Back to the good ol' days - Ozark float

It's been a few years since I fished from our family's canoe, used mainly for family outings now.  That changed last weekend as my brother had a free weekend to fish.  He doesn't own a kayak so a good ol' fashioned canoe trip (this is how our dad took us some 30 yrs ago) was planned.  So we loaded the river barge and headed out at 2am was on the creek by 5:30 and floated/fished for 13 hours.  A 13 hour float by canoe really makes you appreciate a kayak and all it's features...what I missed most was my Cuda's comfortable seat.  But I'm not complaining, I was able to fish with my brother and that doesn't happen very often these days.  The fishing made the day even better:

Brother and the 1st fish of the trip, 5:45...not a bad start.

2nd fish of the day.  My brother thought he had a monster for a few seconds...but reality set in and he knew it wasn't a SM....next was the guessing game, catfish, carp, or gar.  It was a great fight and he ended up trying to catch a few more during the float...no luck.

The float was very scenic, the water was low as expected in July, but the cool mountain water was welcomed as the afternoon temp's got to 97.  I think I waded about half the trip and had to walk the canoe down almost every shoal.

Big fish 17"

 Big fish of the day was 17" but we caught several at 15-16"s and too many to count in the 12-14" range.  I estimate we caught between 30-40 SM and about the same in goggle eye, rock bass, and sunfish.  Really a great day of fishing.

 The fishing was off and on all day but the best bite was early morning and late afternoon.  During the middle of the day finding shade and rapids was the ticket.

Another hard fighting bronzeback.

Cool looking river bluff.  Gravel bar we stopped at for lunch had shade and a view.

The float was good the fishing was great....till next time.