Exercise in Patience

Man what can I tell you? I pick the crappiest week weather wise to spend in the Florida Keys. Still, a week in the keys with crappy weather is better than a week anywhere else in the world that I can think of.

We went down on Monday and stayed in a great little house on plantation Key in Islamorada, it had a canal in the back with a great little place to dock the boat. I thought I’d get to fish every day and sometimes twice a day but I did not actually get out for the first time until Friday.

The Mutton bite is on in the Keys around the full moon in June, and I was having fantasies of hooking up on some of them large snapper. Mother Nature had her own ideas however and the full moon came and went before I got a chance to get at’em.

High winds, thunderstorms, and heavy rains were the order until Friday, I’d wake up just before sunrise, look out the window, and the neighbor’s American flag would be stiff as he one left by our astronauts on the moon. So I’d go back to sleep a little bitter and hope I could get out in the afternoon, only to be rudely greeted by electrical discharges and thunder claps galore.

So along came Friday; FINALLY! I woke up just as the sun was coming up and I looked out the window to see a Flag that was finally free of the Viagra it was taking all week. I woke my kids up, got ready in short order and headed out. I was pretty sure the Mutton bite would not be so hot by now, but I was hoping on a little Yellowtail action to cure my fishing blues.

Oh yeah that reminds, you guys that know me know that I find all kinds of cool stuff on the internet, well I found a place in the lower keys (mile marker 22.5 actually) that swears they make the most catchingest Pinfish traps around. Well my friend Mike (Off Limits Charters) says those things suck, but I told him I had read up on it and that these traps really work. So on Thursday (likely the crappiest day) I decided to take a 70 mile drive to mile marker 22.5 to buy the trap.

Crazy you say? Yeah, crazy like a fox, I baited the trap and put it out late Thursday afternoon. I rigged it with a coconut for a buoy with a ring screwed into it and 300lb test. I placed it out of the way on some grass flats and hoped for the best. I went through all the trouble because everyone keeps telling me that there are bait pirates out there, and that if I tied a regular buoy to it that someone would come investigating and steal my bait and maybe even my trap.

So I headed out to check my trap and it had about 16 to 18 Pinfish in it, (those little critters are hard to count inside the bait well), so I thought hey not bad my little trap works pretty well. Now I did not want to take the trap on the boat with me for a day of fishing, so I left it where it was with a minimal amount of chum left from the night before. When I made it back at the end of the day, I had 5 Pinfish leftover and decided I would go leave them in the trap overnight. Guess what I found in my trap? About 40 new Pinfish had entered the trap to feed on the little chum that was left over.

Anyway, back to the fishing and boating. So I picked up my pinfish and headed out for a Yellowtail spot Mike was kind enough to give me the numbers for. I anchored once then re-anchored again before I was satisfied. I put the Chum in the water and hoped to soon boat some tails.

Turns out the tails bite was off, but a school on peanut Dolphin did come into our Chum slick, and my kids had a good ole time catching those. Only two of them were above 20” so the rest of them went back in the water.

I decided to move to another spot, another set of numbers for a wreck called the Duane that Mike gave me the numbers for. Lots of schoolie Dolphin there too; but I was tired of catching those. We tried one more spot Mike gave me in 300 ft. but the kids were getting bored and I was getting frustrated so I told them lets head in and go snorkeling.

We went back to the house we are staying there (right after I checked my awesome pin fish trap) and picked up my wife my youngest daughter and my Wife’s cousin Omar his wife Jina, and their boys Dylan and Devan.

We went to a protected reef called Hens and Chickens that my friend Jorge gave me the numbers for and it was beautiful there. The kids had a great time snorkeling, they saw tons of chubs, yellowtail, Barracuda, triggerfish, and a host of other smaller reef fish.

Enjoy the pictures, and I’ll be back on with another story as soon as it takes place.

Till Then…

P.S. I forgot to tell you about the jig with a 1/0 hook I got stuck in my middle finger when my son dropped the rod while I was taking his Dolphin of the line. It went in well passed the barb, and I was forced to yank it out OUCH!

