Best Day of Fishing

Well, it really was night fishing or after dark here when I visited the other Coloradoan (Dick) on the beach around 6:30 -- he already had caught a few whiting and had only been there less than 15 minutes, he said.  So, after two days of fishing without a single bite, I decided "why not give it a try" and grabbed the few mullet I had saved from the last pack I bought a couple days ago and took my rod and bucket down to the beach.

Dick as usual had his sand fleas on his lines and had even caught a blue or two on them so, I moved to his left and cast at an angle away from him so that if my cut bait attracted the blues I wanted, they might not scare away the whiting he was after (only fish he eats from the ocean apparently).  As soon as my rig hit the water there was an immediate strike and I hooked the first of more than a dozen fish -- sometimes catching two on the line at the same time.  I filled my bucket with 8 keepers of over 12 inches and put back over 6 or 8 others that were too small -- great fun but, when my feet got too cold anymore and all my bait had been used, I decided it was time to quit (lost my sinker too).  Those fish were biting on everything including the little heads of the mullet which they usually never touch during the daytime fishing -- even when it's good.

Oceanview from our RV

Guess everything was aligned for good fishing as the sky was clear and the stars were bright with the moon half lit and a couple planets on either side.  The dark ocean was lit from horizon to horizon with the lights of 15 or 20 shrimp boats working the waters -- a good sign there must be something out there in the water, it would seem -- sure enough, there was.

Cleaned the fish and bagged them in twos for the freezer -- one pair for tomorrow's dinner.  I had bought a small gas grille this morning (Christmas present to myself) and had been thinking of getting some hamburgers and hot dogs if I didn't catch any fish today-- soo it will stay stored until I reach Homestead on Sunday (though I did assemble it and gave it a test burn earlier today before the daytime fishing).  Now I will sleep well tonight after the workout and will probably dream of that one large one that flopped off the hook as it hit the beach at the water's edge -- I couldn't get there fast enough to get a hand or foot on it before it righted itself and swam back into the next wave.  Darn it all!

Tiger and Molly living in the RV