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To break up the monotony of being around the hot desert for nearly the whole summer, we took the kids up to northern Arizona to go fishing on July 4th at Woods Canyon Lake which was one of our favorite fishing holes. It was all my wife’s idea and she had been fishing these area’s for trout since she was a little girl and introduced me to the lakes when I came to Arizona so many years ago.
The trip was a little bit of a drive, and we all woke up at a quarter to five in the morning to drive almost three hours and arrive at the Woods Canyon Lake by just a little after eight. The kids enjoyed having the cool temperatures and looking for bugs, crayfish and minnows to catch in the water’s edge. We took our two Boston Terriers who enjoyed escaping the heat and rode in the car very well.
Due to so many people being there and just poor luck, we didn’t catch any trout, and only by using a bug net, was I able to entertain the kids by catching some Crayfish, minnows, a caterpillar and a dragonfly. I did take the kids for a hike in the woods and they enjoyed walking among the majestic pine tree’s and exploring dead tree trunks and moving aside large rocks to see if any creepy crawlers lay hidden within.
After a few hours we decided to rent a small boat, which they cleverly use car type batteries to power the small motor so they don’t cause any pollution to rent and operate them. We took the two year old, five year old and my wife and I into the boat and we explored the deeper channels of the small lake.
Just under an hour of fishing the lake a monsoon storm blew in and thunder cracked around us, rain poured into the boat and we hastily sped back toward the dock to escape the cold rain. We were soaked and we tried to wait out the storm by waiting in the truck, but alas, it rained for about two full hours and we decide to call it a day at almost three in the afternoon.
Though we were rained out and only got forty five minutes of boating time (no refund even if rained out) was the store policy, we had a grand adventure and this was the first time my kids were on a boat. The whole family enjoyed being at the lake and in the cooler northern country, and now that we have an annual fishing license we probably will make the most of it by doing several more trips up north this summer.
-Justin Germino
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