The Crazy Journey

It’s been a Bass Crazy 2 and a half months since joining the team at Jackson Kayak in late February. Being honest it has been one of the most fun journeys I have started to date. The team has allowed the some great opportunities to be out on the road shaking hands, meeting new people and getting to see how huge the impact Jackson Kayak has made in the sport of kayak fishing. It’s hard to believe so many stories can come from such a short time span.

The Indianapolis Boat show was the big kick off as far as traveling to events go. I got to spend 2 weekends back to back working with the good folks at Wildcat Creek Outfitters. It seemed like our entire kayaking crew from the YF and IKA events were able to sit down take some time and catch up after a long winter. It’s always good to see those guys no matter what time of the year it is. We tend to have a good time, trade a few punch lines and talk all things fishing.

We sold a ton of kayaks both weekends and got to hear some really great stories from so many folks that had been saving and dreaming about taking home their 1st Jackson Kayak. It was everything from a woman that had been recovering from drug abuse that found a new love in kayaking to a father and son that had always dreamed about owning a Coosa HD ever since they had seen that Drew Gregory guy whipping around in one on YouTube. The added bonus to the show was getting to meet Matt and Haven from the JK factory as well as picking up my JK Big Rig.

The second stop on my tour landed me at Kentucky Lake Outdoors where I got to meet Michael Ernst. It was a slower and colder afternoon with weather reports calling for a snow storm that never really happened. We again managed to sell a Jackson Cruise 12 to a older gentleman that had again dreamed of one day owning his on Jackson. In between conversations with customers Michael showed me pictures what has to be the biggest trout I’d ever seen. While I am not a trout guy, I have to say that Michael has me itching to hook some of those giants. Hopefully one day we can make time to make that happen.

My 3rd stop was to the FLW Tour event on Lake Cumberland to meet Robert Brown and the man himself, Eric Jackson. To say I was nervous would be a understatement when you look at the resume and success that EJ has had through the years. I enjoyed getting to see him work and how he interacted with each person that stopped at the RV. He talked fishing with Robert and I asked us about our endeavors with Roberts company Osprey Rods and ours at BassCrazy365.net. The funny part to meeting EJ was I’d told Noah Heck after reading EJ’s blog that he was probably one of the people that I wanted to meet most in my journey at JK. Well, it happened pretty quickly and I am very glad that it did. You always walk away wishing you could have more time to hear the stories that EJ has to share but events are short and that’s just how things go

Somehow in between all this I have managed to get the Big Rig on the water and catch a few fish. We kicked off the season opener of the BC365 Yak Freaks trail last weekend. I made a bad decision out of the gate and went a little too far south into some muddy water. Luckily I was able to make the last 2 hours pay off and earn a spot in the top 10 to get much needed points for the championship event in October. We had a great turn out for a local event as we do not try to over promote the trail. We have let it spread by word of mouth and that really seems to be paying off the best.

– Chad Brock