Fishing for alligators

This past Friday and Saturday was our ward's Father/son campout. Kyle took the boys and headed off to the campground about an hour and a half away. They planned on roasting marshmallows, fishing, maybe some hiking and just general camping stuff. Who knew the fishing part would turn out to be so exciting.

Jacob was fishing on the bank of the lake and having a great time when he caught a fish. He started pulling it in and when he almost had it, suddenly, it took off away from the bank but was still hooked on the line. Jacob reeled it back in, thinking he had a good, big, fightin' fish. This time when he got it close to the shore, he managed to pull it out of the water a bit and there is a fish on the line but on the fish is an alligator. Jacob yelled, "There's an alligator on my fish!" Brother Adams, who was fishing next to Jacob, looks over and sure enough, there is a gator on Jacob's fish. Kyle comes running over as do several other dads. The gator has let go by this time but is floating close to shore. All the boys run over and Kyle gets the great idea to hook the gator. He starts throwing out his line trying to hook it any way he can and hooks the elbow. He starts to pull it in and it starts thrashing around and fighting. Kyle had to cut the line and I asked him what he would have done if he had gotten it onto shore. He said that if all the young boys hadn't been there, he, along with the other dads of course, would have wrestled it up on shore and taken pictures with it. That is just like a Winkel man. His dad will be proud.

In this picture the alligator is about an inch to the left of the pipe. Just it's head and right front leg are out of the water. Who knew that an alligator about three feet long would be lurking in the lake? What a fun experience!

Oh, yeah. Jacob also came home with three ticks. Yeah camping!