I woke up Easter Sunday morning dreading the day. I knew that if it was a typical holiday weekend day it would be a zoo at the ramp and on the water. It always is! I figured it would be hard to deliver a good trip to my customers, Ken and Marsha Stieh, and their sixteen year old son, Jeff, of Port Murray, New Jersey. I even warned them one more time and gave them a chance to back out. I knew Jeff was really looking forward to this trip, as I had talked with him many times via email. I knew from that he would be a good fisherman. Ken wanted a promise of fish, which I would not give him; not today. We decided to give it a go.

We headed north to the area around Chino island to look for bait. To my surprise there was only one other boat on the flat chumming for bait. Jeff, who's a very mature sixteen year old, took over chumming duties, while mom and dad looked on. I was using a brand new Caloosa 10 ft. X 3/8 inch castnet for the second day, and it was giving me a hard time. It kept balling up in deep water and the leadline kept snagging up in the net. This aggravation with the net was not helping my overall mood. I have a low tolerance for expensive stuff that doesn't work as promised. I finally noticed that the excess line from the knots in the bralle lines had not been trimmed, and each one had about an inch or so of tag end sticking out that was causing all kinds of problems. Shame on Caloosa Nets! That's just poor quality control, or somebody in too big a hurry to get product out the door. Anyway, I started clipping them as I found them.

Bait didn't come easy, and we had to chum and throw way more than I had in me that morning. We finally got them going, and loaded the well with 4 to 500 baits. Happy to have that part of the trip over with, I closed the lid on the well while I cleaned the boat. After cleaning and chatting a few minutes as we prepared to go fishing, I opened the well for the ride, and there were all the baits laying in the bottom of the well with no water on them. The pump had either been inadvertently turned off, or I'd hit the wrong switch while I was cleaning the seaweed out of the well, or something, but regardless of how it happened, we were back to square one. At that point I just wanted to go home.

We started over! We didn't have much chum left, but Jeff masterfully chummed the bait up in short order and with a few labored throws of the net, we again had a full baitwell. Things were looking up. I threw a few more times to see if we could cull out some bigger baits. I figured we'd need them to get the distance if the breeze didn't blow.

We headed to one of my favorite early incoming tide spots. It was pretty good. We caught some nice jack crevalle, a couple of nice flounder, some trout, and a snook, but the snook didn't turn on the way they should have. I moved to another hole close by. I threw a bat full of chum, and one of the shiners was immediately blown up. I could tell it was a big fish. Jeff and Kenny put baits out. In no time, Jeff's line was snatched tight and the reel screamed in agony as the fish headed north along the treeline. I knew that the snook would instinctively head for the mangrove roots, and from our position near the trees, I knew Jeff would not be able to stop him. So, I told Jeff to hit the water running to get as far away from the trees as he could before the snook turned. He went out of the boat without question, and lost one of his Speedos in the process. But, the fish was still on.

Jeff made some ground on the fish, and even started getting line on it. As she came toward him some, she realized that freedom was in the trees and made a run under the root system. At this point I knew the fish was gone if Jeff didn't get his rod down in the water in an attempt to get the line down to the fishes level and under the hanging barnacle covered roots. I hollered at Jeff, "Rod in the water, rod in the water!" In all the excitement he was slow to follow the instruction, but did get the rod down, and eventually won the battle at the treeline. At this point the fish was still on, and I was pretty sure was going to beat a big snook in the trees on light tackle. No easy feat!

But the fish wasn't done. The snook continued to fight as Jeff wrestled her toward the boat. I could see her, now. She was a beauty of somewhere between 15 and 20 pounds. After executing my instructions perfectly, and using his own angling experience, Jeff was within ten feet of landing the fish. The hook pulled!!!! If felt sorry for Jeff, but he was so excited that he was in adrenaline overload. It took a good half hour for him to settle down and get his heart rate near normal. He was still talking about the experience when we broke for lunch at the Waterfront Restaurant.

After lunch we headed to the flats for some redfish and big trout action. I did a lot of chumming and moving, but the big reds that have been around for weeks seemed to be missing. But there were plenty of big trout there to take their place at the chum table, and before we were done, Jeff and Ken had caught 4 redfish to 25 inches, and around 20 big trout to 4 pounds. I can't remember if they got any snook there, but I think they got a couple of small ones along with a ladyfish or two. Like nearly everyone with few exceptions, they had great difficulty with waiting to strike a tight line. Consequently, they missed a lot of fish. The action slowed after some moron in a small Boston Whaler came running right across our flat in front of us, no doubt blowing the fish out, and I couldn't get them chummed up again. So, the Easter Sunday that I had feared would be a really tough day, was indeed, a tough day, but we put some nice fish in the boat after all.

Monday morning Marsha Sitzenstatter, of Benus Point, New York, told me her husband John was totally wired for his trip. I had talked with John via email quite a bit, and knew he was really looking forward to getting out on the water here for the first time. John and Marsha have been coming to the area for four years, but had never hired a guide. When I arrived at the ramp just before eleven o'clock, the place was overrun with vehicles. It looked like a weekend! I was concerned about traffic on the water.

