Fishing is always better on the other side of the bridge .

Many years ago I entered a fishing tournament at Lake Wausau with my good friend Randy Splitgerber. There happens to be a golf course along this lake and on a practice day we found some bass under the low bridge that led into the golf course waterway. I just had a feeling that if we could somehow get under that bridge and into the golf course ponds we would catch a bunch of fish. The problem was the bridge was so low that we could not get the boat under it unless we took off the boat seats and the boat motor. I convinced Randy, my usually more intelligent partner, that we should take some motor removing tools and give that spot past the bridge a try.

Tournament day we went straight to the bridge, took off the seats, unbolted a stubborn motor, and put the motor on the bottom of our boat. Then, with the enticement of big bass on the other side of the bridge, we got on our backs and struggled to push our boat under that low bridge. Barriers such as bird nests, spider webs, and bee hives would not deter us. After the ordeal we reached the Promised Land, the other side of the bridge. We had made into virgin waters and bass heaven. Occasionally there would be a loud splash in the water around us. It was usually preceded by a scream that sounded like foooour. I guess it was those golfers hoping we would catch four fish or something? However, we did not catch a single bass. Then to aggravate our now deflating hope of catching fish in this our secret spot, we noticed another tournament boat coming towards us from the other direction! We couldn’t believe it. We asked these fishermen,” How in the heck did you guys get into our secret spot?” They told us, “This area connects up to the main lake from the backside.” Rather than taking off the motor and going under that nasty low bridge, like we did, they just motored right up to the spot. Randy shrugged his shoulders, looked over at me, sighed, and casually mentioned, “Another fine mess you got us into.”

-Randy Williams