Yes you can turtle a Big Tuna, and a few other things I learned in Maine!

7/24/2012 

Over the 4^th of July week, I spent 6 days on Cobbosseeconte Lake in Maine.  We have been coming to this lake for a few years and the fishing is always excellent.  The place we rent has a canoe but there were many days where the wind on this large lake kept me on shore.  This trip was also one of the main motivators for me to get a SOT rather than a hybrid kayak like the Ultimate 14.5.  There is a fair amount of boat traffic and it is a BIG lake.  I was mildly concerned that if I took a wake over the side I’d be swamped and a long way from help.  So I decided on the Big Tuna and this was the first time out on some bigger water.  I learned a few things and will share them below.

Solo Paddling

One evening my son was occupied with some friends so I was able to take the Big Tuna out for some solo fishing.  Wow did I like how this boat paddles solo.  It was better balanced then it normally is with my lightweight passenger up front and paddled effortlessly with a very nice glide.  I enjoyed paddling so much that is was tough to stop to fish.  Well, maybe not that tough.  I caught about a dozen little guys like the one below.

The crown jewel of this solo adventure was paddling back as the moon was coming over the trees.  I think a Yak Attack VisiCarbon Pro is in my future so I can do some more evening trips without having to rely on my flashlight for visibility.

Fishing

The fishing was awesome.  I will let the pictures speak for themselves below but I didn't miss a day because of wind!  One day while we were out there it was a little choppy.  We were killing it and at the last minute I noticed a large wake heading my way.  It was coming from the side angled toward the rear of the boat.  I didn't have time to reposition so we were along for the ride.  The wave was starting to peak a few feet before it got to us and broke over the rear 1/3 of the boat.  This was enough water that the top of my thigh was wet sitting in the high position.   Before I could look to see how much water we had taken on it was gone.  Big Smile on my face again for choosing the Tuna!

Over the week, we caught about a dozen fish nice size fish, but the highlight was watching my son catch the one he is pictured in below with his 5 ½ ft ultra-light rod with  4lb test line.

And finally! Yes You Can Turtle a Big Tuna

This is more a story about my inexperience then the inadequacies of the boat, but I did manage to get this thing unexpectedly upside down.  Luckily for me we were close to shore and didn't loose any gear or suffer any injuries other then to my ego.  Basically it goes like this.

We had plans in the afternoon and I was trying to sneak in an hour or so of late morning fishing.  I was in a bit of a rush so I throw my gear in the boat and launched.  We were a few feet off the dock and I was trying to organize my gear when somehow my Panasonic Lumix TS3 Waterproof Digital Camera ends up in the water right next to the boat.  I reach and the next thing I know I am in the water and the boat is upside down.  I’m not really sure what happened.  There is the possibility that my son shifted his weight at the same time or that we caught a wake but it is pretty immaterial at this point.  Luckily for us we always have our PFD’s on and my NRS Chinook PFD floated me well, I’m really happy with that purchase so far.

My 5 year old son handle it amazingly well and after chastising me for capsizing the boat, followed instructions to swim to the dock and get out of the water.  I was able to right the boat very easily and by grabbing the side handle and lifting the near side while pulling stand assist strap on the far side.  Then took inventory and collected the “floating debris”.  I was surprised to see my camera floating in it's Mountainsmith Cyber II case that started this whole thing.  I had no idea that the case would float.  I noticed that I was down 2 rods and some other miscellaneous gear.  I took this opportunity to see if I could get back into this thing which I could with a little work.  The trick was to kick vigorously and get my weight onto the deck as quickly as possible.  I also found that you can use the “stand assist strap” as a stirrup to make this much easier.

After this I got some goggles and swam down to get my rods and other items.  Man was I glad I was only in 10 feet of water.

So what did I learn?

1.  Strap everything down! I've read this before but it really was a wake up call for me.  If I couldn't get my gear back this would have been one expensive lesson.  Currently looking for ways to secure my rods in the flush mount rod holder as well as a way to attach the rod to me wile fishing.  I don’t like the idea of having everything on a tether but a system where I can secure stationary items when not in use and then transfer to a single tether that is attached to me seems doable.  This will reduce the lines on deck and hopefully be something I can use for both my rods and my paddle.  I have also figured out that the seat straps provide a decent location for lashing things that you may not want to have on person.

2.  Load your Boat completely before you launch! Another contributing factor to this whole thing was that I was in a hurry.  If I had taken another minute and properly loaded my boat I probably would have gotten my fishing in rather then taking my hour to fish my gear off the lake bed.

3.  I need to get the Mesh Cargo Panel accessory for the Big Tuna! All of my tackle that was in the bungees stayed in the boat.  The stuff under the seat was floating.  This accessory should give me secured storage for two extra Plano boxes.