As we headed north toward the bait flats, John told me he was so happy to be out on the water he didn't care if he caught anything or not. That took some pressure off me, but I still wanted to put him on all the fish I could, and figured I had to keep the pressure on John in order for him to get some fish into the boat. When we arrived on the first flat, the water was sparkling as if it was full of diamonds, but those diamonds were shiners. We mixed a little chum just to gang them up, and had bait in short order. I made a few extra throws just to try to cull out some bigger baits. We were ready to go fishing.

On the flats the action started pretty quickly. John had told me he didn't care if he caught or not, but I could tell from his reaction each time he struck a fish early and missed it, that he did care. It really is hard for people who've never done this kind of fishing to adjust to the technique of waiting until the line is completely tight and pulling drag through a straight rod. We use light tackle in order to get the long casts necessary to reach the fish on the shallow flats. Often, the only way I can get my customers to settle down and strike through a tight line is to keep telling them until they do it. John and Martha were wonderful, easy going folks and eventually came around. Even with lots of missed fish and a couple of breakoffs, they bagged 4 redfish, 5 or 6 snook, 4 big gator trout, a ladyfish, and a nice jack.

The action subsided early partly because of the poor tide, but more because of all the activity on the flat. Other boats motored nearby, and there was a wind surfer who kept crossing in front of us, running over our fish. We left the flats and spent the last hour fishing the mangrove bushes, but only recorded two misses. It had been a beautiful day spent with some great people.

My Tuesday trip was a two boat trip with Jeff Rowe, and a group of his friends who all have daughters who play championship high school volleyball. My second boat was supposed to be Capt. Mark Bess, but at the last minute he was called to be a witness in an attempted murder case. He had to appear or be in contempt of court. My friend Capt. Kevin Holley, who had a morning trip, was kind enough to donate his afternoon and get me out of a scrape. Instead of making it a full day trip, we started at noon and made it a six hour half day. The tide in the morning was lousy, anyway.

My crew was "Farmer" Bob and his eight year old son, Jordon, who was an absolute delight to have on the boat, Tom, and Pete. Bob was the only one of the bunch who admitted to being a fisherman, so I figured fishing the open flats for big trout and reds would be much easier than chasing them in the bushes. We went to what is usually one of the most fertile flats in the sound, full of big trout and redfish, as well as snook thinking this would be a done deal for my none fishermen. Well, I don't know what's happened, but the fish were gone. I couldn't believe I couldn't find a pocket of fish. I kept moving around on the flat, but nothing. I mean nothing. So, as the tide got higher I moved to structure and fished for snook. My crew, who were a fun bunch of guys, started catching snook. There were several breakoffs, and a lot of missed hits, but they managed to boat a dozen or so snook to 24 inches, along with a jack crevalle and a good sized ladyfish.

Kevin had slipped off a small trout hole to fish the bushes with his crew, and we didn't see him again until we got back to the docks. They had caught a couple of small snook, four small reds, and some trout that were in the keeper slot. Everyone had a great time, I hope!

Wednesday, I was able to sleep late (7:30) and get some much needed rest. Ken and Jeff Stieh were going to meet me for their second trip, and fish the afternoon incoming tide. The tide was laying flat all morning, and not moving very well in the afternoon, but at least it was moving. Bait didn't take long on the Chino flats, and we were off to do some flats fishing.

Once in the shallows and doing some chumming we had plenty of snook action. Although Ken and Jeff had had a day of practice, they still had trouble getting that tight line hook set on those fish. The redfish didn't show like they normally would, but there were plenty of opportunities to catch. The final tally was 3 redfish, 6 or so snook, 2 nice trout, and a jack. I think Ken may have been kind of disappointed that they didn't catch as many fish as they would have liked, but there were a lot of fish missed.

Thursday morning I was off to the Waterfront Restaurant to pick up David and Bobbette Miller, and David's father Jim. Jim has a place up in Flamingo. I knew this would be an enjoyable trip as I had talked with David a lot via email. The Millers were an unusual group in that they, and nearly everyone in the family are teachers. As it turns out, they were very good students, too. And, the best student was Bobbette, of course. You know, the gals always put it on the guys when it comes to fishing! We went to a beautiful flat and chummed a bunch of that beautiful bait we'd caught at Chino. It wasn't a spectacular day, but we had steady action, and we wound up with several redfish after missing a few, half dozen or more snook, a half dozen or so nice trout, and a jack. We created a stir back at the Waterfront as we unloaded a beautiful mess of redfish, snook, and trout.

I had problems with my jackplate on the last couple of trips of the week, and went by Smith Marine to have it checked out on the way home. The news was not good! Is it ever? There had been salt water intrusion into the hydraulic system, and the motor was seizing. I left the boat with Craig for the weekend. I was hoping that they would have at least one of my boats ready by Sunday night so I could work Monday, and I was seriously ready for some time off!