Hello Terry, glad to see another aspiring koke fisher among us. I like the name, can I assume you are a lathe man? I enjoy a bit of that myself when I have the time. I must say that I think you have great taste in boats. I have been wanting an Arima for quite some time but they're just a bit too rich for me right now. I'm wanting to save up for a 19' hardtop. And I too fish often from a pontoon boat, mine is a 10ft Scadden with the standing platform. I'm going to step up a bit and go with the Maxxon tubes so I can enjoy a gas motor on it to handle the bigger waters.
Since we share some of the same tastes in water craft, I thought I might mention to you one of my first choices for a smaller fishing vessle. You mention that you are thinking about the idea of a 10' aluminum boat and I have to ask if you've considered one of the inflatable sport boats. They are much more stable and way safer than a 10' aluminum. I used to use a 10' zodiac on a good sized body of water and never thought anything of it because it was always safe. One year I took a couple of extra people so I decided to borrow my dad's 14ft aluminum for the extra room and it almost killed us all. I had not seen anything that lake had to offer that even came close to being risky with the zodiac, but when the wind stirred up a bit I realized just how dangerous it was when I tried using a small aluminum boat. You've got to use what you enjoy but just speaking from my own experience, when you stay small, those little inflatable sport boats are hard to beat.
Good luck with those koke's. If you look at all the advice that is and has been offered here, I'm sure you'll gain an abundance of knowledge that will add to your success. I happen to be a jigger primarily and if that's something you'd like to try I'd be happy to help you but most of the rest of these guys are far more experienced than I when it comes to trolling for these little fish so I would recommend their advice. But jigging is a lot of fun.