Albert Jr. at the helm

Keep us in the center of the channel boy
Alexa Chillin on the bow

Nina insists on wearing her life vest

Dylan wears his life vest too

I'll smile but I'm not getting in the water with that Cudda

Tania, Jina, Devan, and Omar... Not afraid of the Cudda

Jina and Devan

My wife has her own style when snorkling

Albert holds up his Dolphin

I caught this one myself

Fishing on the Off LimitsWith Capt. Mike Murias

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Fisherman:

Mike Murias, Captain of the 29’ See Vee and owner of Off limits Charters.

Alfonso (sorry I didn’t get his last name) He’s new to fishing; spear fishing was his thing until he hooked up with Mike, but is now becoming an avid fisherman or so he told me.

And Myself of course.


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It had been nearly three weeks since I had gone fishing, and though this trip would not involve the Reef Raider it was still good to be back out on the water.

Bad weather, bad luck, bad timing, and bad Jiu Jiu had kept me landlocked, but I finally got out yesterday with my Friend Mike the Capt of Off Limits charters. I keep telling you guys he’s the man but it seems only the pictures or a trip on his boat make believers; plain and simple the guy can fish, there is no one out there with their own fishing show or otherwise that does it any better than this guys.

The plan was to head out around 9:00AM because Mike had to take care of some business early in the morning before he could go out. He is the owner of Migdalia’s awards, they service many of Dade County Public Schools with their trophies, plaques, medals, and other types of awards, he does this pretty damn well also, so if you need to order awards, give him a call and get hooked up with some top quality stuff.

Anyway, back to the fishing… Due to a meeting that ran a little longer than expected and some technical difficulties with the trailer lights we didn’t actually get in the water until about 12:30 PM, from there we made a run to get Diesel, which took some time, then finally we were off.

The Oceans were much rougher than expected, the Marine Weather Service was calling for winds out of the South East at 10 to 15 and Sea’s 2 to 4 feet, but the only thing they got right was the winds out of the South East. It was actually sustained 20 with gusts of 25 to 30 I would say, and the Sea’s were definitely 4 to 6 with some 7’s mixed in.

We went off to look for some live Bait but they were not at Mike’s secret patch, not at 2:00 PM anyway; luckily a friend of Mike’s that catches bait for a living had provided us with about 7 dozen Pilchards, so it was not a big deal that we did not find more bait and we headed off for our targeted location. It was about 13 miles from where we were and with the seas at 4 to 6 it would not be a short trip.

We got to the spot circled a bit to gather our bearings and find a spot Mike liked. He anchored once and realized that the wind and the current were at odds so we pulled up and tried it again. He was finally satisfied with our position, and by the time we got our lines in the water it was nearly 4:00 PM.

Mike had brought along some Live Crabs because it was his intent to target Permit at this spot we were headed for. Alfonso had dove at this wreck recently and knew that it held schools of Permit. We tried just crab for a while but the Permit (if they were there) were not interested. So we changed the game plan and put out some Pilchards, 2 rods out flat (one with Crab the other with a Pilchard, 2 rods at mid water, and of course two rods to the bottom.

Alfons also had stated that the wreck held many Black grouper and also a couple of Goliath, so we knew it would be a challenge to get the Blacks up from the deep wreck, but also to keep the Goliath from devouring it.

Sure enough, not long after the Pilchards made it down… BANG the rod bent over, mike reeled down and whatever it was made a run for the wreck, it made it there and locked itself down, after several attempts to free the fish from the wreck, the line broke off. Then BANG! My rod bent over, I actually got whatever it was up about a third of the way up before something bigger grabbed it and head down like a locomotive.

Mike surmised it was the Goliath and made the comment that any efforts to get fish to the boat from that bottom would likely be futile, but we did not give up. One of the flat lines screamed and we felt some excitement that we might get some top water action, mike worked the rod pretty easily, at the end of it was just a schoolie Dolphin, we left it in the water a few minutes to see if he could bring some company, but he was rogue and no other Dolphin appeared. Not long after we released it alive to go do some growing so we can run into him again another day.

We had experienced a few more runs on the bottom only to be cut off time and again, and then things got quiet for around 20 minutes, then all of a sudden BANG! And not a minute later BANG again! My rod screamed out, and my new Finore Offshore was about to be tested. Whatever it was made a run to the surface which meant it was not a Groper but a pelagic, good news because likely it would not be bothered by the Goliath. While I was fighting this beast, Mikes rod with a crab on flat line took off as well.

