Small boat and big waves

[AWS]

I hunted the Potholes Res. out of a power canoe for years and like others have said there are access points all around the lake so you should have no trouble launching and getting to a hunting spot without having to cross open water on the windward side of the lake.  I'm always prepared to spend the night also if I do get caught where the weather is to bad to get back to the landing.  My big fear is fog out on the lake as there are so any guys running GPS coordinates to their blind and they run faster than they can see, I've had a couple of close calls.  I did ave one happy moment when one of the must have entered the wrong coordinates and run their boat about 30' up the bank in the fog.

[Stein]

If you are exposed to 35, it will suck and you will get wet - if everything works out well.  The thing about those conditions is that if you lose power or take on water, bad things happen fast.


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[Bill W]

During my years of duck hunting and fishing I've almost had a boat flipped with me in it when a gust hit the boat.   I have had one rolled down the shoreline throwing everything out.   One year up at the Skagit the wind was so bad we had to tie the boat down on the trailer just to keep it there.  Didn't know until we got home just how bad the conditions were.  It was one of the Thanksgiving storms.

My rule of thumb now is small craft warning mean hunting from shore.  Once it gets close to 20 mph I don't go in the boat.

[jackson7]

I was bird hunting in basin about 3 years ago and ran into some duck hunters who were out in 15 foot boat.
The boat was swamped and the 3 of them were in the water about mile off shore. they were on their backs and the wind blew them to shore. Interesting thing was wind was not normal prevailing wind. Had it been, they would have been blown further out and never made it to shore. They were all shaken up.

[Badhabit]

http://app.leg.wa.gov/WAC/default.aspx?cite=232-16-600

I don't know if they have changed this law or not. As I read it you cannot launch a boat off the job corp dike from 10-1 thru 5-30. That would leave  the Crab creek launch or drag a boat from the mid dune launch at the end of the road by the job corp.