Rock The Dock 2017

The Panacea Rock The Dock Fishing tournament was held recently.  That tournament is always a lot of fun for us because it is held in Panacea, the Crak Shak is in Panacea, my boat is in Panacea, the Mad Anthony's bar is in Panacea and that bar serves a lot of beer.  Add all that up, and it equals a great weekend for us and everyone else.

The only problem:  6-8 foot seas scheduled for Saturday and 8-10 foot seas scheduled for Sunday. That is NEVER good.  Pictures NEVER do seas justice.  In fact, as I look through these pictures, the seas don't look very rough, but trust me, they were bad.  I was attempting to head to S Tower about 50 miles offshore to look for red grouper, but we never made it.  Because of the wind and waves, we were forced to stay in State Waters about 9 miles offshore.

The night before, our favorite country rock band, Tobacco Road performed a concert for everyone. In fact, Paul Consulting Group just completed the website for Tobacco Road.  Check it out here.

There were several of us on the boat this Saturday.  In addition to those of us fishing, we also had "new guy" Josh taking videos and photographs all day.  He did a great job.  In fact, we will VERY SOON be posting more videos of this latest trip on the Capt'n Hook YouTube channel.  Look for those videos in the next week. You can get to our YouTube channel by clicking on the link at the top of the CaptnHook website.

And our presence on Google is increasing.  If you have fished with me, go to Google and type in "Fishing Florida's Forgotten Coast" - and click on Images. See if your picture comes up towards the top.  It probably will.

So Josh did a great job of taking photos and videos all morning.  I would like to say that we caught HUGE fish, but we didn't.  Huge fish are very difficult to come by in State Waters.  But Josh did get some fantastic photos along the way.  Some of my favorite ones are his shots of SJ.  Who knew the little kid was so photogenic.

For the most part, I think the pictures speak for themselves, and since there are so many photos, I think I will comment less in this blog and just let you enjoy the shots with only short comments scattered through.  Also, I am behind in my work duties :-)

SJ - First thing in the morning (what a great shot):

   

Crab?  No idea here.  Perhaps our new photographer is a little odd.  I know his girlfriend is.

The Coast Guard Foundation sent me a new hat and FlardaFish, as you already know, is our sponsor for apparel.  Personally, I think they look great together:

Looks even better with the Capt'n Hook visor on Sam.

Ahhhh..

 

You're killing me wind:

This is where I decided to get the crew's opinion.  Remember that my goal was to head to S Tower about 50 miles offshore.  I told everyone that I would make the final decision to head there (or not) when we reached the 26 buoy which is about 10 miles away from Rock Landing.  Well, right before we got to the 26 buoy, we hit a cresting 6 foot wave.  Now, my boat is about 5000 pounds, and with a full fuel tank, that adds another 1000 pounds, and with 7 people on board, that adds another 1000 pounds. Simply said, my boat is heavy.  But for the first time EVER, after we hit that wave, the entire vessel, including the engines, went airborne.  When we slammed back into the ocean, Mike said, "I gotta go see a chiropractor on Monday".

Needless to say, we made the decision to only go another mile to my state water waypoint(s) instead of heading another 30 miles into deeper, much rougher, federal waters.  The Gulf was bad, bad bad!

Group meeting.  Decision time.  Skyler's hat was facing down when we started.  He didn't move it on his own.

Okay, so the water doesn't seem to be bothering Gene much:

Again, pictures never do the seas justice, but you can see by Gene's shirt that the wind is blowing like a banshee.  After a few hours, even Gene had had enough.

Rock The Dock?  No, Rock the Gulf!

I'll give everyone credit.  Even though it was rough, we caught LOTS of fish.  In this case, none of them exceptionally large, but we did put about 35 fish in the box.  Way to go guys!  And girl!

Great shot of Mikey.

Conditions never seems to bother Megan.  That girl loves to fish!  And she looks great doing it.

Dang Mike.  The gym is paying off.  You are a beast!   You know, I do find you physically attractive.

 Gene not as crazy here as another wave slams into us.

Sam watching Megan fish?  Yeah, that makes sense.   :-)

Another great shot of Mike and SJ.

Are we boring you SJ?

Cute couple.

I like these GoPro shots!

 

Some of the fish we caught were pretty good sized.

I think just about everyone took a turn on the bean bags.

