So July 19th came... This year I started my day earlier than I have in the past around 5:15am since Terry and I were planning on catching an 8am boat out of Barnegat Light, NJ. He swung by around 5:30ish and we loaded up his Yellow Submarine and headed for the boat. BTW his yellow submarine is actually a late model Yellow Nissan Xterra, I just call it the yellow submarine. We actually got down to the boat around 7:30am and got our spots. I told terry at this point that this may very well an uneventful trip. He obviously asked why. I explained it was the Fowler Fishing Rod Curse. Every time I get a new stick, first trip out I catch nothing, nothing at all. Usually I won't even reel in a skate or sea-robin, let alone a fluke. He kinda chuckled and thought of it like I did. A day out on the water fishing is a day well spent even if you don't catch anything.
The trip out was nice, terry paid for my fare since it was my birthday & I thought wow what a great guy, He drives me down, Carries the cooler, and pays my way onto the Boat. First line in the water was around 8:45am. Terry was learning to use one of my older baitcasting reels, and hitting on the female mate, who BTW had enormous boobs, while I was getting used to my rod & reel. This rod has a really light tip and I thought wow you can feel everything. We drifted for about 10-15 minutes when I felt the nibble. I slowly raised the rod and knew I had fluke feeding on my bait. I waited him out and hooked him. As I was reeling the Fluke in I thought wow, fluke don't usually fight like this one. Maybe I got a Sea Bass on the line. I fought & fought and brought him up to the surface. My Curse was broken, maybe it was the Birthday Thing out weighing the Rod Curse. I don't know but as the mate netted what looked to me like a 19' Fluke, I was very happy the curse was broken. We threw him in the cooler and proceeded to continue to fish.
The rest of the day was kinda slow, Terry who by this time I deemed Skater Boy, because of his uncanny ability to catch Skate was really striking it up Boobs Mcgee. I mean Beth. The female mate's name was Beth. I really thought he would have at least gotten her number since she spent most of trip standing right next to him flirting her ass off. But I guess not. We wound up only catching the one keeper but had a great time doing it. Since the whole boat was slow, terry and I were watching each and every fish that came up since we had a 19 incher we had a chance at winning the Boat Pool. Plus there was some guy who roped us in to a side pool for 5 bucks each, which terry paid for as well.
When the final horns sounded we packed it in and headed for home. During this time the mate came around asking for Pool fish, they came right to me. I thought it was odd since it was only a 19' Fluke I had caught. Well when I unpacked him from the cooler I realized I had made a major mistake. This wasn't no 19' Fluke it was actually a 23 and a 1/4 inch Fluke weighing around 4.5 lbs. Talk about turning a frown upside down. I was happy as pig in shit. This was awesome, I caught probably the biggest fluke of my life on my new stick & I was probably gonna win the pool to boot. Well we won. We won the Boat Pool and the Side Pool, man what a nice feeling. It was at this point that reality was setting in and I thought about all those times I was on the water with my dad. I felt better after I realized how proud of me he would have been, & how I didn't need to call him to tell him since he knew already. It was then when I realized how the 23 & 1/4 inch Fluke was caught & my curse of the Rod & Reel where broken. I had a fisherman pulling for me up with the Bug Guy. Thanks Dad I owe ya one.
No comments:
Post a Comment