Pea Ridge Road Bridge, Jordan Lake

You guys know how I like screenshots and wanted to share a special one with you. The picture below is of the Pea Ridge Road over New Hope Creek. My Grandparent's home was about 300 yards from this bridge. The Vista Point parking lot is all that remains of their land that is out of water. A group of demolition guys from Ft. Bragg came up and used dynamite (or some explosive) to drop the bridge.

I have lots of memories from time spent down at the creek. There was a driveway down to the water on one side of the bridge. A number of times over the years my Father would float the creek in a small boat with his cousin Jerry. They would have someone pick them up in the area that is now the dam. My cousins had a swimming hole near the bridge with a rope that you could swing out and drop down to swim. I also remember a large sawdust pile not far from the river and it had very large earthworms that we would dig up and use bream fishing.

I have good memories of those old days, but I am also making good memories of being on the lake now. The bottom picture is a screenshot from last Saturday and it amazed me how similar it looks to the original picture I have of the bridge. You can see the creek channel in the picture and in the screenshot, you know where the channel is by all the baitfish hovering over it.

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That is cool!

You should be guiding on this lake, you have a knowledge that others will never have. And we tried the areas you recommended to me and couldn't find any fish down that way, we run out of time and didn't have a lot of time to search. Thanks

That is way cool. The fish finders have such amazing capabilities now-a-days. Interesting to hear some stories from some folks who lived in this area before the water rose.

crappietuttle - when were you out there?

One more for old times sake: this is my parents, along with my aunt Betty. Pop was in the Army and this was probably a weekend back home. They caught these crappie on the Haw River, very close to where the dam is on Jordan. Pop is 81 and still catching crappie in the same area.

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awesome pics and story! thanks for sharing.

I guarantee you he is still catching crappie. I've seen him put it on everyone more than once!

You should be guiding on this lake!!! OOPS Crappie Tuttle beat me to it.
What cool historical knowledge of one of NCs more popular fishing spots.

Very interesting story and pics. Thanks for sharing

Used to catch hundreds of largemouth off that roadbed in a day with rubber worms in the mid 80s.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by todobien

crappietuttle - when were you out there?

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Yesterday, blue and white 198 DLV

Alrighty saw you at the bridge and then later in the day. We were in an old bass tracker.

How old are you? Those are cool pics

Too cool!

I'm 57. I was about 12 or so when my Grandparents had to move. I think the picture of the bridge was taken in 1973. I'll check later to make sure. I have a book on the history of Jordan Lake.

That's really impressive!

That is neat as all get out![emoji476]. Thanks for sharing Jordan limit.

John--you make an interesting point about the bass. In the '80's, best I can remember, Jordan was the best bass lake in NC. If I am correct, they would catch bass like we catch crappie. Things are different today and the bass have dropped way off. Do you think part of the reason the bass numbers have declined is that the crappie numbers have increased? It may be that all those young, hungry crappie are eating up too many of the young bass. I'll ask the Wildlife one day and see what they think.

Thanks for sharing the info! Always interesting to hear about what existed before a lake was built. Do you have any other photos of houses versus what it looks like now?

Jordan Lake (Images of America): Heather Leigh Wallace: 9780738585949: Amazon.com: Books

The above is a link to Amazon and a book on Jordan lake. My aunt helped supply a lot of the pictures in it. There's a whole chapter on Pea Ridge Road with lot's of my family members in it. The one of my parents and my aunt crappie fishing are from a calendar my aunt made for the family.

I think part of it is the lake has aged and the fish assemblage has changed. White perch and spotteds can't help those largemouth either. I still know folks that bass fish it regularly and do good but an older lake doesn't fish like it did when it was a new lake.

Cool