First up on Monday was a great chap I fished with back in 1998, 1999, and 2000, as I recall. He is George McRobbie, of Melrose, Scotland. I hadn't seen George since 2000, and was thrilled that he was coming back to Florida, and we would fish. And, this time his wife Alison was coming along. George had set my main mission which was to get Alison hooked on fishing.
George and Alison were there a little early, and we left the dock just as dawn was breaking. We headed to B Span flats for bait, and I could just barely see there were a couple of other boats in the area already working on bait. The tide was running out hard. So hard in fact, that it turned the Talon 90 degrees to the north wind we had blowing.
George took over the chumming duties, and wound up putting the chum down around amidships, and I finally hit the best bait throwing off the bow to the end of my rope! It took a while to get the bait going, but once we did we caught plenty of it, and it was a great mix from small to outsized! We were ready to take on the fish!
We didn't have to go far to do that. In fact, we didn't have to go anywhere. The whole time we were catching bait there were trout, ladyfish, and mackerel busting bait all over the place. My mission being to try to get Alison hooked on fishing, I figured there was no better place to start than right there.
We tossed shiners down the wind and up the tide, and let them drift back down the tide past us. I think every bait we tossed out there caught a speckled trout, a ladyfish, and even a catfish and lizard fish or two. It was great catching action. As the tide slowed after about an hour, we elected to use the slack tide as travel time, and moved on. It was a good start for Alison.
We headed north up into the Sound in search of more action. But, at the first stop which is always full of snook, we struck out. I was a bit shocked. The fish weren't eating. We stayed until the tide was moving well, and there was still no bite. We moved on.
I went back to the "looking for action" mode with Alison in mind. We settled on a pothole I love to fish during the winter months. Once we got to the part of the hole that always holds the fish, we were in the action, and caught bunches of trout and ladyfish on both live shiners and jigs. Once it slowed we moved on.
Our next stop was a great spot that usually offers up big trout and snook during the cool months. We caught a few nice trout there, and had a couple of baits scaled by snook, but never got a snook to commit. At this point in the morning, we'd caught lots of keeper trout, but of course they're now out of season.
At this point we'd caught plenty of fish. But, I wanted to get George and Alison on some redfish and/or snook. We shifted gears, and went looking for reds first. But, although the fish were present, we struck out on two redfish spots. They just weren't interested.
Actually, I was still looking for a redfish bite at the next stop, although I've caught many snook and outsized snook there over the years. But, again the redfish refused our offerings. The upside was that George boated a 27" snook, and Alison boated a beautiful 4 pound trout, there.
We headed to what would be the last stop before lunch to see if we could find some hungry snook. Almost immediately, George stuck a descent snook, and I thought perhaps we'd finally found fish that would eat. But, it turned out that we only caught two more snook there, as the lockjaw continued.
Finally, it was time for us anglers to eat, and we headed off to the Waterfront Restaurant for what turned out to be another fabulous meal. My God, I love that place, and the folks that make it work! It was an absolutely great lunch, and the perfect end to a great day with old friends.
Tuesday's trip was with some very special friends that I met back in March of 2001. Darin and Julie May were honeymooners on Sanibel and we were to fish together as part of their honeymoon. But, we woke up to horrible weather that morning, and wound up spending half the day in a local restaurant laughing and carrying on and getting to know each other, and have been close ever since. Their son Carson, who is six, is 4 ft. 2 inches, and 102 pounds, and that morning once we got him in to an adult PFD, looked like one of Bret Favre's linemen! He's the sweetest kid, and is wise far beyond his six years, and has a great sense of humor. He gets stuff at age six that I wouldn't have even understood at twice that age.
We headed straight to the B span flats again for bait. It took us some time to figure out the under current, but once we did we caught plenty of bait. Darin did a great job of keeping the chum in front of the fish while I tried to figure out the water. Oddly, we didn't have all the trout and mackerel activity as we'd had the day before. Yet, we managed to catch a bunch of trout, a couple of lizard fish, and catfish before we moved on.
With bait in the well, we headed up into the Sound in search of action. We were still on the last part of the outgoing tide. I chose an area that I like on outgoing tides in cool weather, and we went to work. But, our efforts only produced one snook. We moved on.
Our next spot was a pothole that I love during the cold months. There we found plenty of action for Carson and Darin. They caught a bunch of trout and ladyfish, including plenty of keeper trout. Julie was quite content to sit and enjoy the sun and the outdoors while she watched her boys have fun catching fish.
Once that action slowed we moved on, and switched our attention to snook. Our chosen spot was full of fish, but the only way we could get the snook to eat was to keep chumming them with live shiners. Darin and Carson caught about half a dozen snook, including 27 inch and 27 inch fish for Darin. I think those were his two best snook.
By the time that was over it was time for us to eat. We headed to the Waterfront Restaurant. Although Julie and Darin aren't serious calamari eaters, I convinced them to have what is the best calamari I've ever eaten. Well, I don't think Julie quit moaning and groaning over that calamari until it was all gone. She was just floored at how good it was. I had it for the second day in a row. I just don't have the words to tell you guys how good it is!
After a long and wonderful lunch and lots of laughs, we decided to hit another spot or two on the way home. Actually, we worked two spots over pretty well, and only came up with one more snook. But, it had been a fantastic day with old friends I have a lot of history with, and I don't know how we could have made it any better. And, that's what I love most about the guide business!