We both fought nice fish around the boat, and he got his in first, it turned out to be a nice Cobia. Some minutes later my fish was finally nearing the surface as well, it was a big African Pompano. Alfonso made quick work of both fish with the Gaff and all of a sudden the empty fish box contained two nice prizes.

Things settled down for some time; there was the eventual run and cut off on the bottom rods, but nothing else on the top. Then at nearly 7:00 PM with the sun going down, BANG! This time it was Alfonso’s rod, he was free lining a crab, so it was either another Cobia or our first Permit. About five seconds into its run Mike proclaimed it was in fact a Permit, it took about two thirds of the spool on a Bait Runner 6500B before Alfonso turned it for home, nearly 20 minutes later it was boat side and Mike gaffed a rather large Permit into the boat. We fished only another 20 minutes or so after that, knowing we had a long run in, and satisfied that we had boated three very nice fish.

All in all another great day of fishing aboard the Off Limits. Next week I will be in Tavernier in the Florida Keys for a week and I plan to fish as much as I can so hopefully I will have some good stories.

Till Then...

Mike with his Cobia

(no action shot, I was fighting the Pompano)

Here is my African Pompano

(no action shot, it's my camera and I was fighting the Pompano)
Nice African Pompano
Alfonso letting the Permit Make it's run and about 2/3's of his line is gone
Mike gets ready to Gaff the Permit
Alfonso and his Permit
A horizontal view
Get a look at the Fish Box

Memorial Weekend on the Water

Nothing better than a long weekend for a boat owner, it gives you time to enjoy a little fishing and also a little time at the Sand bar with the family.

So I called up my former assistant coach Humberto Miret (Who is now an assistant principle at Coral Gables senior) and asked him if he wanted to go fishing. Not an easy task for him to get out of the house, the poor guy has been busier than a one legged man in an ass kicking contest since his wife had twins. I can only imagine how much work goes into twins because I had mine one at a time and that was all consuming so two at the same time has to be incredibly difficult.

Humberto got the OK from the Wife and the trip was set, I called up my current assistant Mike Castro and he was in as well.

We headed out early enough, arrived at Homestead Bayfront around 7:45 AM and were quickly underway. We stopped briefly to see if we could catch any Pin Fish, but they just weren’t there so we headed off to the Yellow Tail spot.

We arrived at the spot just 35 min later and looked around for a spot to anchor. I saw what I thought was a nice bottom, came around and anchored up. The first thing I noticed was that the current was crossed up with the wind, never a good thing when Yellow Tailing, it means that the boat is facing one way and the current is headed in an awkward direction that makes it hard to fish. To make matter worse, the current was very light up top and virtually non existent lower in the water column.

We were only in 57 feet of water so I decided to go a little deeper; we picked up anchor and reset, but to similar results. Humberto got a call from Capt. Juan Estevez (Why Knot Charters, we call him Papo) to see how we were doing, the report was not good, and Papo told us to run south a bit, he said they were killing the Mutton there just days before and we might have better luck there.

We picked up and ran south; I did not have any numbers so I blindly scanned the bottom for some structure. I found a little something and anchored up but the result was even worse south of the Whistle, at least on the North side there was a very light current, over here there was no current at all.

So we picked up and headed back north, on the way there I saw a boat anchored up in 65 feet or so, it looked like they were Yellow Tailing, chum bag in the water, rod straight back in free line mode etc. So I slowed down and scoped out the bottom, “Looks Good” I said, and we came around again looking for a good spot to throw anchor.

The mate on the boat that was already there was not pleased we had pulled up, but he doesn’t own the ocean, and I kept a respectable distance from them so I don’t know what was his problem? At first he waved good bye mockingly, and then when he realized we were about to anchor he screamed out, “did you run out of gas!” “F – You” I said you don’t own this spot A – Hole. The nerve of some people, this guy was willing to make trouble all for a fishing spot? Anyway, he had nothing to worry about, by the time we anchored up they already had them feeding off the back of their boat and despite our heavy chumming, it was not enough to bring them over to us. Humberto and Mike did manage a one, two, punch and caught 2 nice tails, I thought right away that we had brought them over, but it was just those two rogues because we tried for another 30 minutes or so and nothing.

