FRIENDS

ABOUT THE TRIP

At its best, fishing is a social activity.  You can go fishing alone, and some people prefer to do so.  But for most of us, a day on or near the water is best enjoyed in the company of old or even new friends.  While one of life’s underrated joys is experiencing new places with old friends, fishing trips have been known to be the beginning of life-long friendships which are priceless.

Recently, I had the opportunity to go on a “friends and family” outing with a friend of 20 years or so.  In times past we would fish together every week and often brought home grouper for the whole neighborhood.  During this trip, I was reminded of how much I enjoyed just sharing the boat with him.  We didn’t talk all of time, and the silence was just as comfortable as the conversations we had about a wide range of topics.  Unfortunately, no one was taking notes so our solutions to some of the world’s most pressing problems were lost to society, but as I remember it, we had some good ones.

As it turned out, we caught fish.  Probably twenty or so of various desirable and undesirable species with shorts mixed in with keepers.  But we didn’t keep anything.  On this day, bringing home a meal was not the point, enjoying the company of a friend was the whole point.  And at the end of the day, the taco dinner I had with my wife that night was just as pleasant as the long-anticipated dinner of grouper in parchment could have been.  Once again, it became obvious to me that all relationships are temporary and need to be enjoyed in the present.  Worrying about what was caught or not caught is evidence of how difficult it can be for us to leave the competitive, results oriented world ashore when we fish.

We went out, came back safely and enjoyed the day.  Enough said.

LESSONS LEARNED

Even on trips where there is no pressure to catch a meal, you still must pay attention to opportunities to improve your skills.  This trip was no exception.  One of the lessons reinforced during this outing was the old concept of, “nothing is done until it is checked”.  In this case, both of us were experienced fisherman and knew the type of gear we wanted to use.  We knew what to use because it had worked in the past and there was no reason to believe that it would not work on that day.  Well, it became apparent early on that someone had not brought the pre-tied leaders that he thought he had.  To make matters worse, the only leader material he had in is bag was 100lb test mono.  Overlooking for the moment the fact that we were fishing for relatively small snapper in only 35 feet of water, it is extremely difficult to get a knot to “lock down” on 100lb mono.  Leaders made with such heavy material are generally fastened in the appropriate configuration with the use of crimps, none of which were available to us at the time.

Fortunately, someone else had the appropriate leader material so that the embarrassment of losing a ten-inch snapper on a 100 lb. leader because of the failure of a knot was avoided.

The lesson here?  Even though you know you packed everything, check your gear before you leave home.  You are not done packing until you are through checking.

ON THE HORIZON

As usual, the seasons are about to change.  Summer and winter both have their fishing doldrums, so it is always exciting for anglers to talk about the upcoming season when it is spring or fall.  And spring is in the air in Florida.  The winter winds will be replaced by spring winds, but warming water temperatures will encourage fish to move around and feed more aggressively.  So not only are the year-round local species available, the seasonal monsters such as cobia and kingfish make their presence known.