Bluewater Outriggers Offshore Classic

[BayGator]

I got a chance to do some offshore fishing with Capt. Zack Ferrel this weekend and had a great trip. We headed out of the Mexico Beach canal Friday night at 11:00 pm and it didn't take long to run into the white caps of a steady 4-6 foot chop. We barely made 4 knots out to the first bait hole at 27 miles and already had one sea sick casualty by then. The rest of us attempted to catch bait and some snapper but eventually we all decided to try and get some sleep. We baited up at 6:00 am and headed to the first hole and tore the red snapper up as well as a few nice grouper. Our sea sick comrade finally made it up to fish and caught a couple of small kings on flat lines and after a while grabbed a bottom rig to give it a shot. We were in 200' of water and the captain told us to bring the lines in and get ready to make a move when Bo's line was thumped at about 100' off the bottom. We all assumed it was an AJ and groaned about having to wait on him to get him to the boat. After a 10 minute fight we were able to see some color on the fish and when it got close enough to make out the species we were amazed to see a huge gag grouper on the hook. We all scrambled to get the gaff and got a nice 29.7 lb. big boy in the boat. We caught good fish the rest of the day and I even managed to snag a blackfin tuna before we started the trip back to the St. Joe Marina about 3 pm for the weigh in. We finished 2nd overall in the grouper division and were beat out of 1st place by 2 lbs. The first place boat did not enter the calcuttas however so we raked in some nice cash for our efforts. We managed to steal the $250 calcutta for kingfish as well with a 21 lb. fish that didn't even make the leader board!! It was a great day with good friends, we won some money ($2500), and we had 275 lbs. of fish cleaned for our freezers!!

[fish on!!]

good report. I made it over to watch some of the weigh in. It looked like a very successful first year tournament.

[cmccord]

Sounds like a great trip. Were most of the fish in 200+ feet or were you able to find some in a little closer/shallower? WTG on the $$$ fish.

[Chalk]

Nice trip BG

[Ron Wilson]

Wow! Nice trip, catch and report. Congragts!

[SHOWBOAT]

Nice work BG. Sounds like a heck of trip.

[Jumptrout51]

Congratulations on the $$.
Sounds like a fun trip.

[Eerman]

Gettin' paid to fish, can't beat it. (not that I would know)

[Jumptrout51]

Eman, you go fish Saturday. If you bring back a fish(edible) I will give you $20.