Floating The Bow River

The First Float In The New Saturn Boat

If you are like me you are impatient. My new boat arrived from Idaho about two weeks ago and I have been staring at it ever since, or it has been staring at me I’m not sure which. I opened it from the box and removed the contents. I then organized the contents which included five paddles, the patch kit, two hand pumps, two replacement valves, and the valve replacement tool. I unpacked the boat and wrapped it into the boat bag that was included in the purchase. All was great and then the weekend arrived. Like a typical fisherman, I could not wait until spring to launch the boat. So I made a phone call to Andrew and we made plans to launch the boat early Saturday morning. Friday I went out to Wholesale Sports and purchased a battery powered pump which would take care of the back breaking manual pumping for us. All my gear was ready to go Friday night and then I went to sleep.

I woke up early on Saturday morning and packed the gear into the car, then the boat was to come out of my basement, this baby weighs 150 pounds and I was not feeling very strong at eight AM. I felt like a body builder trying to lift a heavy box spring mattress. This boat is awkward and bulky. I finally heaved the boat onto the last stair and paused for some deep breaths of air and I was not even half way to the car yet. I managed to get it to the car and into the trunk with the back seats folded down; after all it’s 14.6 feet long. Then I made the long drive to the river. Is it just me or when you’re in a hurry to get fishing you seem to hit every bad driver on the road and every red light along the way. Must be just my luck? I met up with Andrew and we dropped his truck of at MacKinnon Flats.

Andrew and I arrived at Policeman’s Flats an hour later and unpacked the boat and all the gear. We removed the boat from its bag and my eyes then opened wide. “This thing is huge” I stated to Andrew. This Mickey Mouse electric pump is never going to fill this monster. We managed to get most of the inflatable raft pumped up with the electric pump and then she ran out of juice. I made Andrew do most of the work as he stated to me he needed the exercise. After an hour of pumping we finally got enough air in the boat to start or trip.

Once we had her in the water the first session of rowing began. We needed to get to the other side of the river in a real hurry; the water levels are low at this point in the season. We paddled our buts off and made it to a safe deep section of river. Then the rods came out and the lures hit the water. I never expected to catch a whole bunch of trout as it’s not the right time of year. We floated for five hours and managed to yard out seven trout between the both of us. Not so bad all things considered. I was glad to finally get the boat that was staring me in the face for weeks, in the water. The Saturn inflatable performed like a dream and I was completely satisfied with my purchase. I look forward to adding the fishing frame to the boat and making it even more comfortable for this fishing season. Soon the river will be experiencing the spring run off, but after the water clears up, I will be out floating the river and looking for those large Bow River trout’s.

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