Fishing at Hidden Valley

My parents have some fish ponds down the road from their house in Jackson, AL. (Actually, they live in McVay, which is outside of Jackson.) So we decided to round up some friends and take a trip down to do some fishing this weekend. Adam, Katie, & Aidan Benefield came down from Greensboro, and Chris, Jessica, & Preston Sentell, Mitch Wright, and Heather & I made the trip from Tuscaloosa. Mary Asher, Mary Charles, Mallie, & Whit Rivenbark joined us from Katy, Texas, and Donna Counselman, Sharee & Ethan Curry, and my parents joined us from home. We had quite a crowd!

Those of us from Tuscaloosa and Greensboro left Friday afternoon and headed down. We got settled in, and got busy doing some fishing. We fished Friday evening from the banks, and then as it got dark, we threw some jugs out in one of the larger ponds and got the boat out for some jug fishing. We fished until after 10pm Friday night. Mary Asher and her 3 came out Saturday and visited with Heather. I didn't visit much, as I was busy baiting hooks, taking fish off, and chasing her 4 year old and trying to make sure he didn't fall in a pond. Meanwhile, Preston, Chris' son, threw a bream basket out into the pond and forgot to hang on the the rope, so guess who got to get it out of the pond? Mary Asher and Heather sat in the shade, laughing, and seemed to be highly entertained by it all. It was all fun, though. Just busy, busy! Those kids had soooo much energy! Mary Asher's brother had given her kids cane poles. They slung those things all over the place. Heather finally came over and helped Mallie, the middle child, catch a fish with her pole. I think that was the only fish caught by the Texans.

Altogether, we caught 65-70 pounds of fish. Daddy cooked some of them for lunch Saturday (along with all the fixin's... fries, hushpuppies and slaw), and we all ate up under the pavilion. We fished again Saturday afternoon and night, and then yesterday afternoon. Adam and I both ended up with 2 gallon sized freezer bags of dressed fish for our freezers.

I think overall everybody had a good time. I know Daddy enjoyed having all the kids down there. We rode the kids around through the woods on the Kubota all weekend, and had no mishaps except for once when I backed it into a pine tree. Daddy rode Aidan around on the tractor yesterday afternoon, and Adam said that was probably Aidan's favorite part of the whole weekend.

I told Daddy last night, that I knew he had to be dog-tired, but he said he was used to it, and that some things made it worth being a little tired. I guess I have to agree with him on that.