So, I always thought the "it's not if, it's when" mentality was not about me. Until it happened. Tuesday we went to the river, while fishing the shoals in our kayaks. I caught some small hybrid shoalies and my 12 y\o son caught his PB (19.5 in, 3.22 lbs). We decided to head back to the launch... While doing so we see an alligator swimming in the same direction. (First time seeing one in the wild and up close... Probably 30 to 40yards max and closer.) I noticed my kayak was making a bubbling sound. I thought it was nothing major. We passed the alligator and saw it go under the water. Well about five minutes later I realize I'm taking on water and my boat is incredibly top-heavy. My son came to assist me and tried moving stuff to his boat... Then splash, I was in the water. Thankfully I was wearing my life jacket. I was able to grab some things and get them to my sons boat. I then had to get my boat flipped over. Once doing that I realized just how winded I was... I only had one attempt to get on. It was unsuccessful. The boat had taken too much water. I had my son call 911. And we got rescue on the way... Keep in mind I was doing all of this not far from where we saw the gator go in. There was no shore to go to, only 90 degree walls... And the alligator was between us and the shoals... So while waiting on the emergency crews to get there,(who also delayed due to a train blocking the launch area.) I look down river and see this prehistoric head of death moving towards us... My 12 year old son maintained his composer all that way until now... I now had to tread water, hold on to his kayak, calm him down, and maintain eye contact with the approaching death. I made the decision to that I will not die in front of my son. I had my duty pistol on and replayed every episode of swamp people I have seen, in my head. After some heavy duty prayers felt a small limb under my foot and was able to stop treading water. Then the alligator turned and went back down river, the train moved, and the rescue boat arrived... We were safely taken to the shore with our boats without incident...
I say that to say this... Wear your life jackets! The amount of energy used to get items of the boat in order to flip it, flipping it, and trying to get on was way more that I ever expected. I was in the water for almost an hour. It could have definitely been a deadly outcome. I lost my shoes, all my bags of paddle tails and soft plastic jerk baits, numerous styles and sizes of drop shot hooks, Neko rig hooks, ned rig hooks, SMH jig heads, bump board with my blat chip from the first SUF Championship, net, tools, broke a rod... But it doesn't matternin the long run, we are alive and can fish another day. Thanks for reading and sorry for the long post... Here are some pictures and screenshots of the day...
