down south

after fighting cooler water, alec and i decided to head way south. wow... piles of tailing reds and saw a few giant snook.

cold front

unfortunately a cold front pushed through and slowed the fishing down. still managed to catch a few small ones

friends that fly fish

alec guided with me a few years back in colorado.  it sure is nice having another fly fisherman on the deck of the boat.  the weather shut the fishing down around lunch, but before then we had a fun morning.  

Merry Christmas

we want to wish you all a very merry christmas!

good & bad news

we picked up a couple friends on the way to the outer islands this morning. a pretty nice speckled sea trout and flipper himself.

now for the good news, after three days of hard looking I found a handful of tarpon that were willing to eat. the bad news, i didn't get any to the boat.  soon...i promise there will be tarpon pics soon.

eileen's family

eileen, our friend from germany who is staying with us for a bit,  and her family have been close friends of my family most of my life and her parents just arrived from germany to spend christmas with us. winnie, pictured above, had never caught a fish in his life and on the first day out he caught 3 reds, 1 trout, 1 jack and a few lady fish. did pretty well, even with jetlag.

tarpon takin a nap

since chapin swallowed a quarter last night, I decided to fish close to home with rowe instead of running a good way out. of coarse, while hammering lady fish we rolled up on this big fella. i figured the zebco wouldn't be the wisest stick to tangle with this poon.

crabs

fortunately for us, if fishing isn't good the canal behind the house can supply dinner.  rowe is a hell of a crabber.  he's not patient with much else, but he sure does have a feel for dragging that chicken neck.

fishing partner

as you can see by our rod selection, i had a another fishing partner today.  sarah and i even managed to pick up a couple reds while rowe was preoccupied with snacks.  

tarpon

sarah was able to to fish with me today and while trying to get her on some redfish we found a cove with laid-up tarpon, a few were 50+ pounds.  We worked them for over an hour, but couldn't get them to eat. I called one of my best friends who just happens to be a tarpon guide to get the skinny on catching laid-up picky fish. hopefully i can post a pic of a big poon after i try j's trick. and yes that is a hole in the crouch of my pants.  we're living on the cheap.

finally

after two days of not seeing anything, it sure was nice to get into a bunch of reds today.  these fish were some of the most eager reds i have ever seen munch a fly.  i'm embarrassed to say one fish ate my fly 4 times, but i finally got him on the 5th.

good motto

love this town already

made it

it's official. we made it to chokoloskee. off to the water tomorrow.

















we had a neat trip on the way down.   since it was my 30th birthday, i got to choose the breakfast spot - one of the original chic-fil-a's in atl.  after being out west, you really appreciate seeing a chic-fil-a sign.

with our 3 am departure, most of the crew was a bit groggy. mr. monkey as well.  

on our way

2000 miles from idaho, 800 miles to go. one less truck, one more boat, & so the journey begins. i never thought i would be using my hell's bay to pack bikes, strollers, and every kind of kid toy, but here we are. the clampets have some competition.