St. Joe Bay 8/19/06
Posted: August 20th, 2006, 8:05 pm
My family and I spent the weekend in Mexico Beach. So with the wife and kids occupied with sand and surf on Saturday, Chalk and I launched a full frontal attack on St. Joe Bay.
Chalk's waiting promptly at 6:00 a.m. in the front yard of the Plywood Palace. I quickly throw my gear in and we're on the way. We arrive at Presnells and there's no sign of Capt. Fred, so we take our time preparing the boat for launch. Capt. Fred drags in around 6:30 and we exchange the usual pleasantries and kid him about the caliber operation he's running opening so late. We get the latest info on the Bay and are soon launched and underway.
With an early high tide and a fall the rest of the day we decide to chase the reds while there is still enough water to manuever around. Within minutes we're in one of our favorite redfish areas. The nearshore flats are eriely quite with very little movement. We ease around trying our best to raise a red on topwater. After an hour we've only manged one.
With it appearing to be a slow day, we decide to move along and see what the day brings. We move south and west across the bay drifting the flats and looking for holes to cast to. Its not long before Chalk finds a willing trout.
We continue on, searching for more productive water. Its not long before I hear Chalk grunt and see him set the hook. I didn't see the fish but judging from the swirl in the water, it's big. Pandamonium ensues.
Chalk vs. Jaws 1
Chalk vs. Jaws 2
So Jaws comes away from the battle with a victory and a sore lip. Chalks get the defeat and a broken BPS Crankin' Stick.
We continue on to a favorite trout area and quickly find all the 14"-15" trout you could want.
We tire of the dinks, so we go back to drift some of our favorite "bomb holes". We see a good many trout and are lucky enough to put a couple in the boat.
By now pretty much all the water has fallen out of the Bay. We decide to drift a grassy flat adjacent to a deeper channel. We scored trout after trout up to 19" for a good hour.
By now it's getting late in the day and we've had a full day dodging scallopers, thunderstorms, jetskis, etc and caught a heck of a lot of trout. Chalk says he's had enough, I relent and we head in.
We didn't keep score and we released all of our catch, but I feel sure we had at least 3 limits of trout, with probably another 25 shorts. We caught the 1 red on topwater and pretty much all the trout came on a certain 2 soft jerkbaits rigged weedless most of the time. ( The floating grass was pretty thick.)
I had a great time, Chalk. Your boat ran great and I love the jack plate. Can't wait til next time.
Chalk's waiting promptly at 6:00 a.m. in the front yard of the Plywood Palace. I quickly throw my gear in and we're on the way. We arrive at Presnells and there's no sign of Capt. Fred, so we take our time preparing the boat for launch. Capt. Fred drags in around 6:30 and we exchange the usual pleasantries and kid him about the caliber operation he's running opening so late. We get the latest info on the Bay and are soon launched and underway.
With an early high tide and a fall the rest of the day we decide to chase the reds while there is still enough water to manuever around. Within minutes we're in one of our favorite redfish areas. The nearshore flats are eriely quite with very little movement. We ease around trying our best to raise a red on topwater. After an hour we've only manged one.
With it appearing to be a slow day, we decide to move along and see what the day brings. We move south and west across the bay drifting the flats and looking for holes to cast to. Its not long before Chalk finds a willing trout.
We continue on, searching for more productive water. Its not long before I hear Chalk grunt and see him set the hook. I didn't see the fish but judging from the swirl in the water, it's big. Pandamonium ensues.
Chalk vs. Jaws 1
Chalk vs. Jaws 2
So Jaws comes away from the battle with a victory and a sore lip. Chalks get the defeat and a broken BPS Crankin' Stick.
We continue on to a favorite trout area and quickly find all the 14"-15" trout you could want.
We tire of the dinks, so we go back to drift some of our favorite "bomb holes". We see a good many trout and are lucky enough to put a couple in the boat.
By now pretty much all the water has fallen out of the Bay. We decide to drift a grassy flat adjacent to a deeper channel. We scored trout after trout up to 19" for a good hour.
By now it's getting late in the day and we've had a full day dodging scallopers, thunderstorms, jetskis, etc and caught a heck of a lot of trout. Chalk says he's had enough, I relent and we head in.
We didn't keep score and we released all of our catch, but I feel sure we had at least 3 limits of trout, with probably another 25 shorts. We caught the 1 red on topwater and pretty much all the trout came on a certain 2 soft jerkbaits rigged weedless most of the time. ( The floating grass was pretty thick.)
I had a great time, Chalk. Your boat ran great and I love the jack plate. Can't wait til next time.
Nice shirt BD 
, you got keep after them