It seems that every week I'm whining and complaining about the weather, in particular, the wind. Well, I'm sorry, but I guess I'm going to do it again. Will these fronts ever stop coming? Will the wind ever quit blowing? It's beginning to look doubtful!

On a positive note, every trip this week was with friends/customers that I have fished with before, and they're all great. It was sort of like old home week.

First up for the week were Scott (Gib) and Colleen (Col) Gibney of Hoboken, New Jersey. I just love these guys. They're the most fun you can have in public without being arrested! Col is the official Queen of the BarHopp'R fleet! She's just gorgeous, and Gib ain't a bad looking stud, either! I was hoping for a descent day, so we could duplicate the day we had last year, but we wound up with a southwest wind a 25 knots. It was blowing!

We headed to Picnic Island for bait, and managed to get plenty. We were off! On top of the wind, we had a miserable tide through the morning hours. In fact, we had miserable, flat, no water moving tides in the morning nearly all week. Because of the southwest wind, the water level was up much more than the NOAH forecast. That meant the trees, bars, flats, etc. were be covered early. I hoped that would work to our advantage on the stagnant tide.

Gib and Col worked hard, as did I, fighting a really nasty wind, and put 8 or 9 nice snook in the boat, including several keepers, 1 big redfish of 27 inches, and 1 trout. They got their Slam! We had hit several beautiful spots that I knew were full of fish, and had broken up the day with a wonderful Waterfront Restaurant lunch. We also made plans to meet at the Seafood Center and Crabhouse for dinner on Tuesday evening. We'd made a great day out of a nasty one.

Tuesday morning things had moderated just slightly for my two boat trip with Tom Baird and his friends Fred Watson, Carl Steele, and Steve Tipps, a super bunch of guys from Signal Mountain, Tennessee. The wind was down to around 20. By mid-day, it had flipped around to the northwest. Capt. John Shearer was the number two boat, and he took Carl and Steve. We stopped at Picnic Island for bait, but wound up finishing up at Chino Island before we had enough to fish.

Early in the trip Tom and Fred boated four snook and lost or missed quite a few. Once the tide was right, I headed to one of my favorite flats to work on the redfish, and began chumming. When I arrived and went to work, the wind was just south of west. Just as the action got going my friend Capt. Rick DePaiva pulled in on our port side. Rick had no more than anchored his boat than the wind shifted to the northwest, blowing us off our fish, and Rick right around onto them. Rick immediately got a good bite going with cut ladyfish. I was forced to move and resituate my boat around behind and to Rick's port side to get back into the fish. Once we did that, everyone was catching. I called John and the boys and told them to come join us for the fun. John, Carl and Steve joined us on my port side, and although they caught several reds, they didn't enjoy the bite that Rick and I had. We finished the day with 14 or 15 big redfish to 12 pounds, and a couple of stingrays thrown in to keep us honest. I was good to see Tom again, but I must admit I wasn't in the best of spirits, and I hope I didn't get on Tom's and Fred's nerves.

My spirits were lifted that afternoon when I found my wife had come down from Sarasota to spend a few days with me. That evening we met Gib and Col Gibney at the Seafood Center and Crab House, and had a fabulous evening with lots of laughs, and great food and drinks. The best part of having my little workhouse right near the ramp now, is that I can for the first time spend time with my friends and customers after the fishing trip. It's great because we get a chance to get to know each other better. I'm usually busy baiting, tying lines, coaching, and so on, and just don't have a lot of time to socialize. Being able to meet my customers outside of the fishing environment gives them a chance to see me as something other than their coach. I love it, but it's really eating into my web time.

Wednesday, I had a wonderful couple named Jim and Dee Vaigl, of Reston, Virginia, for their first BarHopp'R trip together. I had fished with Jim and his dad before, but not met Dee. The wind that morning was around to 15 plus from the northeast, and I knew that meant the front had passed, and the bite would be very slow. At that point, I had no idea just how tough, or I might have been tempted to cancel the trip. If I had, though, I would have missed a day with some really nice folks.

We got bait at Chino Island. I think it was during the bait catching that Dee told me she could just sit and stare at the end of a pole all day long. Unfortunately, that's about what it turned into! No matter what I did, I just couldn't get a bite going. I felt sure that I just stayed with it, the fish would eventually eat, but they didn't. We caught one trout, one stingray, and one catfish, and lost one snook, all morning long. The secondary culprit was the tide. It laid still and didn't move all day long. There was no water movement until very late in the evening, long after we were gone. When you couple that with a passing front and north winds, you have a formula for fishing disaster. It's what I call a golfing day. Jim and Dee took it all in stride, and didn't complain the first bit. We actually had plenty of time to chat, and we had a very enjoyable day on the water. It was just very short on fish!

To make a point about the tides, the tide that followed on Thursday was so poor that I scheduled the day as an off day. I could have booked the day many times over, but just had to be out there flogging the water with customers who want to catch fish when I know there will be no bite. Thursday night Jean and I had dinner with Harald Tollrian, my German friend from the previous week, and his lovely lady Karen and son Daniel. After dinner we came back to the fish camp to visit for a while, and I gave Harald some snook and redfish I had just caught. It was a great evening.

The week ended with my friend Carl Pearce, of Venice, Florida, and his brother Steven, and a friend. Somehow, the wind had come around the compass overnight, and was now out of the west at around 15. I wanted to get Carl and the boys out on the Stickbeach, since that's where the majority of the snook are, but I knew it would be rough. I hoped it would settle down by the time we'd caught bait at Picnic Island, but it didn't. We made our way out to the beach in some pretty bumpy water. The bite was slow. We boated 6 to 8 snook and a trout, and we were paying a comfort price for it.

I headed inside to flat water and hopefully a redfish bite on a flat somewhere. I did my usually chumming routine, but could not attract the first redfish. All that would come to the chum were stingrays. In fact, the rays were everywhere. After giving it plenty of time to work, I decided to get on the pole and see if I could get eyeball to eyeball with some fish. To my surprise, there were no individual, free swimming, or schooled redfish on the flat. Every single fish I saw was following one of the big rays cruising the flats. The rays would have one to three fish following. It was peculiar behavior that we rarely see here, but it at least gave us a chance to sight-fish the big reds. The wind was making it impossible to get more than one shot at a fish, but almost at the end of the flat I spotted a ray that had a big red on it. I told Carl where and how to cast, and he executed a perfect cast. A few seconds went by, and I was thinking that I couldn't believe Carl's perfect cast went ignored, when all of a sudden I saw the line tighten and heard the drag go. Fish on! It had just taken the big red a while to decide to eat. It was a perfect, top of the slot 27 inch fish, and we were all as happy as Carl was at the catch. There's something special about seeing a fish, making the perfect cast, and having everything hold together for the catch. It was a great way to end our day, and although we hadn't caught lots of fish, we had caught some nice fish, gotten our Slam, and had a great time. Isn't that what it's all about?

As I left my fish camp that morning, Jean told me she'd probably be bald when I got home. I found the idea that one's hair could fall out in one day, for any reason including chemo treatments. She assured me it could. Sure as hell, when I arrived home Friday afternoon, Jean had only a little peach fuzz left, and for the first time in thirty-one years, I saw my beautiful wife's perfectly round head. She had taken on the look of a little Buddhist monk. The whole thing doesn't seem to be bothering her, and her attitude is great. My thanks to all of you out there who continue to pray for her.

Note: Those of you who have trips booked in the future, or who may want to book, should note my new phone numbers. Home/office is 239-628-3522, and the new cell phone number is 239-633-5851.