4.  Don’t be overconfident in your equipment! –It wasn't that I thought it was impossible to flip this boat but I didn't think it was possible on a clear day on flat water 10 ft from the dock.  The boat is very stable and I think I put a little too much faith in the hype that this was the ultimate in stability from a SOT Kayak.  It is a really great boat but under the right set of circumstances, anything can happen.

Moving Forward

Moving forward I have to do some work to pay for all these trips I’ve been taking ;-)  Seriously, I’m looking forward to some fishing on my home water in the Potomac River.  I am thinking I may spend some time making some small outfitting mods to the boat and will be posting those updates here.

Big Tuna in the Adirondacks!

7.15.2012

We had a great week in the park and I got to play with the boat when others weren’t stealing it from me.  In all honesty we did do some fishing but the highlight of this trip was using the Big Tuna for some good old family fun.  It was really cool to see how versatile this boat is and I immensely enjoyed sharing it. We really put the boat through its paces this week.  Face time seat time, Tandem Paddle, What is the real Capacity, fishing, and more…..

Facetime seating

I managed to convince my brother and his girlfriend to take the boat out for a paddle.  This only took a little prodding after she found out that she didn't have to paddle!  The spent about an hour out on the water the first day and really had a good time.  I think the first thing his girlfriend asked when they got back was “how much are these, this would be a great boat for us”  They spent many hours cruising around the lake over the week and my brother who doesn't have much paddling experience commentated several times on how great the rudder system was.  The more I use the boat, the more I appreciate how simple yet functional the rudder system is.  It is one of my favorite parts of the boat.

Paddling with Kids

I had the most fun on this trip just piling on the kids and taking them for a paddle.  They absolutely loved it and I actually found that the best way to do it was to put the seat in the solo position and let the kids sit on the floor in the front or behind the seat.

This picture is me with my son and nephew.  They had a great time exploring and looking for turtles, frogs and getting some close up looks at loons.  The most exciting thing on this trip was getting to see a few military jets on a training exercise.  The boys were amazed watching them practice stalls and other maneuvers.  It’s amazing what you can see when you are practically in the middle of nowhere.

Stand-up Paddling

No one believed me that you could actually stand-up paddle this boat.  They saw me standing and fishing and though I was insane.  After a quick demo my brother took it out and went for a nice paddle.  His comment on return was that I needed to buy a stand up paddle.  The kayakers in the background of this shot were bewildered at what they were seeing.

Tandem Paddling

So I finally realize why tandems are called divorce boats!  I took one of my other brothers out for a tandem paddle to see how the boat handled.  The first thing I noticed was that my brother was a horrible paddler and it was impossible to stay in sync with him resulting in banging paddles, etc.   After a few “on-the-water” lessons, things went much more smoothly.  I’m not sure those lessons would have gone as well with my wife.

Bottom line is the boat paddles very well with two adult males in it.  It was relatively fast, handled well and was very stable.  We probably combine for about 440lbs and had plenty of room left in the scuppers.  I was once again pretty impressed and I actually thought the boat paddled a little better with the extra weight in the front in comparison to my normal 40lb companion.

So how much weight can this thing handle?

After seeing how well it handled my brother and I we decided to do a load test safely attached to the dock. +1 more adult male to bring us up to about 620lbs.  Boat is about maxed out; water is very close to the tops of the scuppers still relatively stable with everyone seated.   Add a few kids and in comes the water and the stability becomes a little sketchy.  So I would say that you may get a little beyond the 575lb capacity rating if your load is evenly distributed but that is pretty dead on for functional use.

Fishing

We actually did fish a little this week.  I have been coming to this lake since I was very young and have great memories of brook trout fishing with a few limit days.  Unfortunately a few years ago yellow perch started showing up and the trout have been harder to come by.  We did get a few trout and too many small perch to count.  Here is a shot of me and my co-fisherman heading out for a sunset attempt.

Moving Forward

This trip was followed by an amazing week of Bass Fishing in Maine over the 4^th.  Hopefully next week I’ll get that up.  I’m thinking a fitting title will be, “Yes you can turtle a Big Tuna, and a few other things I learned in Maine”.  You can use your own imagination until I get it up.

Father's Day Paddle in the Big Tuna

6/17/2012

On Father’s Day I finally got to take out my new Big Tuna with my 5-year-old son.  I bought this boat primarily to fish with him and to support some solo adventures.  These are my initial impressions on the boat; overall it met my expectations and surprised me in more than a few ways.  The trip was on the wide water upstream of Great Falls on the Potomac River around Algonkian Regional Park.   This is a wide and relatively shallow section of water that resembles more of a lake when the water isn’t high.

