Caples Lake Official Report

Thanks again Eric for hosting this event, I had a blast as always. I was stoked about getting up to caples and wasnt quite sure i was until last minute, Thanks Gary for carpooling it sure helps a lot and is nice to hav a good buddy along on a long drive. It was also great to see so many of the Sac Crew Guys up there as well, We cleaned up! ...Congrats to all the Winners, You all are obvisoulsy a lot smarter than me for using quality made stringers!! Damn China! ....Yea the fishing was pretty slow, but Ol' Num nuts here still managed two fish, 1 of them being a SURE placer too! . I have never caught a brown before, and was stoked when I did right off the bat in
the morning over by the dam. I did everything right except take a Damn picture of the fish on a the Ruler and put it on my game clip! Instead, i put the fish on a cheap chain stringer, made in china, took a couple of paddles and looked back, it was gone! NOOOOOOOOOOOOO....But why my 1st brown! I had a feeling all morning and day that fish was gonna haunt me and it did! ....That makes two rookie mistakes now, and Mooch knows the first! shhhhhhhh mooch!....Im still pretty stoked tho for getting up there and fishing Caples with all my NCKA Buds, it was fun!.....
One more yakhopper event left, I WILL BE READY!

I'm so bummed I had to miss this - I was REALLY looking forward to it.  I've read so many Caples reports that it's not even funny and thought what a better first time out ... NOT!  Don't get me started as to why.

Congrats to everybody that made it and those that placed.

Sadly, it looks like I won't be able to make the final Tiki event but that's how it goes.  I've got a final camping trip already planned.  I've got my eyes set on next year's event though!

Thanks again Eric, Fisherman's Warehouse, and sponsors!

Congrats to the top three on your win. Frank so stoked for you to take 2nd you
fish catching machine you. See all at Tikki if not sooner.

Jedmo

I would like to thank  Eric, Fisherman's Warehouse, and all the rest of the generous sponsors for such a wonderful event , had a blast  cant wait for Tiki. see you all there

just a couple of pic to add....

OK, just stopped sulking from a Caples Lake BEAT DOWN!

But, I did had a great time up at one of my favorite spots, fishing with my bro's, hanging at the Rockstar motel, partying at yet another cool Yakhopper/FW tourney! Got a chance to meet some more NCKA'ers, and even met up with a childhood neighborhood friend from the 60's - great to fish with you dergib!

Weimarian, thanks for securing the lodge and making things livable, Rob, your BBQ chicken was damn tasty!

Arrived Sat. at 4pm to pre-fish and got a pre-skunk.

Got to the Rockstar and proceeded to party like one...(a OG rockstar  ) BTW, had a blast with all of the roomies!

Finally went to sleep at 2:30a  -  Alarm went off at 4:30a 

Got to the ramp and fumbled around forever finally getting on the water kinda late.

Decided I was gonna fish big lures for big fish - that didn't work out so well.
Switched to trolling med. sized Rapalas in various flavors - nada.
Started stripping Wooly Buggers - not.
Jigged with dead minnows over what I hoped were Macs - Zero.
Went back to trolling, then finished up tossing a Kastmaster and trolling it back to the ramp. - To complete the circumnavigation and resultant SKUNK!!!!!

To top off the day I dropped my wet fly box in about 30 ft of H20 by the inlet, I've had that box since 1983!
Maybe it's time to start tying my own flies.

So, I'll conclude with a hearty CONGRATS to those lucky NCKA'ers who scored podium spots and to everyone who caught a fish or scored one of those sweet swag bags!

Oh, and thanks Eric/Yakhopper, it was nice to meet your family, and many thanks for putting these events on.
It was sure fun to fish with friends!
Hope to see everyone at Tiki - novofish

Art and I didn't make it to the lake on time to fish but we were there, my first event in a long time.  I hadn't been to any of the Yakhopper events but now I understand why everyone likes them so much...he throws on heck of an event and regardless of the fishing you can't beat the places he picks.

The RockStar Lodge was great to stay at. Not only was the price right but the location is great and the guys running it were mellow and made staying there pretty relaxing.

Thanks to Yakhopper for putting on the events and congratulations to the winners...it sounds like you definetely deserved the win.

Great event! Thanks Eric for all your hard work. I managed to get three people to come and fish who probably would have not otherwise, I think they are hooked on these events now.

After doing my research I knew fishing was going to be tough so I got/brought everything I could think of. And down sized lure and line size. I went so far as to re-tie my spinners and hooches in 4lb fluorocarbon (good idea bad implementation) 

I ended up catching one brown on the east side of the lake in between the rocks. Trolling in the first few feet with a 4" watermelon dodger, and a pink/purple spinner with 4lb fluorocarbon and a night crawler. It was a little guy in the 8-10in range. My leader broke off at the boat and I watch the fish swim away with my spinner in its mouth. I trolled back though with no results and saw Anthony so I told him what happened and moved on. He ended up staying there and caught his first place fish, so congrats to him.

At first I thought the loop knot on my spinner that connected to my dodger broke. But after recalling the event very vividly a few times (I was pissed  so naturally I remember it well) I came to the conclusion that the snap on my dodger must have damaged the integrity of my leader from the constant action and the 4lb line test. Plus I put too much pressure on the fish at the kayak trying to get it in.

Lesson, use a small swivel instead of a loop knot when dealing with light lines and lots of action.

Ryan

Strong work again Yakhopper...

  you really have captured what a kayakfishing tournament trail should be...

Great event and I great time camping with the family. I would like to see the next tournment earlier or later in the year and without the full moon. It was the first time at Caples and it is absolutely gorgeous! The fee's in the area are a little on the high side, so we launched from the shore, by the dam.

Caples was BEAUTIFUL!!!    What a nice place to fish (not catch  ) Sara and I really enjoyed the scenerey and glassy clear water.  No fish caught by us, except I got one at the Carson river on Friday.  All in all we had a great weekend staying at Jeff's condo near Tahoe, hitting the hot tub morning noon and night  Thanks again for the fun event Eric!   

Another successful, Class A, Yakhopper- FishermansWarehouse Event!! Congrats to all the participants and the top three finishers!!
From the looks of the pics posted so far, it looks like i missed on some good ol'fashioned FUNinTHEsun  

Very pretty lake you chose Eric. A real fishing challenge, although I didn't produce the opportunity was there. Nice gathering, we got to know and hang with Frank & Bunny. We'll hopefully camp together often. Pam & dave...

Eric,
Thanks to you, Fisherman’s Warehouse and all the sponsors that made it another great event.  The scenery was excellent, fishing not so much.   Dave & I went out on Friday and I was able to get a couple of planter rainbows which Dave used for a crawdad trap.  As you can see from the pictures, Dave’s trap was successful.  Thanks for the swag bag with the FW baseball hat; I left my other one at Pardee, I seem to do that a lot.  Also enjoyed meeting with all the NCKA brothers and families, camping with Pam & Dave and visiting with Snapperhead and family.  See you at Tiki Lagun where I’ll bring tie downs for my new Kayak; even though it doesn’t have peddles, I’ll make it work.

What a beautiful lake!  Never been there.  Now that I know that you can catch some mini lobsters there I will make sure we make it there next year.  Thanks for the report and pics.

Rey