Got out for a major workout yesterday to the Green River in IL with fellow ISA member and resident Minister of Survival, Don (Crazyman) R! Thankfully he had to work in the morning, or I wouldn’t be able to walk at all today. Now I’m just hobbling around with many sore muscles that I forgot I had. Not only are my legs and back hurting, but so are my sides and face from laughing so much!
If you’ve never had the opportunity to fish the Green, here’s a little scenerio. The banks of the river are at about a 60 degree angle and rise up 15-20ft from the bottom of the river. The sides of the banks look like something straight out of the rainforest. My first question was…. How do we get down to the river? I was assured that it was no problem! 
We did make it down without incident, but then there was the fact that we had to climb back up when we were done with our wade waying heavily on my mind the entire time!
Something to also keep in mind if you ever plan to venture out that way is the water level. The gauge height when we got there was 4.70ft. It’s recommended to wait until it drops at least a foot. We ended up pretty much just walking the banks, which gave us about 4′ of rock to navigate on before it dropped sharply into much deeper water. This rock was at a 45 degree angle, which made things very interesting to say the least. We were able to cross the middle of the river in spots, though not many. Most of it was well over chest wader height.
On to the fishing! I kept hearing about all the fish that had been caught in the past from this pool and that pool, but they were few and far between yesterday. Quote number one for the day…. “the fish seem slightly isolated”…. that was an understatement. Don picked up a dink smallie early on, but that was it for quite some time. He picked up a little sunfish under a grassmat a while later. I had just given him a great razz after a couple of fishless hours, and sooner had the words left my lips, my swimjig gets hit in an eddy at the bottom of some riffles. It turned out to be my biggest smallie of the year at 18-1/2”, weighing in at 2lbs 12-3/4oz. It certainly wouldn’t win any beauty contests as it seemed fairly old, with a red sore at the base of it’s tail, and fins all seperated and cut up. When I released it, it didn’t want to let go of my thumb. Just felt at ease as I swished it back and forth in the water for a minute or two. I’d probably still be standing there with it now if I hadn’t just let it go, to watch it swim back into the depths.
That was it for the action for awhile longer. I did “almost” land a pike, which would have been my first ever. I was reeling in my swimjig, and saw a giant mouth break the surface just as I was raising the jig out of the water. Once the jig was gone it turned and disappeared. It had to go a good 24″, and the only reason I knew it was a pike is because it followed my swimjig back on the next three casts. All this happened about 6′ in front of my! Don tied on a spoon, but never could get it to hit.
A little farther downstream, Don picked up a nice 17″ smallie. It was much prettier than mine, but mine was still bigger! 
I did get a nice pic, but it was a bit too revealing. Yes, Don was fully clothed, but the spot was way to evident! Don picked up another dink, that I had on for a minute, we think. Then nailed a nice fat 15″er. I picked up another one that went 13″ shortly before we made our exit.
As stated before, the fish were slightly isolated, but the weather was perfect, and we definately had a good time. I’m back in touch with body parts I’d forgotten about since becoming semi-retired, though I wish the reminders wouldn’t be quite so alarming. And to sum it all up, I’ll leave you with the last quote of the day…. “I’d sacrifice catching 35 dinks for one big smallie!” 