Trophy21
Crew Member
First week of June my fishin bud and I headed to the keys for a fishing trip. We had gone the previous year and had 3 days with guides. Being unimpressed with what we had done with guides we rented a boat for a day and had a blast learning catching Bonita tuna.
This year we rented a place on a canal and a boat for the entire week.
We flew in late at night to Fort Lauderdale picked up our rental car and headed to homestead, about 2 hours from marathon our destination. We crashed in a motel and woke up to a sunny warm morning in Florida. Hit the road headed straight for bass pro in world famous islamorada.
Picked up 2 penn spinfisher v 6500 rod and reel combos a cast net and other thing we figured we could use. I got sucked into buy some real pricey Costa sunglasses because the 480 lenses are for offshore fishing. Lol.
Back on the road, we get to our rental early and low and behold not only is the rental ready but the boat is sitting on the dock! We got our stuff organized and took the boat out to get the lay of the area,find fuel stops ect. We find a fuel spot,tackle store and bait store all in a one stop dock area. We are set! Take the boat out about 5 miles off shore to a wreck called the Thunderbolt. Target amberjacks. Worked at getting gear down and finding the for a hour or two and have little success so call it a day.
Up the next morning decided to hit the patch reefs for some light tackle fun. I find a nice patch and anchour up, set up the chum bag and wait. One hour later schools of fish all behind the boat! We chuck jig heads with pieces of squid. Catching fish after fish. Yellow tail,triggerfish,all kinds of reef fish. Then 2 turtles show up to the party! They keep trying to eat our hooks.lol. I see a school of ballihoo right behind the boat, yell get the cast net! Then the gong show begins, we have no idea how to thro the net! Several attempts ending in no fish and us laughing our asses off at each other. We managed to keep some various small fish for bait and threw them in the live well. Pulled up anchour and headed out deeper to some rubble piles for some bigger fish. Anchour chum the new spot and drop down some livys. 20 mins later BOOM one rod goes off! Line is screaming off! A large silver fish jumps straight out of the water! Holly ****! Grab the rod!! Snap!! 80lbs mono breaks! Do this a couple more times. Wtf! Ok I get serious tie on a metal leader, this guy is mine! Drop down a livy..........15mins...Rod goes off, line is rippin off the reel, I grab it, set the hook! The fish takes off, jumps out of the water! Boom gone.....! Wtf I check my set up. The wire leader is now a coil spring the hook is totally bent! **** that didn't work,lol. We decide to pack it in and search out some local knowledge about why we are getting smoked.
Next morning off to the tackle shop for some info. Guy says "y'all boys got into some kingfish or somethin you boys need #7 copper wire and long shank j hooks. Do a haywire twist to your hook and swivel and you'd be killin them things." Off to our spot with some new fishing knowledge. Drop some livys down.........bam! Rod goes off 20mins later. Reel is screaming , fish is launching! Still on!! Get it to the boat side, buddy says holly **** look at those teeth! You pick it up! Maybe I had one to many lol so I did. The first one was a little nerve racking but we sorted it out.landed a bunch of those then decided to hit the weed lines for some Mahi. Pull anchour and run offshore looking for birds,weeds,debris. Find a nice weed line so start throwing jigs at the weeds. Not seeing much move along the line and come across a large buoy floating ne'er the weed line. Go over and inspect. Doesn't look like much, start throwing jigs at it. Fish come up see triple tail trigger fish lots of life. Then the yell! Mahi!mahi! Right there!!!! And Mahi mahem is on! Get the chunk baits! We are running a tripping all over the boat.lol grab the pitch rods! **** there not rigged! Gong show lol. We keep chunking them the Mahi are lite up hammering our chunks! We thro the pitch rods out with bait on them. Wham Mahi on!! We keep it by the boat. Wham double header!!! So much fun! We spend the rest of the day catching and realesing.
Report..fishing for Mahi Mahi good from 300 out to 750 larger fish seem to be deeper. Weed lines sparse in the mornings grouping up in the afternoons. Amber Jack and grouper tougher to get down, the current is really ripping on the wrecks.
