. Everything seems to be fine until I reach a no wake zone, and then my alarm goes off again. No water pressure. I pull over to some shallow water, check the intake, climb out and even look at the pee hole. Everything looks ok. But its not. My alarm will continue to sound, and little water pressure. I think my water pump has gone. I call Bump to see where he is. He agrees to come pull me in if I can't make it back to the ramp. I will make it eventually. This is not good. There will be no service crew here until 2 days, and there will likely not be a Mercury service crew here period.
Day Four: The task today is to find a mechanic or dealer who is willing to look at my motor. I don't have a good feeling about this one. The first dealer I go to brushes me off, says no way I can expect to get anyone to look at it today or less than a week. Not what I want to hear. I remember how Mare Marine stated at the FLW meeting they would do anything to help us fishermen. Bad thing about that, we were on the Maryland side, where they are located. As I look up the phone number, I find that Mare Marine also has an annex dealership about an hour away. Off I go. When I arrive, I am greeted by a salesmen, he is very friendly, even calls the mechanic up to talk to me. To my amazement, he tells me to pull it around to the service bay. I explain to him what it did, and give him my shade tree opinion, its the water pump. He quickly replies, "I have never seen a Mercury water pump go out on a 4 year old motor, must less one like mine, just months old. He agrees to start with that though. After about an hour, he says, "yep, just like I figured, the water pump is good. That's the good news, the bad news is that it can only be one other thing, the head gasket has came unsealed, allowing the water to escape out the exhaust." Now I get worried, really worried.
After a few quiet moments, what seemed like an eternity, he says, "I will pull the head off and check". Man, am I relieved !! This takes about another hour, and after inspection, that's the problem. I'm thinking, ok, we replace the gasket, I'm on my way. Whoa Nellie. The mechanic says they don't have any instock, not a common problem, so he will have to do a search on the web to see if he can locate one. Now I am Really Nervous !! We are down a couple calls with not much luck, when a dealership on the other side of DC says they have one. He tells me if I go get it, he will try and replace it today. "IF I CAN GET BACK", he smirks. The bridge is out in DC, the traffic is bad, and its gonna run me getting in the afternoon DC traffic. But off I go with high hopes. On the way north on I95, its becomes very apparent what he was referring to, south bound I95 is backed up for miles.
Ironically, the dealer that has the gasket is the first dealer I went to with no help. While the guy is writing up a ticket, I make the comment, "isn't that a warranty item"? He quickly snaps back at me, "Not with me Jack! You better be glad you even got someone to look at it, must less fix it." I will not utter another word, no need to press my luck further. Out the door I go, I95 south awaits !
When I hit the on ramp for I95, I can see traffic for miles in both directions, going no where. This is crazy ! I wonder if I can get a police escort. Heck, I wonder if a police escort can even get here. I am really getting nervous, time is wasting. I decide to take a chance and run some back roads parallel with I95. At first, this seems like a good idea, till I realize allot more had the same idea. The traffic is moving, be it slow, but moving. No way I could live up here and deal with this traffic day in and day out. It will take me over an hour to go a few miles, but I do manage to snake my way back into moving traffic on I95 south. Time is not on myside.
Finally I find myself back at the dealership, only to see he has started working on another rig. He calls me over and quickly says, "it time you get down and dirty". Well, Ok........ I guess. My task, is for me to take a razor and remove the old gasket from the head. Nothing but roll up my sleeves and get to it. After about an hour, three inspections by the mechanic in which I don't pass, I finally get it done. There has got to be a better way to remove a gasket than using a regular shaving razor blade.
As the mechanic begins putting my head back together, he gets a page, got a phone call. I can tell by his reaction, something is not righteous here. He hangs up, says my dog is sick, I got to go take' em to the vet. NOW I am Really getting Nervous. After getting a "no" from the first dealer, after a mad dash up I95, after 10 blisters on my hands, I'm going to get sidelined because a dog is sick? This makes for nervous moments for all. I can tell the mechanic is upset, worried over his dog, he can tell I am nervous, worried about not having a boat to fish out of. To make a long story short, the mechanic will take the time to get my motor back up and hopefully running as good as new. A test on the river tomorrow will give that answer. I thank everyone involved, wish the guy luck with his dog and leave.
Day Five: It has been a restless couple nites. First, not knowing if I would have a boat, last night not knowing if it is fixed. A quick stop at the gas pumps, what a painful stop. Gas has gone up almost .90 cents since we arrived, now at $2.68 a gal. I hit the river early, the motor fires up, purrs like a kitten. I run across the river, no alarm, and normal water pressure. It is fixed ! My first stop, I sit there and realize how fortunate I was to have found a dealership with people who cared, took the time to help me. I cannot say "thank you" enough. Mare Marine of Aqua is a dealership the area should be grateful is there. Back to fishing. I got one short day to finally practice. Its been hectic not being able to practice since I am just outside the top 10 overall in points. With the river so different, it will be hard to just go fishing. But that is what I will have to do. A major electrical storm will hit around noon, runs me off the river. The lightning is just to sharp, while the rain is heavy, to stay in harms way. The pairings meeting is tonight.
Tournament Day 1: My co-angler partner today is from NC. Last nite at the pairings meeting, I told him of my lack of practice, that we were just going to go practice today, see what happens. He made the comment that we should just go to a large community hole and fish. This is something I too have considered. We are middle of the pack in blast off, I use this time to decide where to go. I will go to the community grassbed. When I arrive, there is already about 20 boats there. I settle in amongst them. We immediately begin catching fish, non-keeper size fish. Boat after boat continues to roll into the grass bed. It gets so crowded, it becomes hard to cast without throwing at another boat. I can't fish like this, so I ponder leaving when I will land a keeper. After about 20 minutes more fighting the crowd, I leave. The day will be a slow one, catching only a few keepers and finding myself about middle of the pack in standings. It could be worse, I could have been on my way home or fishing by trolling motor only. I still have a chance to remain close to the top 10 in points if I can catch a few tomorrow.
Tournament Day 2: Today I will avoid the community grass beds. My co-angler today is from West Va. I think my best chance is to go to area's that I have confidence in and fish. My first stop, I have a 3 pound fish eat my topwater, only to bury down in the grass on come off. My co-angler will quickly experience the same faith. After an hour, we move on. The sun is high, no wind, so I decide to run around, look for any wood I can get to from the grass. I will quickly lose a nice keeper. This is not how I wanted to start the day. The day will be hot and long. I will catch two small keepers and fall in the overall standings. This turns out to be one frustrating week. I had looked forward to the Potomac event, and guess should thank my lucky stars that I found some good people, at a good dealership, that cared enough to make things right for me to be able to fish. I got points because of this, I could have gotten a quick exit home.
