GHOST OVER THE GULF

Home in Port Charlotte
High of 90

On Saturday, my friend Al and I went fishing offshore. This time we took Al's 23 foot Bayliner walk around. The marine weather forecast was excellent, calling for 1 foot seas and winds around 5 to 10 mph. This could not have been more in accurate.

Overnight thunderstorms had churned up the seas and waves were more like 2 to 3 foot with the occasional five footer thrown in for good measure. The ride out was very uncomfortable. By 10:00 AM I was wishing I had stayed home for the day to rest. After a work week that found me in six states in four days, getting beat up at sea was not my idea of a fun Saturday. However we figured that these unexpected seas were from some unexpected thunderstorms and after they passed, so would the rough water.

We fished a few holes between five and 7 miles offshore and didn't have much luck except Al one nice flounder. By 2 PM the seas started to smooth out and the storms had moved onshore, away from us.

23 miles offshore, we anchored down in 90 feet of water. At 3 PM, as if someone had flipped a switch, the bite turned on. Over the next 90 minutes we caught red grouper, Vermillion snapper, Lane snapper, yellowtail snapper, grunts, sharks, romora, grey triggerfish, Porgie and lots of baitfish, which we proceeded to fillet and release.

For a short while every single cast was resulting in fish. When we dropped the bait overboard it would take a few seconds for it to get 90 feet down but as soon as we closed the bail on the reel, the rod was getting tugged immediately. It's moments like these that make fishing addictive. In fact it's not even fishing... it's catching!

By 6:30 PM we knew it was time to pull up anchor and make the long run back to shore. The ride back in was not nearly as rough as the ride out, although the chop did pick up the closer we got to shore. We got the boat back on the trailer right at 8 PM as the sun was going down.

All of the keepers had been placed on ice while we were fishing so everything remained fresh to be filleted the next morning.  As I write this on Sunday afternoon, my wife and I are preparing to enjoy grouper fish tacos for dinner tonight. We will compliment the tacos with a special wasabi lime sauce, from a recipe shared by my brother Mike.

Enjoy the photos below. The one that looks like a ghost cloud rising over the gulf was quite interesting to see.
He must have been a friendly ghost, as the lightning stayed well clear of us.

Ghost of fishermen past?

Night shot of all of our keepers

4 Vermillion Snapper, 2 Lane Snapper; one pound is a common size

Porgie

Red Grouper

He just found out the menu

Sunday dinner: blackened Grouper, lemon pepper Lane Snapper tacos with  homemade wasabi lime sauce

Grouper taco with wasabi lime sauce