Received an unexpected, but MUCH appreciated invite to fish with Ken and the boys again and I knew right away that my partner on this trip would be my lovely bride and not my Dad this time. Celeste and I arrived late Friday so just called Ken to confirm time to be at the boat. We were early and loaded the boat with gear and Ice for Ken, when they arrived it wasn’t a few minutes before we were filling up and getting some extra frozen bait that Ken said they were chewing pretty good on Wed.
The Learning Curve crew waiting to fuel up; Ken, Jason Frankie, Celeste and I.
Captain and My mate :babe:
We left the Docks around 8:30 and on out of the river to unexpected southerly winds, having looked at the weather numerous times before leaving Friday we were expecting it to be rough in the morning, but calming throughout the day and the winds were to be out of the north not the south, so we went the way of least resistance and the least bumpy and wet; we road out to one of kens bait holes to get some live bait since the pinfish have now officially left the bay with this latest cold snap! Managed a few at the first spot than trolled stretches to the second spot with no takers and only managed a few more sand perch at the second hole so we finally gave up to get some grouper in the box!
Jason decided that he was going to start the day with the frozen macks and it paid off after losing a good fish seconds after the first drop hit the sea floor. He quickly made up for it and started a grouper frenzy as fish seems to come flying over the gunnels we measured everything just for fun since we had the big law stick, but nothing hitting the decks even warranted the need as they were all over 25 inches with one of Jason’s hitting 30!
Shortly after my wife mumbled something about not getting hit, we all herd the unusually S word coming from my sweet wife’s mouth, :biglaugh: but the bend in a fairly stout rod along with the request to tighten her drag gave the what for away! :fishing: After quite the give and take my bride hauls in the big fish of the day honors and her personal best grouper a great gag of 32.5 inches and 15 lbs after being iced. This is the only picture I have on board because she was simply too wiped out to hold it up for more.
What’s for dinner…
We managed eight nice grouper in fairly short order with many of the endangered ARS hitting our bait as well; Frankie even managed two short AJ’s.
Ken catching them two at a time…
Frankie with an AJ.
After giving our first spot numerous small anchoring changes to give up our limit, it unfortunately left us two short, so made a fairly long run to pick up our two remaining fish and possibility of the copper colored variety.
Well after battling porpoise and hammer head sharks determined to take some of the snapper we were not allowed, we managed to catch a couple 24 inchers and fill out our limit with one 17 in Scamp and a nice Lane Snapper that Celeste was happy to put in the box after releasing 20 or so Red snapper. Jason having been the hot hand in the grouper catching during the morning melee opted for lighter tackle in the afternoon and put a smack down on some grunts for Mrs. Illinoisfisherman, nice of J to take care of mom’s requests hehe!
We battened down the hatches including Celeste who was about froze so we added every available layer of clothing to the super fisherwoman of a mate I get to call love, and headed to the hill with a box full of fish and memories!
C-belle River Sunset
How can you capture a day like this in words I am so blessed to have the whole Illinoisfisherman family as friends and to be with such great people doing what Celeste and I love is hard to express, the gratitude and emotion gets in the way of my simple thank you!
And again all of this would not be possible without one of my most prized friendships and his hospitality! He knows who he is, Thank you Mr. Blue
A few after dinner pictures!
The Creel
My Wife with a little more energy…
Frankie, Me and Jason
Man, I ned to get out there!
