Big Red Drum and Shark Was the Catch...

Another beach camping trip is in the books. Once again the fishing was good at Pop-Pop's secret beach spot but this time instead of just enjoying our own company most of the time like we usually do we were joined by Rose and family who live locally, the Zamora's who drove down for a day and we spent a very enjoyable afternoon getting to know my cousin Caleb and his girlfriend Angelica who live and work in Houston.    

 Fishing score for this trip was this 32 inch red drum which I threw back because he was out of the slot and because I had bought my fishing license online this week and had not received the red drum tag yet, another 20 inch slot drum which I kept, four throw back trout and a small pile of those whiting which we really enjoy eating.   

If you note in the photo the tail of the drum is a bit chewed so there's something bigger out there. Also when I looked down his throat to remove my hook I spotted a shrimp tail lure with a pretty fresh dead mullet that was apparently embellishing the presentation. I removed it along with the 15 or 20 pound trailing length of braided line. I had seen a couple of guys 100 yards or so up the beach catching mullet for bait and fishing so I expect they had lost this rig and he gobbled it off the bottom.   

Come on everyone! Let us fill our pants up with sand. With some increased wind speed a little tropical weather blooming up from the Pacific water turned from Bluewater Highway blue to sandy green. That held the trout and Spanish Mac bite back a bit but that's a good signal for the fall red drum run. 

  One odd thing this trip was that seems our propane was not as efficient as usual. We typically run solar power all day and at night use the generator for air conditioning and that has been taking 3 to 4 five gallon tanks over a three night trip. This time we used five tanks. I'll have to investigate this discrepancy. 

Miguel and Milo stay close while the rest of the crew heads out. 

The red drum makes about the 14th species of screaming beast I have subdued this year but Mary caught this 26 inch black tip shark.  

Once when my son Morgan sent me photos of big red drum he had caught surf fishing I responded with the observation that he really knew how to catch them. 

He responded, "I learned from the best." That made me feel good. 

This trip I asked Mary what her childhood memories of the beach were ad she replied it was all the adults being amazed that a little girl could throw a cast net and catch mullet for bait. 

Somewhere, someplace someone might be saying, "Hey, you remember that little girl that caught all those mullet?" That just goes to show that beach memories are good memories.