To be continued....
This year we rented a place on a canal and a boat for the entire week.
We flew in late at night to Fort Lauderdale picked up our rental car and headed to homestead, about 2 hours from marathon our destination. We crashed in a motel and woke up to a sunny warm morning in Florida. Hit the road headed straight for bass pro in world famous islamorada.
Picked up 2 penn spinfisher v 6500 rod and reel combos a cast net and other thing we figured we could use. I got sucked into buy some real pricey Costa sunglasses because the 480 lenses are for offshore fishing. Lol.
Back on the road, we get to our rental early and low and behold not only is the rental ready but the boat is sitting on the dock! We got our stuff organized and took the boat out to get the lay of the area,find fuel stops ect. We find a fuel spot,tackle store and bait store all in a one stop dock area. We are set! Take the boat out about 5 miles off shore to a wreck called the Thunderbolt. Target amberjacks. Worked at getting gear down and finding the for a hour or two and have little success so call it a day.
Up the next morning decided to hit the patch reefs for some light tackle fun. I find a nice patch and anchour up, set up the chum bag and wait. One hour later schools of fish all behind the boat! We chuck jig heads with pieces of squid. Catching fish after fish. Yellow tail,triggerfish,all kinds of reef fish. Then 2 turtles show up to the party! They keep trying to eat our hooks.lol. I see a school of ballihoo right behind the boat, yell get the cast net! Then the gong show begins, we have no idea how to thro the net! Several attempts ending in no fish and us laughing our asses off at each other. We managed to keep some various small fish for bait and threw them in the live well. Pulled up anchour and headed out deeper to some rubble piles for some bigger fish. Anchour chum the new spot and drop down some livys. 20 mins later BOOM one rod goes off! Line is screaming off! A large silver fish jumps straight out of the water! Holly ****! Grab the rod!! Snap!! 80lbs mono breaks! Do this a couple more times. Wtf! Ok I get serious tie on a metal leader, this guy is mine! Drop down a livy..........15mins...Rod goes off, line is rippin off the reel, I grab it, set the hook! The fish takes off, jumps out of the water! Boom gone.....! Wtf I check my set up. The wire leader is now a coil spring the hook is totally bent! **** that didn't work,lol. We decide to pack it in and search out some local knowledge about why we are getting smoked.
Next morning off to the tackle shop for some info. Guy says "y'all boys got into some kingfish or somethin you boys need #7 copper wire and long shank j hooks. Do a haywire twist to your hook and swivel and you'd be killin them things." Off to our spot with some new fishing knowledge. Drop some livys down.........bam! Rod goes off 20mins later. Reel is screaming , fish is launching! Still on!! Get it to the boat side, buddy says holly **** look at those teeth! You pick it up! Maybe I had one to many lol so I did. The first one was a little nerve racking but we sorted it out.landed a bunch of those then decided to hit the weed lines for some Mahi. Pull anchour and run offshore looking for birds,weeds,debris. Find a nice weed line so start throwing jigs at the weeds. Not seeing much move along the line and come across a large buoy floating ne'er the weed line. Go over and inspect. Doesn't look like much, start throwing jigs at it. Fish come up see triple tail trigger fish lots of life. Then the yell! Mahi!mahi! Right there!!!! And Mahi mahem is on! Get the chunk baits! We are running a tripping all over the boat.lol grab the pitch rods! **** there not rigged! Gong show lol. We keep chunking them the Mahi are lite up hammering our chunks! We thro the pitch rods out with bait on them. Wham Mahi on!! We keep it by the boat. Wham double header!!! So much fun! We spend the rest of the day catching and realesing.
Report..fishing for Mahi Mahi good from 300 out to 750 larger fish seem to be deeper. Weed lines sparse in the mornings grouping up in the afternoons. Amber Jack and grouper tougher to get down, the current is really ripping on the wrecks.
To be continued....