We headed back south of the whistle and anchored up one last time, there were tons of bait fish in the water and I managed to catch two Cero Mackerel with a sidewinder jig that it seems Mackerel can’t resist. There was a Frigate bird circling above us a little north, and that could mean Dolphin in the area, the two boats directly behind us paired up on two nice size Dolphin, one the Bull and the other the Cow, we tried everything to get them to come to us but they never did. Still it was cool to see the fish jump out of the water and to see the other boats land their fish, as screams and cheers came for them from our boat and the other boats in the area.

A pretty bad storm was moving towards us from the North so we decided along with all the other boats out there to pick up and run in. We took on some heavy rain as we ran back, thankfully we all had rain gear or it would have been much more miserable.

On Sunday my cousin JC called and we took the families to the Sand Bar just outside Key Biscayne; the wind was howling, and the waters were rough even inside the bay. Still, the kids had a great time swimming and playing around in the water. I relaxed in the water for a long while with JC while our wives laid out and slept on board. I told Tania (my lovely wife) that she looked a little burnt, she ignored it and when we got home she noticed that she was in fact a little extra crispy.

So all in all it was another great weekend on the boat, we did not catch a lot of fish, and the weather was a little rough on Sunday, but it sure beats staying at home watching TV. I’ll see if I can stir up better results next week.

Till Then…

Reef Raider gets his letters

Humberto Tries to catch some bait


Shake that Chum bag Mikie


Strawberry Grouper... GREAT!


Not a bad little Cero to avoid being skunked

Mikie catches his first Tail on his own, and it was a nice one


The kid next next to us fights a nice Dolphin


The meager catch

JC takes a picture of his boat fromt he water

Chow time

OK Claudia Shiffer

Angelina and Jonah

I think the Logo is cool, what do you think?

Damn! Still a Rookie…

I guess it will be a while before I learn all the in’s and out’s of fishing and boating because it seems like every time out there is some little glitch that is frustrating as hell but definitely serves as a lesson.

We headed out of Matheson Hammock around 7:15 AM, My assistant coach Mike Castro, My Son Albert, and myself; we were headed for Bug light to catch some live bait, and I could see from very far away that there were tons of boats with the same idea that were already there trying to get their share. It really was too crowded for me because in that situation you need someone to be at the helm while someone else fishes for the bait. Unfortunately Mike has NO experience driving a boat, and my son is only 8 years old so obviously he could not handle the job either.

“Screw it” I said, lets just head for the Whistle Buoy and catch some Yellow Tails, it should have been my plan all along with two rookies on board, my plan was in fact to teach both of them how to fish, mind you that I am still learning myself. Still, Yellow tailing is the one thing I know how to do pretty well so it should have been my goal from the beginning.

So off we went, 17 miles from Bug Light to the Whistle; the seas weren’t too bad, mostly 2’s and 3’s with an occasional 4, my little boat cut’s right through that stuff and we were cruising at around 23MPH so it was a 35 to 40 minute run. Just 3 miles from the Whistle I look down at the gauges and OH! NO! The OIL LIGHT is flashing. Frack this! I can’t believe it, how frustrating. So what could I do, there was no thinking involved the trip was over. My only hope was that the oil light as it often is with cars will come one when the level is low, but not dangerously so, that the engine would not be damaged. I gave Mike and my son the bad news, to which my son of course reacted with a big NOOOOOO!

I did not push the RPM just in case; we cruised back to Matheson at around 17 MPH and made it back without any further problems. It was still early and I thought “if I run to West Marine and get some oil, I can still get back out and fish." On the way there, I called Suzuki; the guy asked me if it was a new engine, “YES” I said, then the bomb. He told me it was not an oil problem; he told me the oil light comes on when the boat needs its first service at 20 hours. DAMN! What an IDIOT.

So I was still determined to fish, and since I was already on US 1 I asked Mike if he was still in? He had to be at a wedding and I had to have him back a the dock by 4PM, but he said yes right away and we headed for Homestead Bay front.

