No Fish in This Wind

Our charter out of Manistee with Captain Paul Owens of Quality Time Charters didn't sail. Mother Nature blew from the northwest at 20 miles per hour whipping the lake into a froth and rolling the water over the piers.

The weather report from the National Weather Service predicted winds 20-30 and the possibility of water spouts in the afternoon. The cross-lake ferry plucked a man from the water off Milwaukee who said his boat was capsized by the waves.

We arrived at Paul's slip in Solberg Marina at 5 a.m., but decided to wait until daylight so we could see the conditions instead of feeling our way through waves in the dark. At daylight, We stuck our nose outside the harbor and took the waves head on. When the bow of his 32-foot Stamas rose up and blocked our view straight ahead, we decided a fish wasn't worth the risk. If there would have been a trough to travel we probably could have fished, but the water was rockin' and arollin', reelin' and arockin' and we wisely turned tail.

There were boats going out that did not belong there in a 10 mph wind. Some charter captains went out to catch one fish so they could get paid. Thanks, but I'll take a cautious captain any day.

We took the captain and his wife, Vivian, to her favorite "greasy spoon" in Old Town Manistee. We talked kids and grandkids over coffee and a super breakfast and made plans for next year.