Carrabelle 10/22, 23,24
Posted: October 25th, 2004, 12:14 pm
Frist trip down in six weeks. Been watching the weather for the last several weeks and finally decided this was the weekend. Headed out of the river with both frozen bait and a few pinfish at 8:00. Forecast called for 2-4 ft out of the East. Rounded the East end of DI and found the fours. Headed out to some hard bottm in 40 ft and started a drift with both live and frozen bait. The grouper wanted the live bait and the sea bass the frozen. Stayed in the same area for a couple of hours and ended up with two keeper gags, one at 28", several shorts and some sea bass. With seas showing no indication of subsiding and my buddy having left lunch back in the truck we decided to call it a day since Saturday was forecast to be better. Wrong
got up Saturday morning walked out on the deck and was greeted with an East wind at 15 knts. Spent the day in the boat riding around the pass and just enjoying being back on the boat and the salt air
I did get to do my good deed for the week and towed a boat back in from just outside the river. Maybe that helped with the seas on Sunday. Because Sunday came closer to the forecast 2-3 ft out of the SE. Got to the Franklin Co reef about 9:00. Water was clear and surface temp was 77 degrees. Got the baits to the bottom and immediately got slammed and then cut off. This happened half a dozen times in the first hour we were there. Put a bait down with a steel leader thinking we had kings on the bottom but, nothing would touch it. Picked up and ran to "O" for some more live bait. Caught a few small sardines and decided to try one last spot that had produced snapper in the past. Finally found it and it doesn't show anything like it did before the storms. Frist drop and two red snapper in the box. Second drop and one 24" gag and one short(19.5") red grouper. Took a total of two keeper gags and eight red snapper from 16.5" (got to allow for shrinkage) to 21" from that spot and left them bitting. All and all a great weekend. Got to spend time with my son and a couple of good friends, boat ran good, and only one crew member turned green
. I'll be having fresh snapper for dinner tonight 



