Fishing with the Fish Whisperer was Pleasant

STATE # 16 - ARIZONA APRIL 2018 - LAKE PLEASANT

SPECIES CAUGHT Striped Bass

After touring parts of Arizona, Nevada, and Utah, my wife Billie Jo and I found ourselves back in Arizona on the same trip.

Before spending the night in Page near the Utah line we toured Lake Powell with several other tourists on a pontoon boat. Looking at Glen Canyon Dam and the Glen Canyon Bridge at Page is similar to the view of Hoover Dam and the Pat Tillman Bridge in Boulder City, NV. Just as awesome, the dam only lacks 16 feet being as tall as Hoover.

I have been to many reservoirs and lakes in this nation and Lake Powell is the most beautiful of all I have seen. It’s pristine water reflecting deep blue along with the view of those orange and cream colored canyon walls made it an absolute pleasure to slowly glide over this stunning beauty that lies in both Arizona and Utah. This three-hour tour was the product of my fishing guide having to cancel due to boat problems.

We were scheduled to fish in the Utah end of the lake but having Billie Jo with me made it easy to improvise. We both loved this tour and recommend it.

There is one place in the lake called the 50-50 zone where the water is 550’ deep and the straight up cliff wall is 550’ tall. And that cliff wall was just absolutely awesome with the beautiful water underneath.

For sightseeing I think this should be on everybody’s bucket list. Anybody who can’t go can still see some some pretty awesome pictures online.

The next day marked two thirds of my 15-day road trip and the end of hers when I dropped her off at Sky Harbor International Airport in Phoenix.

I checked in at my hotel in Surprise and took a short rest and then met my guide Mike Strole - The Fish Whisperer at his home in Glendale. I rode with him as he pulled his boat to Lake Pleasant for our night Striper fishing trip. With a lake named Pleasant, a town named Surprise and a guide called the Fish Whisperer it’s hard to go wrong.

Mike is one of those guys who has some age on him but is young at heart and that’s a good combination.

Experience cannot be bought but only hoped for once you climb into a boat with someone.

It was still a couple hours before dark when we hit the clear water of this deep gorgeous little 7,500 acre reservoir that has many sought after fish species.

I was only after one and that was Striped Bass. After catching a few they proved to be runners, but they couldn’t hide from the Fish Whisperer.

So that was the drill and added to the fun as we chased them all over the lake back and forth. So I found myself talking to my targeted fish and quoting my friend Grady Epperson telling them, “you can run but you can’t hide.”

When dark arrived the bite picked up and knowing they were unlimited added to the thrill of catching 21 of them before quitting after 11 o’clock pm. Mike filleted them and after I processed them further making them ready to fry I put them on ice. But it was after 2 a.m. when I got in the bed.

Morning came on time and after a fast hotel breakfast at the Quality Inn, I met Mike at the lake and again we tore out on the open water. Mike wore a hat and when he hit the wind it rolled up on the front and I don’t know how it stayed in place.

He may be very well be the Fish Whisperer but he looked like Admiral John Paul Jones every time that hat bill bent back from the wind.

We were both sleep deprived after that long night and early start and so I let this awesome fishing guide off early but not before adding 8 more Stripers to the catch.

I now had an inventory milestone accomplished. My preliminary plan for having two fish fries in Odessa, TX with kinfolks was now a solid plan with plenty meat to spare. But I still had another stop in between at NM. My hotel was waiting on me there booked for this night and 455 miles away. So taking off early worked good for me too. I added these fish to the ice chests and headed out. That beautiful clear lake has some interesting history online from it’s purposes to it’s creation in 1927 and modifications with it’s last one complete in 1994.

Mike is an easy going guy, easy to get to know, knows this lake well, knows Striper fishing well, and it was lots of fun chasing them around with him. He is online at www.fishingguidearizona.com and a general search will find him at Arizona Great Adventure Fishing. He is also on Facebook at Mike Strole and I recommend fishing with him.

AZ has many reasons to tour it - including the awesome Grand Canyon, and Lake Powell which is also a very grand canyon, except filled up with water. Those were what I marveled at the most. But the most fun was fulfilling chapter 16 of Fishing America that proved to be a pleasant surprise.