Next I get to Carrabelle and hear my brakes scrubbing. I guess I should have gone and got that front brake job a month ago. Almost got metal to metal on one brake.
Oh well, I'll be getting a brake job in the morning.
Man, was it BEAUTIFUL today. Slick this morning with some 2 footers offshore later in the day. Couldn't have asked for a better day. Decided to hit the Dog Island reef area and troll a mackeral tree on one rod and a spoon with a duster on another.
The spanish macks were all over the mack tree rig. Catching 3 and sometimes 4 at a time. The macks stopped and we started picking up bluefish. We put them in the livewell for their journey offshore. We got about 13 macks total.
Here is Jared and Joey having fun unhooking several.
Next we decide to troll stretch 30's in 35 to 40 ft of water for grouper. No luck there.
Onward to the Yamaha reef with the live bait to see if we can find a AJ or two to fight. 2 boats had the Yamaha anchored up....so we drifted around there and no luck. Decide to take it out to the Bryson Reef. There were two boats anchored there. So we get up about 200 yds from them and anchor on some promising show on the bottom machine. We noticed the guys behind us were hooking up left and right on grouper and AJ's.
I also noticed these guys reeling like crazy and then losing some too. (You will see where this ties in>>>>)
So we drop live bluefish to the bottom. I was holding a stand up rod and was feeling that familiar live bait being chased feel. Right then a grouper inhaled a 8 inch long bluefish. I handed the rod to Jared because I wanted him to catch one. He reeled up this nice gag which was about 26" long.
Notice this J hook in the side of this grouper's mouth? Not ours!
I believe the J hook in this grouper's mouth was from the guys fishing there behind us. They would be reeling a fish in and you would see it break off. I don't think these guys were tying good knots.
Well, we think, great, we are going to put some grouper in the box. Wrong!!
Jared goes to put mr gag in the fish box and the fish starts wiggling and I hear some cussing. That hook that was in the side of the mouth hooked him in the thumb through a glove.
He had to cut the glove away from the hook to see how deep it was.
It was in a little deep.....and the point was not real sharp. After some real good choice words and a little surgery with a sharp filet knife....he pushed the hook through. OUCH! Jared is a paramedic....he had to work on his self for once! The wire dykes I had weren't strong enough to cut the barb off. So he had to ride 24 miles back in with it in his thumb. We got to the ramp and I had a small pair of bolt cutters in the truck toolbox. Barb cut off and hook is out.
(Note to self, make sure dykes that will cut a hook are in boat next time..... Also take hooks out of fish before handling if possible.)This was how smooth it looked at 3:45 this afternoon:
While loading the boat and winching it tight....SNAP! The winch strap busts where it is stitched together at the hook. Had to tie a knot in the winch strap to secure the boat. One more thing that needs to be fixed... no biggie!
It was a great day on the H20 with friends. Too bad we couldn't stay and catch more grouper.....but there will be other days.