We were out at the Whistle in 35 minutes; I anchored poorly the first time but soon picked up and re-anchored. Much better spot the second time, I could tell from the bottom and the fish it was marking. We started chumming and not 5 minutes later BAM! Nice tail! In the 16 inch range for sure. We chummed some more and next drift BAM another one, this one a FLAG (the biggest one of the trip as it turned out). I started teaching Mike how to free line for tails, but as it always is with beginners, they want to slow down the drift or stop it altogether because they think the fish will just come to them. I took the rod from him and told him to watch me, BAM! Another nice tail, I handed him the rod and showed him how to work it, tip up and reel down, tip up and reel down. Great job for his first tail, I could see the excitement in his eyes, I think he will want to fish again soon.

Back in with another drift; Bam! This time I hand the rod to my son, he’s just a little guy and those tails were nice size and smacking the rod to try to get off. He got it in by himself (great job by the little guy as well), he was a little tired but it’s because he forgot to breathe when he was reeling. He wants no part of the fish once it’s on board though, that is the next thing I have to teach him, he needs to learn to take his own fish off the hook and toss it in the cooler.

They each caught a couple and then I went back on, I caught another nice one and was right back in the water with another drift. Bam! I hooked a nice one, could be bigger than the biggest one because it actually got some line off my spool. I tightened the drag a bit and started her towards the boat, not 15 feet from the boat a Bull shark comes in blazing and takes my tail. Well, that turned off the bite, and it was now 3:55 and Mike was going to be late.

It took a few minutes to get the anchor out, the tie wraps I am using are a little big and it took some motoring to break the anchor free. We made it back to the dock around 4:45PM, content with 7 tails considering we could have had nothing, and we only fished for a couple of hours.

I forgot to take my camera on the boat so there are no action shots, but here are some pictures of my Boy and the Tails.

P.S. A side note, A cobia came broad side to the boat and started feeding off the chum bag, I did not have any rod rigged for that size fish, (I estimate it was around 60 lbs) I have heard of my Friend Mike Murias of Off Limits Charters do this so I thought I’d try it, I took out my gaff and attempted to free gaff the Cobia. I hit it good and brought it over the gunnel, unfortunately it was too big and it bent the hook on my gaff, it fell off, hit the gunnel and bounced out of the boat. It would have made a great story if it had landed inside the boat but whatever …

Check back next week, I’m sure it will be another adventure.

Till then…

Albert with the biggest Yellowtail

2 Nice ones
19 1/2 inches nose to the tip of the tail
7 beauties await the knife
Cleaned and ready for the Friar
One last Line-up
2lbs 4 3/4 ounces Clean

Perfect Trip! Finally!Target: YellowtailsFisherman: Myself Of Course, My Cousin Freddy, My Good Friend Hector,& (OH NO!) My Brother

OK so you’ve been reading my Blog and you know that the first few times out did not go exactly as planned; and for a Blog titled Fishing Adventures that is not very impressive. Well this time all went perfect, finally!

We headed for Homestead Bay Front a little later than planned; it seems that in his excitement to go fishing my friend Hector locked his keys in his car. No biggie; that is why he has AAA, so 45 min or so after we had planned we were on the road.

We got in the water and out the channel; we made a brief stop to hopefully catch some pinfish because we had it in mind to do a drift or two before we set up for the Yellowtails. Unfortunately it was the wrong time of day for the pinfish, and they just weren’t there. We did manage to catch a few, but the Pinfish would not factor into the success of our fishing trip.

We headed out for a wreck anyway, it was by now kind of late in the day (around 6:30 PM) but I wanted to try drifting over the wreck a few times just to get some practice at it for future trips. I actually did a pretty good job; I used the chart plotter to figure out the drift, went a little beyond the spot and sure enough a few minutes later we drifted right over the spot. We considered sending some of the pin fish down, but it was getting kind of late and we wanted to be anchored and start our chum slick before dark so instead of setting up another drift we just plotted a course for the whistle buoy.

20 minutes later we were at the Whistle Buoy, my friend Bob gave me the GPS coordinates to his Yellowtail spot, quite the gesture considering how protective most people are about their “Secret Numbers.” I found a nice bottom that we thought would hold fish, I corrected for the drift and my brother dropped anchor.