Lots of key West grunts, lots of Rock Bass.  We also caught a LOT of gag grouper and even a few red grouper, but none of them were large enough to keep.  In fact, at one point in time, we had a four-person hookup of gag grouper, but we had to throw them all back - except one - thanks Gene.

Thanks again FlardaFish!  We all look good on camera!  If you want to give us more shirts, we won't stop you.

Josh, what exactly are you taking a video of here??  :-)

 Fish box starting to fill up.  That is what Josh was filming, btw.

Mr. Photogenic:

I have no idea what I am doing here, or that I was being photographed.  I actually was trying to have some fun riding the waves without holding on.  I wasn't very successful.  Mike is simply ignoring me.

I'm definitely not as photogenic as SJ.

So even though the weather was rough, I still think everyone had a good time.  We parked the boat Saturday afternoon, started drinking beer and never even considered taking it back out again on Sunday.  We were all pretty exhausted.

I have asked Josh, who was our photographer, and who had never been offshore fishing, to give us all his opinion of the day.  So the next blog post, which will be in a day or so, will be his perspective on the day.

And we will be posting new videos to our YouTube channel soon.  A couple of them are kind of funny.

Thanks for reading everyone.  Oh, and Caroline, I have a surprise for you.

I hope to be back soon - although almost EVERYTHING (all species) in the Gulf are closed right now for recreational fishermen.  Don't get me started.  In fact, lots of locals want me to create a non-profit lobbying corporation to represent recreational fishermen in Florida.  Commercial versus recreational rights and quotas have become quite skewed - with recreational fishermen losing out at every turn. Apparently, red snapper, for recreational fishermen, will only be open 3 days this year.  3 days!  And two of those days are weekdays.  Gag grouper are closed all year as well as AmberJack. What do you think I should do?

Gotta go.

Happy 50th Birthday

Cameron, my son, has a friend named Tommy.  They have been friends since early childhood. Tommy texted me recently and asked if he and his Dad could come fish with Capt'n Hook.  His Dad loves to fish and it was his Dad's 50th birthday. His Dad, "Tom", is also a Tallahassee fireman.  We like those guys!

So, of course I said "Yes".  Let's go!

Originally, I had intended to go to V Tower and hunt AmberJack again. I have been pretty successful at that lately. But then I learned (Thanks Jackson), that AmberJack is closed until December 31st.

So let's count together:  For recreational fishermen, Amberjack is closed for the rest of the year and they have increased the size.  Gag Grouper is closed for the rest of the year in Federal waters and they have increased the size.  Red Snapper is closed for the rest of the year.

You gotta be kidding me!  There is absolutely nothing left to catch in the Gulf of Mexico!

Well, whatever,  Grouper IS open in State Water.  They do that because they know that Grouper are currently migrating OUT of State Water into Federal water because the water is warming up and Grouper are moving to deeper, colder water.  They really don't want you catching Grouper in State Water either.  Things really are getting out of hand folks.  But I digress.  (Deep breath)

We get the boat ready Friday night.  It looks kinda cool all lit up at night:

We all (Gene, Jackson, Tommy, Tom, and myself) head down to Panacea Friday night and stay at the Shak.  Nice night for a fire and for star watching.

After the boat is setup, we have a little time to sit by the fire Friday night and enjoy some "hot tea" at the Shak :-)

We head out the next morning:

 

Oh, did I mention that Sam decided to join us!

Apparently, I did not get the aqua marine, blue hat memo:

We don't have far to go.  State waters are within 9 miles of shore.  There simply aren't any grouper on the Panacea side of Alligator Point, so we head out from Panacea to just south of Alligator Point. The water is a whopping 30 feet deep here.  Very difficult to find 24" grouper in 30 feet of water, btw.

Fortunately, I have a couple of "spots" given to me by a friend (Thanks Fred).  We stop at the 1st waypoint and within just a few minutes, we have several rock bass and Tommy catches this "keeper" grouper. I really need to teach Tommy how to stick the fish nearer to the camera to make it look bigger:  :-)

We catch numerous Rock Bass at this 1st location.  Rock bass are good, grouper are better though.

We stop at the 2nd spot.  Lots of Red Snapper here.  We, of course, can't keep any of them.  Red snapper are EVERYWHERE these days. Why?  Because they are only open 10 days out of the year to recreational fisherman.

