Saturday, April 19, 2008

4/19 - No, No it isn't....

The title of this post shouldn't be confusing. I'm just answering the title of my last post.
THE WIND HASN'T GONE AWAY!

Holy crap it was windy today. Totally screwed me over. Had a two boat, 8 passenger trip with Richard Ridgway and crew, visiting Amelia Island. We (me and the other boat) had big plans of hitting the jetties as early as possible. With 4 passengers a piece we needed a sure thing. So the inlet is always in order when these trips come around.

We both left the dock and rounded the corner past the Navy Base and I was shocked. The south jetty was a chopped up mess I wasn't gonna anchor in and try to show 4 people how to float fish in.

And we also had a big drop in the Barometer today....(seen via my new weather screen on my home page as seen this morning at 0530 hrs)

I didn't want to leave so we looked around and around. Incoming tide, Full moon, south wind at 20 knots, 4 passengers....I had a mindful of worries. Where to go, when the #1 spot is unfishable. Unfishable for a Float-rigging 4 passenger trip. I needed current. And we had NONE!

So after goofing around making up my mind we headed up river. As I told my folks, it's like this..one time my dad said to a waiter at the Chinese Restaurant, "Man, this yellow mustard sure is spicy!" The old Chinese waiter said in return, "no sir, it's just exciting!"

That's what jetty fishing is in my book, compared to fishing the river or some creek.

Just plain more exciting!!

So we headed down river as the incoming tide got higher and higher, and the wind blew stronger and stronger. First spot, out of the wind, but no trout bites, just this years first bait stealing Mangrove Snapper, and a few sand perch.

I said to my group..."looks like ya'll are gonna get the river world tour", as I pulled anchor and hauled ass even further up river. There's only so many places to hide from a south wind, and I know of maybe a few that could produce today. The first one didn't on the high water.

Morale was LOW, I could tell. But 99.9% of all freshwater fisherman, don't get what tides do and how important they are. If nothings happening on a incoming, then the opposite, the falling tide must be the tide to fish.......BINGO!

After the tide just started to turn on the very bottom, in two drifts we had back to back, Specks.
First one was 18", and the second 20".

Finally.... it wasn't like we were burning down the house here. We just had two really nice fish all in 2 minutes. As the ebb tide slowly started.
I made an adjustment and we started catching some Yellowmouths, a few okay sized ones for the box and several small ones.

But the action was very refreshing. And as it happens many times. The river's tide change, changed the atmosphere above, and the wind died. A very refreshing change there!

We ended up with 9 keeper fish in the box. And then I talked to the other boat. They were heading out to brave the jetties again and take a look.

They ended up fishing there, but as the Captain said..."Dave, it's hold on with one hand fish with the other, if you can. It's that rough but we're catching yellowmouths at least and caught a small Pompano."

In short order, we started to run low on shrimp. So I stayed longer and we finished them off. It was a 12 mile run back to the boat ramp from where we were, and the wind backed off inshore, but was still honking in Mayport when we returned.

Saw a few really small boats heading offshore this morning. If I was bitchin' at the jetties I can't imagine what it was out there.

Next up: Monday, single solo passenger trip. Just the opposite of today. And since the forecast was WRONG today. I hope I can fish someday in the opposite of today, and that would be "calm winds".

Two Saturday's in a row of heinous winds has me hating weekends!