We caught bottom quickly enough (I love my little plow anchor) and then for a little trick I learned from a friend of my dad’s when I was a teen. I tied a rope to the rear cleat made a slip not on the main anchor rope and threaded the rear line through it. This has the effect of essentially turning the boat sideways to the current. Cats are great that way, we could all stand and fish out of the same side, and you could barely even notice the boat list at all. Luckily the seas were only 1 to 3 feet; that is not a technique you really want to use if the waters were any rougher.

My cousin Freddy had mixed together a nice chum cocktail specially mixed for yellowtails earlier while Hector and I tried to catch some Pinfish. First thing we did once we were anchored was put a chum bag in the water, and then scoop in some of the special mix my cousin had prepared. Fred was first to start his drift, and not a couple minutes later he was on with the fist Tail of the night.

Soon after I was on as well, and for the first hour or so the fishing was pretty consistent, as the Yellowtails kept finding themselves trapped in our Cooler. Hector (the Yoyo man) struggled a bit, he refuses to use a rod and that hurt his chances (in my opinion). He lost several fish to a Cuda that was lurking; he missed a few bites, and did not have enough line on his Yoyo to make it all the way back to where the tails were hanging out. Still he managed to put 4 or 5 Tails in the Cooler, so he can’t really be too disappointed considering.

My brother is not really into fishing, but he went along for the ride, and was super helpful around the boat taking care of getting bait, keeping the boat clean, and other stuff. I was surprised, considering his mission is usually to annoy everyone, especially if the bite is slow. Freddy developed a sore neck a little after night fall (getting old cuz) which led to a headache; so he teamed up with my brother to help him real in a few. So even my brother caught a few nice Tails, and had fun doing it which was more surprising.

Anyhow, the bite slowed down some around 9:30 PM, we caught a few more tails after then but they were smaller and further back. The current had dropped from steady to almost light, and it is likely the best explanation for why the Tails became less interested. An hour later we had 27 Tails in the Cooler, we wanted to make it an even 30, but it was 10:30 PM and though we were not in a hurry to get back we felt satisfied and decided to call it quits.

We pulled up anchor headed home and were back at the Marina in 40 min. Freddy and Hector seemed quite impressed with my little boat, both giving it great reviews seeing as how it was their first time out on it. I would like to say at this point “I told you so” but in all sincerity it means a lot to me that they liked my boat and had a good time on it. I spent more than a year researching boats, and I must say that for my needs I feel I picked the perfect boat. It’s very stable even with four people on board, uses little gas with the Suzuki 140HP Four Stroke; and it cuts through the waves like a champ which is the most impressive part of this little boat.

So we had a great time, spent little money getting it done, and got to fish for what I think is pound for pound one of the funnest fish to catch in the ocean. Can’t wait for the next trip out, I gotta take my kids to that spot, they are going to have a blast catching Tails once they get the hang of it.

Till then…

P.S. Much appreciation to my friend Bob and his brother Jorge for sharing their prime Yellowtail spot with me. By the way, Bob is the owner of Jomara Seafood, a fish market located in Hialeah where you can find the freshest selection of seafood in town, if you want to get your hands on your favorite type of Fish, Shrimp, Lobster, or other seafood you might be craving, you should really check out his place. Here is there address, and the link to their webpage.

2275 West 9th Avenue
Hialeah, Florida 33010
Local (305) 885-4577
Facsimile (305) 885-4102

http://www.jomaraseafood.com/

Freddy show of the first Tail of the night

Freddy let Hector sneak into the picture

One of the prettiest sights you'll ever see, Sunset while fishing, AWESOME

Fish on baby

Speedo For bait, Yum Yum


Gentalmen start your drift's

Swallowed the hook just a bit

1 on the head, that's my mark

Check out Hector with Yoyo

Freddy working a Tail

This is a nice one

My Neck is killing me

Fiti takes the Rod

We're coming home Gringa

Hey Fiti nice Tat's

17 inches

The Twins

The Baby of the Bunch

Even Dozen

Just Cleaned

1lb 6oz cleaned and ready for the table