Salt Life

[Jimmy_1]

This winter I had the absolute privilege of spending a week in Florida with my kids and my parents.

My dad had recently retired after 37 years working with National Defence.

One of his passions is fishing and did he ever get back into it hard!

When we visited we were lucky to catch a plethora of species.

Sea trout, whiting, skate, lemon shark, sea robin and pompano

We also got into the gar on the Tomachoka river.

This was especially cool as it was a chance for my Dad, myself and my son to get out.

The gar were huge and plentiful!
Alligator, long-nose, short nose, spotted and Florida gar were all in one specific section!
You couldn't throw a single hook or bait without it getting crushed!!

Now I hooked a small gator gar and lost a small spotted gar boat side.

That wasn't the cool part.

Being on the boat and my son reels in a blue fish.
We notice a lot of manatee swimming by and in large numbers.
One even came to the back of the boat and let us pet it.
That really made all of our day.

I'd have to say that I have been outfished. Be it whomever I am out with caught more or got the bigger fish.
But never as outfished as this!!

My dad and I are on the pier on the inter coastal behind Captains BBQ.
We're getting strikes and hoping to land flounder. We each bring in a few small fish of varied species.

Then "HE" shows up.....

There he is 20 yds away. Catching all the fish and putting on a big show about it.
Letting my dad and I know he is waaaaay better.

It was great fishing until he showed up.

Damn dolphin!!