Aug 13
Friday the 13 that's fight and today we've got Rene and his sister Rikki and two very close friends of the family Vicky and Diane all from Texas down here in Sunny South Florida to watch their brother Roger Huerta AKA (El Matador) fight at Hard Rock. As it turned out Rogers' fight was canceled due to his opponent getting hurt in practice. But if you get a chance goggle this Roger Huerta he is one bad ass that has finally hit the big time in fighting.
Since they were already down here they figured any kind of fight would do so how about fighting a fish or two.
I've got to say that a finer group of people you would be hard pressed to find.
We trolled the reef with two planners running about 45 feet down along with three baits skipping across the surface.
While we did not get much action on our surface baits the two planner rods were on fire.
We were catching kings and bonitos one after another and the bantering back and forth was just about as good as it gets.
Vicky and Rene were at each other the entire trip and they just had the rest of us in stitches.
Thanks again guys for great time fishing and for all the laughs.
Captain Taco (954) 764-4344 or toll free (877) SEA-4344
Aug 15
Today we had Eddie the baker from Publix where shopping is a pleaser and his girl friend Marge from Pompano. Eddies brother Greg and his wife Annette came down to visit from Mississippi.
Now Eddie has had this trip planned for over a month now and I run into him every couple days at Publix and I knew how excited they all were about this fishing trip so to say the pressure was on an understatement.
Seeing I was under the gun to produce fish I knew that trolling the reef was going to be my best bet to put plenty of fish in the box.
We set out both planners running about 45 feet down and three bait on the surface skipping across the surface.
BUT much to my surprise today the reef was just not producing many bites. We did manage to catch 1 bonito and three small barracudas but that was it and it was time for some fast thinking.
Plain B we brought in all the trolling gear and sent down two chicken rigs to the bottom. A chicken Rig is 5 hooks in a row with a lead at the bottom and is used for catching snappers.
Plain B was a big hit!! The snappers were biting like mad dogs and we were now not only catching but we were catching some great eating fish. Things were going pretty much as we would have hoped for when all of a sudden Eddies rod started bending over a bit more than the rest of the times and we knew we had something different on this time. When Eddie finally reeled his fish to the surface I could not believe my eyes he had caught a 5 pound yellow eye snapper in 170 feet of water.
For those of you that don't know what a yellow eye snapper is well let me just say that it is one of the best eating fish you can put on a plate. The funny part is that these fish are usually caught anywhere from 350 feet of water out to 600 on the bottom but never have I seen one in 170.
We ended up with more than enough fish and I am sure everyone had a ball. Thanks again guys and Eddie you owe me a box of your special donuts. (LOL)
As we got back to the dock we had our afternoon party waiting to give their luck a shot aboard the Hooked Up.
This afternoon we had a shared charter with Kevin and his son Bryson from Westin Florida and their good friend Greg from Pembroke Pines Florida and last but not least Wendy from Minnesota who had fished with us last week.
We decided to once again try some trolling and then hit some snappers once we got down to where we had caught them earlier. But this time the reef was going off and the kings and bonitos were biting like crazy. I've got to take a second to say that I've been fishing the waters off the coast of fort Lauderdale since 1974 and once I think I've got it figured out I find out that you just never can quite figure out mother nature. This morning the reef was dead and this afternoon we can't even get all the baits in the water. (GO FIGURE)
Anyways back to the fishing we loaded the box with king fish and bonitos but once I got down to where we had wacked the snappers earlier but now all we could catch was 2 little snappers.
All in all everyone aboard the Hooked Up today had a ball and we can't thank you guys enough for fishing aboard the Hooked Up.
Captain Taco (954) 764-4344 or toll free (877) SEA-4344
Aug 16
Today we had Melissa and Aaron the honeymooners from Lansing Mi spend the afternoon fishing aboard the Hooked Up.
These two were just out to have a good time no matter what. You could have put them in a mud puddle and they would have had a ball. We started out trolling the reef with 2 planners running deep and 3 baits skipping across the surface and when we got our first bite I had to turn around you would have thought we had a 1000 pound blue marlin on by the way they were yelling and just having a ball.
Somehow they got me all caught up in their excitement and we were all yelling and just trolling down the reef. The other boats must have thought we were nuts. But the fact is we were having a ball and the kings and bonitos were biting the bottom out of the boat. We were not fishing we were catching and having a ball at it.
Aaron had told me that what they would really to catch was a big fish to hang on their wall to remember their honeymoon with.
So we trolled our way to the south off the coast of Hallandale beach Florida where there was 3 big structures on the bottom that sometimes holds some big barracudas. Just before we got there we had hooked into a nice 8 pound bonito and we decided to keep him alive and set 3 big trouble hooks in him and see just what kind of sea monster we could pull out.
Things were going according to plan till all of a sudden BAM we got the bite BUT we did not get the hooks into whatever sea monster it was that took half of our 8 pound bonito. (RATS)
Now here we were 7 miles from our inlet running short on time and no live bait.
I made an executive dissension and we ran all the way back to a buoy in front of our inlet and set out a couple of dead bonitos on the bottom and hopped for a big shark.
Aaron had come up on the bridge with me after we got the baits set out and asked how much longer we had. I told him we only had about 25 min left but that the good news was it only takes one second to get the bite. All of a sudden our bait that was connected to a balloon took off and we were Hooked Up.
Melissa jumped in the chair and the fight was on. She would gain 10 feet and the fish would take 20 back and forth. After a good 15 min she decided to make this a family affair and Aaron jumped in the chair. And once again as soon as he would get the fish close to the boat off it would go again at will.
Now we do this fishing thing everyday and most of the time we know what we are fighting and we were sure this was a big sand bar shark but after a good 35 min of back and forth tug a war up popped this 94 inch Hammer head shark. What a great surprise and at this point the shark was tired and all wrapped up in the leader so we decided to slide him in the tuna door to get a quick measurement and a couple of pictures to have a replica trophy made of the honeymooners catch.
What a great way to end the day. Melissa and Aaron thanks sooo much and have a great time in the Dominican Republic.
Captain Taco (954) 764-4344 or toll free (877) SEA-4344