About Me

Before I get into the review I want to tell you a little about me because I think where I come from heavily influences what I am going to say later.  I am a total newcomer to the kayak fishing world, however, I have been fishing and kayaking individually for a long time.  Fishing has been mostly form canoes, row boats, and shore since I was a child.  Kayaking has been all whitewater variety and I paddled almost daily for 5+ years.  This being said, life happens and it has been about 8 years since I have been in my whitewater boat.  My main motivation for getting a kayak over a canoe was that there have been too many days that the wind has ruined my fishing when a canoe was the vessel.   I wanted something that had a chance to get me out there when it was blowing.

About the Jackson Kayak Big Tuna

Transport

This is a Big and Heavy Boat.  I am able to car top it by myself on my 2010 Honda Pilot but I would never tell anyone that it is easy.  I opted for the Yakima HullyRollers and Mako Saddles as they were the only thing I found that comfortably handled the weight of the boat.  They held it well and made loading and unloading a little easier.  I read another review where the author said “Unloading at the ramp was a cinch!” I laughed out loud.  Unless you have it on a trailer, there is no way I would agree with that statement.  I also removed the seats and the Tuna Tank to lighten it up a bit and that did make a difference.  Don’t get discouraged, the rest of what I have to say makes it worth it!

Next week I am taking it on a road trip to the Adirondack State park in NY.  I have some ideas about how to transport with the seats in and fully outfitted.  I will need help to load and unload it, but it will save me some precious cargo space for our family vacation.  I will post and update on this when I get back.

Launching

Once it was off the truck it only took me a few minutes to get the seats in and everything ready to go.  It was very easy to set up.  Launching was a snap and we were on the river.  I set it up with the front seat in the high position for my son and the rear on in the low position.

Paddling

First impression was that I wasn’t a big fan of the low position so I immediately moved the rear seat to the high position while on the water.  There was absolutely no issue with this.  I loosened the strap holding the seat down slid forward and lifted the seats onto the risers.  I was surprised how stable the boat was while doing this.   I later realized that I didn’t like the low position because it requires a low angle paddle stroke.  From my whitewater days, I naturally have a very high angle stroke that works very well from the high position.  This had me immediately wishing that I had opted for the 240cm Werner Corryvrecken (high angle design) paddle over the Camano (low angle design).  Other than this, the Camano worked well and 240cm is definitely the right length for me.

From there I paddled to across the river to an island to fish the shore upstream.  The wind was blowing nicely which allowed us to drift upstream controlling the boat with the rudder.  We did this for almost an hour and a half and I couldn’t have been happier that I opted for the rudder.  I was amazed at how well I could control the boat with it.  I also found that the rod staging bungee cords are a great paddle holder.  It is quick, easy and holds the paddle very securely.  Once we had had our fill I had to turn around and got to see how this boat really paddled.

I was about a mile or so upstream and the wind had picked up quite a bit.  I felt my hat lifting several times and being caught by the strap.  In some sections, the water was beginning to white cap.  I was a little nervous about getting back and immediately thought that I would be screwed if I was in a canoe.  I spun the boat easily with the help of the rudder and headed directly into the wind and current.   I was pleasantly surprised how well the boat tracked and was able to maintain a very good clip the whole way back to the take out.    I am a fairly strong paddler and while a little out of practice, I feel like I have very decent form.  This may have helped.  One other note on this; as long as I was paddling we were good, if I stopped we would weathervane as soon as we lost our glide.  With my light son in the front, this wasn’t a big surprise.

Overall I love how it paddled, it basically tracked well when I needed it to and turned when needed that, what else can you ask for in a paddle craft!

Fishing

One thing I immediately noticed is that I need to change my fishing habits.  As I said before, I am a novice kayak fisherman.  I brought along my tackle bag which quite frankly was in the way the whole time.  This boat is a tackle bag!  About half way through the trip I was so frustrated I took everything I needed out of the bag and spreading it around the boat.

• One Plano box on either side of the seat
• One on either side of my thighs in the bungies
• My tools in the pouch under the seat
• My plastics in the bag on the back on the seat.
• The Tackle Bag in the back dry storage, never to be seen again!

I was much happier now and everything was in reach and very easy to access.  This was a fundamental shift for me that I am very happy with.   Rod storage was great, I used the holders behind the rear seat and my son used the stagers up front.  No issues with either.

Everything else was equally as pleasant from a fishability perspective.  My son actually stood a good bit of the time and was very comfortable.  I stood for a bit and let’s just say it is something I will have to get used to.  I was fine until a boat wake came rolling in and the rocking was a little unsettling.  There was also plenty of room for two people to fish comfortably.  You do have to pay attention but you do not feel like you are in each other’s way.  We did appropriately slime the boat with a Bass each.

Moving Forward

This week I am heading to upstate NY for some trout fishing on some small lakes and then to Maine around the 4^th for some large lake Bass Fishing.  I will try to keep this updated as a rolling review.