Robin's Reports

8/17/09 Indian River Laggoon fishing & picnic

This past Friday, I was tired. Tired from the heat and tired from cutting the grass & breaking ground on a garden Thursday. The furthest thing from my mind was expending energy in another 95+ deg day, fighting big fish on little sleep. So, Jack didn't give me the 6am wake-up call and came home around 8am from work.
W-E-E-K-E-N-D!!! Well, as you can see from the first photo, it was a beautiful day and the water was like glass. I was game for a picnic on the water if I didn't have to work too hard.

Instead of sandwiches, chips & the usual fishing day cooler foods, I packed fruits, hotdogs, chips & salsa. We didn't even take a fish cooler with us, so there was extra room on board. We put in the ramp just 2 miles from our house which saved us 20 min of driving. That is a power station behind my son's head. He is showing off his gator trout & red fish t-shirt.

We headed a couple miles up the river, sight-seeing along the way. We saw numerous manatees, dolphin, jellyfish and even divers searching for clams.

We parked under the Hwy 405 bridge for shade and because we weren't fighting current. Jack tied us to one of the pilings and we let the kids fish with their kiddie poles.

My oldest was first with a fish. A juvenile whiting. I'm a bad mom for not getting the picture. I really don't have a good excuse except that I was "working" for the kids.

A few minutes later, Little Man hooks something nice but it wrapped itself around the piling and we (meaning, I interferred w/ too much pressure) were cut off from the fish with the sharp barnacles on the piling and Mr. Fishy got to see another day. Probably a keeper gator trout (i.e. large spotted trout's nickname).

Bites were slow but Little Man ended up picking up this juvenile spotted trout. The picture above, you can see him reeling it in and then here, he's holding it. All fish were released today.

After this, we stopped to have our picnic lunch in the partial shade. It sure was nice to have the fruit. I don't usually do that. Our pineapple plant had finally riped its fruit and so I had cut it up that morning. It was so sweet!

Also, in our area, the local legend is that bananas are not allowed on boats for the bad luck. Well, we don't believe in all that but still Jack doesn't let me pack it for offshore trips. (hmmmm?) It has been debunked over and over again. Some think the smell may affect the fish. Whatever, I say. It used to also be bad luck to have women on board ships but I don't buy that for a second either.

We moved up the river another couple bridges north and found this old railroad track bridge. It was loaded with Jack Crevelle which were attacking the glass minnows. Poor things were running to our boat for cover at one point. Unfortunately, none of us got any bites even with all that visual.

As you can see, the wind is picking up a little bit and putting ripples in the water.

As we left that bridge, Jack took a picture of me sitting on the pulpit. Oh, it was so fun to ride up there. I could see all the needlefish darting out of our way.

We had a pair of manatees cross our path right before this picture.

A couple quick miles back to the ramp and we were home. As you can see, it was shallow water (1.6 ft) as we approached the ramp. Jack had to raise up the engine a little to glide on in.

We were home by 2:30pm and in the pool by 3:30. Sometimes I think that we've got live too good. We certainly do make a point to have quality family time and enjoy our lives. We love each other and have found the best family hobby in fishing/boating.

Soon, the boat will be disassembled and painting pictures will begin to appear on the blog. We're still gathering all our materials at this point and watching to see what Hurricane Dean is doing.

Enjoy!

Robin