It's Not Faulty Equipment!

Now that I have gotten my feet wet and truly succeeded in saltwater fishing, I had to return as soon as possible to see if I could better improve my skills and make sure what happened on my last trip wasn't a hoax.

It was on a Wednesday night after a day of teaching that I began to think of what I wanted to do on Thursday, since the Lee County Public Schools were beginning their Spring Break and I did not have to teach. "I'll go fishing." But I knew I did not want to go by myself and then I remembered Chad did not have to do anything that Thursday. "Chad, you aren't doing anything tomorrow, are you?" "No, What's up?" "I'm going fishing tomorrow around 9 because I am going to get out there early and do some damage."(Considering we have only gone in the afternoon when the temperature is smoldering or freezing.) Chad was all for this idea. "I'll be at your house around 8:30 and we will head back to Big Carlos Bridge.

I woke up on April 1st at 7:45 ready to get to the bridge. I threw on a tank top and some board shorts, kissed Aren goodbye, and headed over to Chad's apartment. It felt like I hit every light green on the way to Chad's place. This time I had my own equipment and I was ready to prove I could do damage with my own tackle.

I walked up to Chad's door, and before I got to the living room, he said, "You ready to go catch some fish?" "Oh yeah, I've got a really good feeling about today."

As we drove down the interstate, we reflected on how well the plug worked a few days earlier. Now Chad was the one wanting to stop at K-Mart and pick up some "Sabiki" rigs. These rigs are a 4 foot long leader with 5 "branches" off of the main line with feathers and a hook attached to each "branch." The presentation looks like a school of fish and it is possible to catch more than one fish at a time on one rig. (Chad showed this off later on in the day.)We arrived at the bridge, and we were some of the first.

We picked our position about half way down the bridge just before the slight hump in the bridge. I was very non chalant on my first cast in that I did not expect to have luck for at least 30 minutes. I was talking to Chad when I casted my line. I worked the plug about 20 feet and BAM! I had the first Spanish Mackeral of the day in the first minute of the day. "Do you believe this?" Little did we know, this was the tone for the next 8 hours until I had to leave to be at work at 6 at Publix.

As the day progressed, more people showed up on the bridge, but not with the results we had. There was a point in the day for every five casts I would throw and Chad would throw, we caught four fish each. I am positive we were hated by the tourists and locals alike. We would take buckets to the cooler in my car and some people would give us the death stare because we were catching all of the fish. It was an absolutely amazing feeling to be on the opposite end of the spectrum than my usual results.

I would love to tell about every fish that we caught and the ridiculous runs we had catching Spanish Mackeral, but this blog would take up half the internet.

We returned to Chads at 4:30 and I began to help him filet the 16 of the 50 fish that we kept.(48 of the 50 were keepers) The personal daily limit is 15 for spanich mackeral, but their were two of us, so we could have up to 30. The problem with that was we did not have enough freezer space for much more than the 16 and we couldn't get in touch with anyone that would tell us if they wanted some. (The 16 keepers are in the picture at the top of the page.)

I don't know when we are going to head back out, but with school wrapping up for the Spring and a free summer with no classes, we will be frequenting Big Carlos Bridge and searching for new hot spots and many different species.