BETHESDA -- "Bet you've never been to Bethesda before," said Ray Tucker as we blinked through the Lawrence County hamlet.
"I have not," I replied, "but I have been to Poughkeepsie (pronounced pow-KEEP-see)."
"One-upped me again," Tucker quipped as we searched for the elusive turnoff to Don and Lyn Tomlinson's house.
Do not enter Bethesda into your GPS to guide you to this destination. Tucker made that mistake the last time he visited and was routed to the far side of the county. The GPS insists it's in Batesville, even though it's about a half-hour away. I don't argue with the technology. Just get me there.
We arrived without incident and settled in for dinner and a porchside visit with a delightful couple that makes hospitality a fine art. We chatted on the porch overlooking a broad pasture that filled with deer as the evening darkened. They were about 300 yards away, but they watched us closely. They have reason to be wary, as Tomlinson selects one or two to fill his freezer every year.
Tomlinson's ranch looks like textbook wild turkey habitat, but he said he doesn't see nearly as many as he once did. It only takes one to make a good season, and to make a good story.
Tomlinson recalled one hunt in which he hadn't heard a turkey gobble all spring, but he went to sit in a blind anyway. He scratched out a few unrequited yelps and clucks in the morning and decided to do a little business by phone. He was talking to the natural gas supplier when a gobbler stepped in front of his blind.
"I put the phone down and shot him," Tomlinson said. "No telling what that poor man on the phone was thinking. I could hear him yelling, "Hello?! Hello?!"
Shortly after, we were at the Tomlinson's table eating elk, potatoes and peppers.
After applying for two decades, Tomlinson finally won a permit to hunt elk in the Buffalo National River. He went to the mandatory orientation meeting in Jasper and met a young preacher that had three young children.
When the meeting started, Tomlinson sat beside the young man and asked when and where he intended to hunt. He told Tomlinson that he was an alternate in case somebody else didn't claim his permit.
The longer Tomlinson talked to the guy, the better he liked him. Finally, he tugged at the preacher's sleeve and towed him to the podium to talk to Wes Wright, the elk program coordinator for the Arkansas Game and Fish Commission.
"I want to give this young man my permit," Tomlinson said. Wright and the young man were extremely surprised, Tomlinson said.
"I'm 80 years old," Tomlinson said. "I don't have time to come up here three or four times to scout, and I don't have the energy to climb all over these hills. This young man will make better use of it than I will."
Tomlinson said that's the closest he ever saw a grown man come to crying, but that's the kind of guy he is. Utterly selfless.
That became evident the next morning when we embarked on the purpose of our visit, a fishing trip on Salado Creek.
Tucker and I loaded all our gear into Tomlinson's 15-foot Alumacraft fishing boat, and Tomlinson ordered me to sit at the bow and man the trolling motor. That's the premier fishing position. Tucker took the stern seat, and Tomlinson sat in the middle. He did not intend to fish, but our lack of success convinced him that we needed a tutorial.
Sunrise should have been a peak fishing time. Bass chased bait all over the creek, but they would not bite our River2Sea Whopper Plopper lures. Monkey Butt has been the best color lately, Tomlinson said, but only one fish bit. It was a small largemouth that I caught next to a stickup.
I finally tied on a LiveTarget squarebill crankbait and caught another small bass, and then watched helplessly as a 3-foot long spotted gar took it away from me.
I switched to a Zoom Baby Brush Hawg and set the hook fruitlessly on a succession of bream that nipped the tail.
A cool front blew through at that time, turning a still, muggy morning into a cool, glorious breath of autumn. The fish were unmoved and continued to be uncooperative.
The confluence of the White River is not far from the ramp, so we came prepared to troll stickbaits for walleyes.
To Tomlinson's dismay, the river had fallen a couple of feet since he last checked, so conditions weren't right for walleyes. However, a big striper blew up on a shad over a gravel shoal in less than a foot of water, so we commenced to trolling jerkbaits for stripers. We had no success except for a small bass I caught from a stickup next to the bank.
We had to leave at noon, but Tucker insisted on the way out that we check to see what was tugging on a jug hanging from a limb at the mouth of the creek. Expecting to see a big catfish on the line, we were surprised and disappointed to discover it was a big yellow carp.
Not nearly as disappointed as the guy that owned the line would be, though.
Sports on 10/01/2017