A FUN day of fishing on the FLA coast

I had the opportunity on Wednesday to sneak in a day of fishing on a 4 day travel week. A longtime friend and business associate set me up with two of the guys who work at the Lake Mary FL Gander Mtn store for a day on the water. Chris and Jerry couldn't have been more perfect fishing companions. Before we went, i talked to Chris and told him I didn't care what we caught or how we caught them - I just wanted to get out.


Jerry at the Bait dock


Chris tries for some mullet- no dice on this throw

We met at 5:30 and proceeded to to New Smyrna Beach on the east coast of FL - just south of Daytona. We launched Chris' Cobia and motored out to the inlet. We were greeted by swarms of bluefish. LOTS of bluefish. So many bluefish I was catching them on both the front and back treble of the Bomber crankbait I was using. Jerry picked up 2 nice Spanish Mackeral in the same area. I believe that, if we had stayed there , we could have caught 500 blues. Great fun on light spinning tackle. So - why didn't we stay there?? Yours truly gets a little (occasionally a LOT) queasy on rough water. While this was a very calm day, the combination of the outgoing tide and the ocean currents made the boat bounce around quite a bit. I could feel myself getting queasy and Chris graciously decided to leave biting fish and move into calmer water inside the breakwall. And - we all know Rule #1 of Fishing is: NEVER leave biting fish.


Porpoises following the boat


We moved into an area where Chris knew there were some nice sheepshead and starting throwing fiddler crabs into the rocks. It took a little while to get the boat anchored correctly in the strong outgoing tide and adjust the weight so we were deep enough, but we figured it out, and Chris got a big sheepshead.


Chris with a nice sheepshead


Jerry with a Spanish Mackeral


So - why didn't we stay there and catch more?? We had to help rescue a sunken boat. Yep - a sunken boat. We all watched as a boat with a man, woman, and an older woman (one of the folks mother?) motored out to our area. We remarked that the old fiberglass boat looked like it had about 4" of freeboard on the back of the boat. Then - the man anchored off the back of the boat. That boat filled up and sank to the bottom within a minute. The 3 of them were floating - no life jackets in site - toward another boat who grabbed them and pulled them aboard. We set off to pick up whatever we could of their floating remains -a few tackle boxes, a cooler, 2 oars. We gave it to them on the other boat and the Sheriff boat showed up, so we moved on.


Floating debris frome the sunken boat


We moved into an area where Chris had done well in the past. by the time our shrimp had run out, we caught: bluefish,Spanish mackeral, sheepshead, grouper, mangrove snapper, sea trout, ladyfish, pinfish (Jerry was the pinfish king), pigfish, and jack crevalle. We saw rays, porpoises, and 2 manatees. It was an absolutely great way to spend a day on the water with new friends. I can't thank these guys enough for taking me out.


Trout


Grouper


Mangrove Snapper


This is my favorite kind of fishing - go out and see what bites. Nothing fancy, no pre-conceived notions. Just going fishing. It was terrific.