And allow me to say "Thank You" to FlardaFish.  They are sponsoring Capt'n Hook for apparel. Tommy looks awesome in his short-sleeve FlardaFish shirt, don't you think?  Need a good fishing shirt, check out FlardaFish!

They even let the Captain catch one of the Snappers.  Once again, thanks to our sponsor: FlardaFish for the great shirts, hats, coozies, and face protectors.  They were very useful on this trip. Personally, I love the long-sleeve, white fishing shirt. And I look great in it!  Just ask me.

 Thanks guys for cleaning all the fish. You two would make a cute couple, btw.  :-)

Hey, what do you know, Grouper for dinner; that was caught on my boat!  It has been a while.

Thanks for reading everyone.

We will be back for Rock-the-Dock on April 28.  Hopefully, LOTS of cool pictures for that.

See you soon.

The Agony of Defeat

Hey Captain Hook!

This is your neighbor - STAN!

You probably don't remember, but you gave me the credentials to this blog site during our last poker game cause you wanted my daughter, who is currently at FSU, to help you with social media.  You probably don't remember because you had had a few beers.

But whatever, here I am!  I figured it out.  I have no idea how to change the font.

Allow me to set the record straight on a few things.

1. You were not "kicking my butt" on the poker table.  In fact, my full house over your straight pretty much did you in. Remember?

2. Yes, I remember the fifty dollar bet.  And as we discussed, it was fifty bucks to split all that wood by hand cause you said you were in such great shape P80Y boy, or whatever the heck it is called.

I saw your selfies with your shirt off.  For an old man, you really should know better.  I'm guessing you lost a few readers over those "fake news" geriatric lumberjack shots.

More importantly, while it is true I was in Washington this weekend (still am).  My wife was NOT!

She also remembers the bet, which is why she was sooooo surprised to see the hydraulic log splitter in your front yard, you sneaky bastard.

So she took a couple of snaps from her iPhone as she was driving by on her way to the grocery store. 

She said on the last shot that it appeared that you were looking right at her, but apparently you were using the hydraulic splitter to take selfies of yourself.  You should be ashamed.

So I'm sorry for ruining your blog - okay I'm not really.

And I'm not sorry at all about taking your fifty bucks.  I'll be back on Wednesday.  Feel free to leave my money in my mailbox.

Your neighbor - and hopefully still your friend - Stan

BTW, When are we fishing again, friend?

The Thrill of Victory

Although I would like to, I can't always go fishing.

1. I don't have that many friends who are available every weekend
2. It is rather expensive
3. Chores exist
4. The weather isn't always accommodating.

In March, #4 (above) often applies because March is windy.  In fact, I looked:

When the forecast begins with a "Small Craft Advisory" highlighted in red, it is safe to say that the conditions offshore are considered "not ideal".  My boat may be able to handle 6 foot seas, but I'm not sure my body can.  I simply ain't getting any younger.

So I am a "land-lubber" this weekend  Ugh, like I stated in #3, there are always chores to do at home. Well, one of the things I enjoy about fishing weekends is hanging out by the fire on the back deck of the Crak Shak in Panacea. However, to enjoy that luxury, wood has to be cut.

As it turns out, my neighbor Stan, who is a lobbyist, bet me fifty dollars a few months ago at the poker table that I could not chop all this wood in my front yard, in one day, by hand:

That's funny.  I just realized there is a dog in this photo.

Since I was already kicking his butt monetarily at the poker table, I figured what the heck? What have I got to lose?  It's his lost money.  He is in Washington this weekend lobbying, so I had to take some "timed selfies" for proof. Although windy, it is still a very nice day today, so I started chopping, and chopping, and chopping, and chopping.  Wow, this is hard for an old dude, but at the end of the day, I got it all done:

Of course, chopping the wood (and winning 50 bucks) is only the 1st step, then it all has to be loaded onto the truck multiple times and taken up the hill to the back yard where it then has to be unloaded from the truck, stacked and finally covered. 

The final stack!

Still, all of it was worth it to prove to my neighbor that I am still the man (albeit old man)!

Now, how much Advil can fifty dollars purchase?

The sweetness of victory!  Stan, I know you read this blog, so feel free to drop off my money anytime.  Don't even think about paying me in pennies either.

I'm out of town for a while on business myself, so I can't blog for a while.

Weather permitting, back to offshore fishing on April 8.

Thanks for reading.

Captain Marc Paul