Well, here's a few tips for my fellow 2coolers that are new to going into the Gulf. First, and foremost, fog sucks!!!! Yes, you can wait until 1100 in the morning, thinking it will burn off some. It burned off over land, why not over the water? Big Zee and I puttered out of the Freeport jetties at about 15 MPH at 1130 Saturday morning, might as well have had Stevie Wonder and Ronnie Milsap driving the boat. But, by god, we were going to get out there, and hoped that conditions would improve. Dodged 2 big logs floating in the water, scared a lot of pelicans, and finally got into the vicinity of the coordinates TPWD showed on their interactive website for the rig I wanted to fish, hoping to pick up some fresh fish for live bait at the Vancouver and "the banks." We could hear the rig, but couldn't find it. Just spooky to hear the beep, try to estimate a bearing with GPS, and still not find a big yellow platform for 45 minutes.
We gave up on plan A and went to plan B. I had left a detailed float plan with my wife, and given the fog, wasn't going to stray from it. I had good coordinates for the Vancouver so we headed that direction. Thanks again to Tom Hilton and other 2coolers for coordinates given to me for previous trips; they put me right on the fish.
Big Zee made a new discovery while we were motoring in circles in the fog; he can handle 30 foot seas on a 300 foot ship in the Gulf during the polar vortex, and 40+ seas in the North Sea during their most recent huge winter storm while on a 700 foot ship. 1-3 foot rollers on a 19 foot Nautic Bay with no horizon to look at, however, make him turn interesting shades of green. He laid down and slept once we got to the Vancouver, leaving me to catch twelve 14.5 inch endangered red snapper, and about thirty 12 inchers all by myself. No 15 inchers for me. They wouldn't touch sardines, even on the Snapper Slappers, just wanted the squid.
Lessons learned?
1) Get better GPS numbers (I'm buying some books before I go again!!!!).
2) Fog doesn't necessarily burn off
3) You can get very sunburned on a foggy day with no visible sun
4) Always bring a variety of bait, you just don't know what they will want that day
5) The motion of the boat does all the work for you when you drop the Snapper Slappers straight down and put the poles in the stern pole holders
We gave up on plan A and went to plan B. I had left a detailed float plan with my wife, and given the fog, wasn't going to stray from it. I had good coordinates for the Vancouver so we headed that direction. Thanks again to Tom Hilton and other 2coolers for coordinates given to me for previous trips; they put me right on the fish.
Big Zee made a new discovery while we were motoring in circles in the fog; he can handle 30 foot seas on a 300 foot ship in the Gulf during the polar vortex, and 40+ seas in the North Sea during their most recent huge winter storm while on a 700 foot ship. 1-3 foot rollers on a 19 foot Nautic Bay with no horizon to look at, however, make him turn interesting shades of green. He laid down and slept once we got to the Vancouver, leaving me to catch twelve 14.5 inch endangered red snapper, and about thirty 12 inchers all by myself. No 15 inchers for me. They wouldn't touch sardines, even on the Snapper Slappers, just wanted the squid.
Lessons learned?
1) Get better GPS numbers (I'm buying some books before I go again!!!!).
2) Fog doesn't necessarily burn off
3) You can get very sunburned on a foggy day with no visible sun
4) Always bring a variety of bait, you just don't know what they will want that day
5) The motion of the boat does all the work for you when you drop the Snapper Slappers straight down and put the poles in the stern pole holders
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