We have been busy and the fishing has been great

[Free Spirit]

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Well, i have fished a load of days since the last report. Wednesday, we could not find a Bass but Bill Mattison and crew caught 16 drum. Unfortunately most were small so we released them to grow up, providing someone else doesn't catch them and decide that they are big enough. Anyway, on Thursday, Jim Wallace, the owner of JIm's Tackle , finally got on my boat and we went off to see if he is as good inshore as he is offshore. He is. The bite had been on during the outgoing tide and so, when we got there at the end of the flood, we figured that we were in great shape. WRONG! We fished the entire ebb and caught 1 nice striper. It was as if they decided that they were not eating today. No matter, we stayed "Just a bit longer", and as the tide started in, we anchored right where the fleet had mugged them the night before. After a while, I noticed that among the 50 or so boats, no rods were bending. Hmmm, what to do, what to do. We decided to go looking and fired up the 465 Yanmar as I pulled the anchor. Let me tell you, that new EZ anchor puller that I installed on the bow is absolutely fantastic. Anyway, I headed inshore of the fleet and what to my wondering eyes should appear on my E 120 screen? Fish! Yessir, we dropped the anchor AQAP, (figure it out) and within a few minutes we had our first drum of the evening. A puppy, but it WAS a drum! Then Jim caught his second bass of the day. another 42" fish. He had told me at the beginning of the trip that he needed a bass for his pastor, a drum for Carmen, and he would be happy. Not only did we have the bass taken care of, but he caught me one for my wife. We ended up with 8 drum of which Jim allowed me to catch 3, but he just happened to boat the best fish of the day, a 55" beauty, ( if drum can be beautiful) that weighed 79 lbs on his scale the next day.



His smile tells it all.

Friday, i took My good friend Howard Weiss out on his new 33 Rampage to seek the elusive drum and Striper and he caught several which included his first drum. Then it started to blow and we decided to run the Relentless up to her berth in Margate. That is a heck of a boat! Wait till the offshore stuff starts.

Saturday dawned sunny, clear and a bit breezy but John Amano and friends stepped onto the deck and we set out. We sat in the slop for the incoming and had a great day. We ended up with 11 drum and a very nice striper. The boat just sits there in the sea. Amazing, no tossing about, no stumbling, just grab the rod and get the fish. I do love it! Check the pics and you will see what I mean about slop.




On Sunday, we went off again but the seas were sloppy enough that they weren't biting. Of 8 charter boats that I spoke with, there was a total of 4 small drum caught. I decided that all I was doing was taking my charter's money so we ran back in at 17 kts in that 30 mph wind and again the seaworthiness and comfort of the boat amazed me. Of course, I did cut the folks a break on the cost because it was the right thing to do.
Monday, I cancelled the charter and slept in, cause I may be dumb, but i ain't stupid.

Now, from what I hear on the forecast, I will be there tomorow afternoon, hopefully putting a tune on the fish population. By the way, I do have a couple of days open next week and the fishing should be excellent. Feel free to call or email me if you are interested in fishhing on the Free Spirit. There are days that we can fisih comfortably from this downeast hull that you simply can't on some boats. As my good buddy Bob, who is building a sister ship to mine now, said," I couldn't be here on my Parker but with my new boat, i should not have to cancel a trip, ever."