Finally! We had great weather on our days off, no previous commitments, good high & low coastal tides which when all combined equaled a chance to go fishing. Bonus being my sister and her husband were visiting so we all enjoyed the time on the water together.
Putting in at Pete’s Pier meant we run down Crystal River before reaching the Gulf – approximately a 25 minute boat ride. There is always interesting things to see and this day was no exception. We ran across a shrimp boat and a crabber checking his traps.
First catch of the day was a blue crab – on a jig baited with a live shrimp. That crab was not letting go of the shrimp, no matter what. Lance brought it on board and if only I had my camera/video handy because the whole deal was quite the rodeo. We were all shocked that it was lifted onboard, then knocked loose, almost hitting my aunt. Everybody was scrambling. Eric joined the melee and it hooked onto his shoe for dear life – until it ended up in the cooler (just chilling 🙂 ).
Things after that slowed down, way down. I obviously had the ‘knack’ for catching lizardfish and hooked more than 12+ during the day. If I got lucky, they got off the hook before being pulled into the boat. Let’s just say that I was the queen for catching those.
Then I seemed to get stuck with hooking another undesirable fish, Jack crevalle – small ones. .
Once in a while, I would catch a few of these:
Eric caught the first keeper fish – a mackerel.
Then he got the second keeper fish……..a 26″ redfish. It was caught on a bobber that was thrown out behind the boat with one of my tiny, trash fish used for bait.
It was when he caught a keeper trout (remember, I was still catching lizardfish) that I needed to change positions. He was catching his fish from the back of the boat, throwing into a deep channel, letting the tide carry along his bait. Soon after switching locations, I got a mack and a trout.
Yes, the above photo is slightly unusual with the net, but the trout had thrown the hook and the net was the only thing keeping the fish on board.
About the time we were running low on shrimp, it was time to head in. The others allowed me a selfie before landing the boat.
We had so many macks that Eric gave a few to a gentleman fishing alongside the boat ramp, but otherwise, we had a nice cooler of fish (and crab) for our day on the water.
Fish swimming during the day……………becomes dinner at night. The mack we ate two different ways, the first being sushi. Eric had some spicy cukes that accompanied the sushi. It was a nice contrast.
The remaining mack was broiled and topped with the crab meat while the redfish was blackened. Eric got to use his ‘fancy’ lemon squeezers he first saw on a trip to France. Cole slaw rounded out our meal.
Always a great day when you can spend time on the water and an even better day when you catch (edible) fish.
Darden Travels 