1st bigbendfishing.net trip 4/4

[GeneO.]

Tom, Chalk, Tin Can, Brian (My Mechanic - that really wanted to go fishing), and I took the inaugural bigbendfishing.net trip on Journey's End today. Tom and Chalk met me at my house at 6:00 or was it 5:00. We then rendezvoused with Tin Can transferred about 30 rigs and 500lbs of other miscellaneous fishing stuff into Tin Cans truck and headed to Carrabelle. We picked up Brian at C-Quarters.

Left the dock about 8:00, stopped in the river and picked up a few dozen pin fish. Ran to my trap where we had another dozen there. Thinking it would be the calmest in the morning we decided to run to Yamaha first. The wind was up when we got there and it was a little bumpy. After missing the anchor a few times we finally got what we were looking for and didn't catch a fish for the next hour. Marked a lot of fish but nothing doing.

We decided to head North and troll for a while. Put the lures in at the first spot and trolled over it a couple of times and nothing. Came around again and a 22" Gag hit the deck, my first in 15 years. We made another pass and Brian landed one about the same size. Chalk was up next and after another pass he put a 28" in the boat. I hate to say this but Chalk will if I don't, it was biggest of the day.

Continued working our way back to the Island and landed a total of 9 grouper 2 were shorts. The wind laid down once we started trolling and it turned out to be a nice day on the water. At about 4:30 the wind kicked up again and we headed for the hill. A great time was had by all, I think, and the trip was successful given it was my first out of Carrabelle. Oh yea, and I got to "STEAL" a few of Tom's numbers.

Chalk promises he'll post some pics soon.

Fella's I had a great time and appreciated the lessons and company. Can't wait to do it again.

[Chalk]

I would like to thank GeneO for inviting me aboard the Journey's End. I had a blast to say the least, I was little unsure at first cause my idea of deep water is eight foot .

We made it out to the yammie; I was anticipating a work out and got one.

Geneo pretty much covered the trip. Ole Mother Nature flipped the switch about 3:30 and the winds picked up considerably. I think if we had been in one of our boats, we would have had to have gone east and hitch hiked back to Carrabelle to get the truck .

This is another fine example of some great fellowship and friendship created by this site. If it was not for this site, this would of never happened. My first keeper grouper, limit of grouper and biggest grouper came from this site.

Off my soapbox and some pics.

My biggest so far 28 incher….


The infamous Tincan holding a good’n…..


The notorious sniper , trolling king and Webmaster Tom Keels with a nice’n….


Thanks again Geneo for the ride…..

[tin can]

It was a heck of a day! The wind kicked up early. It laid a little in the middle of the day, but not much. Then it got ugly. Even though the wind blew all day, the Journey's End was up for the trip.

I'm not sure Geno had any idea what kind of crew he had compiled before this trip. Lord knows he knows, now. He's probably never received that much abuse on his own boat. It could take years for him to recover from yesterday.

Chalk is on the money. This trip would have never happened, if not for this forum. Geno, thank you for putting this trip together, and thanks for a great day on the water.

[Tom Keels]

I too had a wonderful time. The lack of action on the Yamaha really ticked me off, as I had hoped to "deflower" two AJ virgins. Oh well, it won't be too much longer, and it will be a sure thing.

We did some deep trolling with stretch 30's and 40's on power pro and light mono. We got hit consitantly in 55-65 feet. This means the grouper were willing to come 10-15 feet or more off the bottom to chase a lure. We even had a grouper follow a hooked one to the surface in 55 feet.

I have never done this, but I can say I'll be doing it some more.

It was a another day of firsts for me. I got to drive the biggest boat I ever have, and pull the heaviest anchor I ever have.

If you would like to donate to the "Buy GeneO a lighter anchor, anchor ball, windlass, or anchor monkey Fund", please send checks to me care of the site and I'll make sure it goes into the fund or the bank for the pending hernia operations.

Thanks Gene for a great trip!

[Sea Fox]

Sounds like a good day. Maybe I should have been trolling sat., what color streches did they want or did it matter?

[Chalk]

I apologize to GeneO for not taking some pics of yours and Brian's fish. But, we didn't have any stink in the box and we tend not to think about pics until we have some stink in the box, that skunk monkey does that to you sometimes. Sorry about that.....

[Tom Keels]

SF, we started with A black and gold, The green 40 you see in the backround of the pic of me and a green tiger stripe. First 2 fish were on the 40 and the Green tiger, so we dumped the black and gold for another green tiger and it caught or hung the majority of the fish.

[Sea Fox]

Thanks Tom.

[CSMarine]

Good report ya'll. Sounds like ya'll had a good time. I was a little dissapointed in my buddy chalk. Thought he might bring my wife some grouper heads and backbones for fish soup .
Guess he was too embarrased to dig them out of the crab bait bucket .

[Chalk]

My wife said I stunk when I got home last night.
I said,"What do I smell like honey?" She said," Like Fish."

[GeneO.]

Dropped a bag in some hot oil tonight, made a some cheese grits, and the necessary vegetable for the kids. Not a soul was late to dinner tonight. We gotta go get some more of that stuff.

[GeneO.]

CS, That's what Chalk meant when he said, "Screw CS I'm not fighting a pelican for anybody", as the pelicans whipped us all for the scraps.