He can't take me anywhere

Dani

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So this weekend we were going out to go chase some Goliath grouper. Didn't matter to us that we couldn't keep one, we just wanted to catch one. Whenever Steve and I have gone out to chase a specific species of fish, you can pretty much guarantee that I will catch all the "trash" fish. We went fishing once with a friend for a trifecta of redfish, snook and tarpon. While Steve was catching what we were supposed to be catching, I had the exact same baits and was catching croaker, mangrove snapper and catfish. When we go big red fishing, he'd make sure that I had a rod just for catching "trash" so that we could just get that out of the way...plus we can use them for bait. But I truly am a "trash queen" when it comes to fishing.

We haven't done a whole lot of offshore fishing because I'm so sensitive to motion sickness but I figured I'd like to give it a try to try and catch a monster grouper. Off we went with our guide....headed about 25 miles offshore....in the Gulf over here that means that it's still only about 30 ft deep. We had perfect weather as far as seas go, a very slight breeze and some shade from high clouds. So we weren't totally baking. We got out to the grouper grounds and dropped a line with a 4lb tuna on the hook that seemed as big as my hand. But hey.....you wanna catch big fish, you use BIG bait and BIIIIIG hooks. We also dropped some smaller rigs to try to catch live bait. It was a slooooooooooooooooooooooooooooow weekend. Not even the baitfish were interested in eating for most of the time we were on the water.

Something did finally pick up my tuna and bend my rod over. We were so excited. SOOOOOOOOOOO hopeful that the bite was picking up. The fish and I fought each other for a bit but I managed to show it who was boss. And WHAT do I catch? A nurse shark......I was excited...my first ever shark (I've taken people fishing before and almost everyone of them catches a shark....I've gone out specifically to catch sharks and I basically just sit on the beach getting a tan while my bait soaked)....even though it wasn't one of the badass sharks it was still pretty cool. And what do I hear from Steve? GEEEEEEEEEEEEZZZZZZZZZ a nurse shark?!?! REAAAAALLY? We go grouper fishing and you catch a nurse shark?!?!?!? Just to kind of put it in perspective....catching a nurse shark while goliath grouper fishing is like going prairie chicken hunting and killing a meadowlark, with your truck, going 1 mph as Steve put it. hahahaha

Well he shouldn't have been surprised....I am the trash queen afterall


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But I was pretty tickled....at least I had caught SOMETHING. And it was another first for me.

We later relocated to a totally different wreck and at least some fish were biting there. I caught remoras (more trash), 2 lb grunts (more trash but at least trash that could be used for bait) and a little baby cobia (definitely not trash but also not a keeper). At the end of the day we finally had a grouper take our "mullet bouquet". I had the rod in the belt, Steve and the guide were both on either side of me and we fought to bring the rod up and turn that fish away from his hole. The grouper won. He broke the 250lb test line as though it was just a twig. Sadly we had to begin heading in after that so we didn't get much chance to try to entice him back out to play again. And he was the only taker of our offerings for the weekend.

It was fun fishing but aggravating that the goliaths didn't want to play. The upside is that no one else was catching anything either. We will try again at some point...but NOT when scallop season is in. Lordy the number of boats out there was incredible. And the channel going into the boat ramp was like Christmas traffic on I-95. But we will try again.......hopefully next time we will have much better luck with the goliaths.

Dani
 
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Thanks Ed....the guide had a cool gopro on a stick to get the in water and out of water shots. Technology is so cool these days.

At the end of the day Saturday I was getting queasy. It wasn't as bad as what is normal for me so the sea sickness patch seems to have helped a lot. A major win in that regard for me. Hopefully they will be effective on our next trip out into big big water.
 
Cool fishing trip! I would have been happy with the shark also. The guide did a great job with those photos.
Hopefully next time you will get one of those huge groupers.

Tim
 
Congrats on the shark, even if it wasn't a man eater! My wife has been wanting to catch one for yrs but we only been able to catch snapper, grouper, triggers, and trash like that when we're offshore :)
 
is like going prairie chicken hunting and killing a meadowlark, with your truck, going 1 mph


That is the best quip I have seen in quite a while!

 
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