Ratcliff Lake Camping...

The very best song ever written is "I Heard the Voice of a Pork Chop" by Jim Jackson. Ratcliff Lake is a pretty good campground to sit around the griddle and let the bacon do the  singing. We had Warren and Coraline for a visit and stayed two nights, the Zamora family stayed one night and the Morgan and Ali family joined us for one day. We weathered a thunderstorm Saturday night staying nice and dry in the camper but power to the park went out the next morning so with my dependence on an electric coffee maker showing we packed it up and came home on Sunday.     

We called this place Camp Catawba Worm because my tree at home was covered with worms and we turned those worms into a fish dinner. 

The campground was pretty full and maybe it was the Boy Scout troop but Ratcliff was a better choice than Sam Rayburn this weekend because of the Big Bass Splash with it's 6000 entry draw. Here's a photo of me winning the Anti Big Bass Splash Tournament. 

You can see the rain that filled the canoe on Saturday night. 

Luca, Ezra, Parker, Warren and Morgan trash the water to a froth off the pier. Barely visible is Cullen whose main mode of transport for the time being is a wagon since he broke his leg and is awaiting casting. He did as well as anyone else casting from this seated position. 

The Zamora mobile. 

I think we ended up with about 10 fat bream with most boat fishermen scoring on lures or Catawba worms. I was hoping the panfish would be in full spawning mode but with the little cool front we did not locate any big concentrations with most fish holding tight to the weeds. Seemed to be some fish in the backwater right in the brush that were hard to target, especially with the crew I had.   

See that stick out over there, that's called a sickout. If you have not said this do you even know anything about boating? 

Later this week we are off with the camper again to Festival International in Lafayette. Warren and Coraline will again accompany us and we get to see one of our favorite Balkan Bands out of New York City, Slavic Soul Party. We have collected the cds for years so this is a big deal.