Finally, Back on the Water...

After about 2 months of not being able to get out on the water and get some inshore action in, I finally got back on the water and back in the game so to speak. Heading into the Memorial Day weekend, I was getting pumped up. I had Friday off to boot. But, I couldn't hold back my anticipation, bugged outta work early Thursday and headed out for some late afternoon fishing. And, what a start it was.

Launched at Sabine Pass and headed for Lighthouse Cove, set anchor on a swift outgoing tide and started chunking Gulp's the mackeral variety. And, right away, catching fish. Started out with a couple of keeper flounder. Then, started catching a mix of undersized redfish and trout. I didn't have many of the Gulp in mackeral. Started using a curly grubtail with some shrimp Yum. Continued to catch numerous undersized redfish, right in that 16" to 18" range.

Amidst the undersized fish, managed a couple more keeper flounder and two nice trout, both over 20". Then, finally, some bigger redfish. After a couple of breakoffs, managed three very nice 23" to 25" redfish.

At this point, relinquished my anchor spot to some other fisherman and decided to troll the bank. Redfish were teaming up the glass minnows and darn near wiping out some egrets at the shoreline dinner table. Threw a topwater, but only got one to roll on it, no serious takers. Called it quits right at sundown. 4 flounder, 3 redfish, and 3 trout.

With that trip, I was once again pumped for Friday. Different game plan though. Headed to Keith Lake at first light. Launched the boat and headed to Mud Lake. Got up on a flat and attempted to do some poling, not too easy with about a 10 mph NW wind. With a lot of water up on the flats, and with the wind, was difficult to see any action. Abandoned that plan and headed to Salt Bayou. The flounder were thick along the bank and busting glass minnows and shad. I threw several different lures, gulp, grub tails, bass assasins, topwater, no takers. Since I had afternoon plans to fish with a friend and some trolling motor problems to resolve before 4:00 p.m., decided to head on out. On the way out attempted to explore the Horseshoe canal only to find out it is closed, and probably just as well, it appears Ike had dropped in quite a bit of mud and grass was growing in the canal.

Also, while on the way out, spotted a boat up on a flat. Some guys fishing out of a shallow water boat with a crow's nest. Saw them when I got to the launch, they were apparently pre-fishing for an upcoming Redfish Cup tourney.

Once back home and running some errands, got the trolling motor woes resolved and headed back out at 4:00 with a friend. Back to Lighthouse Cove. My friend doesn't get out as often as he would like (don't we all), and it's difficult to string together a nice outing. And, I was sure hoping we could get into the same spot I was in Thursday and that the bite would be on again. Well, it was. Once again, lots of undersized fish. Both reds and trout. All our fish were on Gulps. We managed 6 flounder, 3 redfish, and 2 trout for the cooler and alot of other landed fish made for a very good trip.

That's not all, but Saturday's trip was totally different. A neighbor friend and I headed out to Keith Lake to do some crabbing. Some threatening weather to the west kept us from running too far, so tried a spot that I hoped would produce some crabs. Not a problem, we ended up with 5 1/2 doz crabs over three hours.

So, what am I about to do right now, on Sunday evening, eat some crabs! And, Monday, or sometime real soon, a fish fry. MMMMMMM,MMMMMM GOOD!