Sunday, February 20, 2011

Fishronicity, Fishendipity & Harmonic Convergence

It is nearing the end of winter and the beginning of spring.  That hit-or-miss time of fishing when the water is either too warm or too cold, or too cold on top and too warm on the bottom, or the tide is in or the tide is out, the moon is full, or not.  And every now and then the tide, the temperature, the moon and the fisherman all come together at the same time, in the same place, with the same thought in mind; eat.


I fortuitously happened upon a lucky fishing hat while shopping at the oriental food store.  Fishermen are big on luck.  Hopefully it wouldn't cause flashbacks in the Vietnam vets who frequent the dock.




We set out on a beautiful, blue sky day, the tide so low the manatees were having trouble finding enough water.  Lively shrimp.  We got to our spot a couple of hundred yards from the marina and commenced fishing.  The tide was just before low.  



We got comfortable.  We had hot dogs ready to grill, drinks, snacks.  Our usual bonanza of fishing food.









And then the fish, the shrimp the fishermen all came together in a harmonic convergence of reel smokin', line stretchin', high fivin' glory.



 She Hooks!  














She Fights!










She Scores!!!!!!








 Ohhhhh yeah.   The bite was on.  Redfish and Sheepshead galore.  We tried to grill hot dogs but the fish just kept biting.  This is not a complaint.  We set out to "fill the cooler".
                                                                      And we did.


We kept fishing and catching until the tide came in and the (sea)cows came home.  On into the dark.  It took both of us to clean all the fish.
So, naturally, the boat didn't get cleaned so, naturally, we had to fish again on Saturday.  It's been a long, long time since we fished two days of a weekend, and it will be a long, long time before we do it again.  
First, two boats were in our special fishing spot (catching nothing).  We chugged up the river to our other special fishing spot.  Nothing catching.  Much biting and losing of shrimp but no catching.  




 Eventually we did catch a couple of nice Sheepshead.  But, the gnats were biting and the many, many, many people who apparently fish on Saturday were out in force.  







So, we motored back to the dock 





 taking in the sights









and leisurely washed the boat, cleaned the fish and, as a special bonus, I learned how to whip a loop in an anchor line.  
Clean boat tucked in, clean fish in the cooler.  Harmonic convergence, yes.

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