As soon as winter break began, Ethan, his dad Andrew, Marcus, and I planned to go on the long awaited sequel to last year's winter break Sailor's Choice party boat fishing trip in Key Largo. Wenger had just got back from law school, and with my applications and decision already in, it was a perfect time for a reunion. While last year's trip happened to occur on a surprisingly cold day, today had absolutely perfect weather - temperature in the 70s, not a cloud in the sky, and very low chop on the water. That being said, I was a little wary because of my experience and often told lessons that good weather for fishermen isn't always good weather for fishing. Regardless, considering a relatively good day last year on cold weather was supposedly an off day for the boat, we figured a warmer winter day would be fun. We set out on the beautiful water catching up while eager to set our lines. Leaving the dock, we could see just how relatively flat the water was. It truly was not very choppy at all, with waves only around 1-3 feet. We soon anchored up at the first spot. We soon felt some continuing nibbles, but only to the tune of a few fish being caught. Most of them were White Grunts, first caught by Marcus and me before Andrew got on the board. Ethan was slow to start catching, but soon went on a run towards the end of our time at the spot. We each had roughly 5 fish for so before the captain said that she heard of a Red Grouper tip at another spot, so we reeled in our lines and got ready to go. Interestingly yet sadly, Andrew said that he saw the previous longtime captain of the boat was actually shot and killed in a road rage incident in between the fishing trips. Yeesh.
We pulled up on the spot with high hopes, but unfortunately received very few bites. Wenger and I only caught two small fish each, still White Grunts and Yellowtail Snapper. We soon moved to another spot when we saw the bites weren't coming, and after about 5-10 minutes at another spot in the area the captain decided to move us somewhere else altogether.
We had 0 fish at the last spot. The whole boat wasn't catching, so it was clear that we'd take a chance at one last spot before running time out to return back to the dock; there wasn't enough time to run out to another spot. We finished with about 6 fish each, and roughly 6 keeper Grunts between us. The species were a mix between White Grunts, Yellowtail Snappers, and Tomtates. That being said, while the fish didn't really show up as we'd hoped, we weren't skunked. And on top of that, the view was absolutely beautiful. Even if not catching fish, being on the magnificent, clear blue water over the keys reefs was definitely worth the trip. The four of us got lunch at a restaurant right by the dock. The lunch was delicious, and we also saw a charter boat dock next to us with an impressive haul of Yellowtail Snapper and a Mahi Mahi. Go figure lol. Before Marcus and I returned to Miami, we picked up some Key Lime Pie. He and I are both proponents of the "when in Rome" philosophy, and it was a must considering it was Marcus' first time in the keys since high school. All in all, it was a fun time with good company at a beautiful spot. The spots seriously were so good, the fish didn't even know about em.
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