Jason and Carmen fished with us last June. They are from Virginia and regularly visit the St. Pete area and love to fish. Last year, we caught a few Spanish mackerel and some grey snapper. This year, they wanted bigger, so off we went to the head of the Egmont channel and caught 3 nice kings and a mess of Spanish mackerel. Big smiles from everyone! Oh, they will be back again next year.

Bob and Sue booked with us some months ago and were excited to have their first experience fishing in Florida. Bob is an experienced tuna fisherman from New England and even though the day was windy and a bit chilly, both fished right through the weather. Sue commented that it was just like a summer's day on Buzzard's Bay! The fish were cooperative, too!

Rolf and his sons, Joshua, Benjamin and Matthew fished with us on a 6-hour trip and we ventured out to the Egmont ship channel (AKA the Ditch) ad trolled for Spanish mackerel and king mackerel. As you can see from the photo, we had a good day and the weather was perfect.

Basil and Janine went out with us to celebrate Janine's birthday. She loves to fish and gets excited whenever a fish gets on the line. We caught a fair number of nice Spanish mackerel the day of our trip which had to be re-scheduled due to a cold front that came along on their original day.

Will and his family had a good day on the water yesterday. Weather has been a constant factor over the least few winter months but we hit it right yesterday with warm, sunny skies and light winds with calm seas. On top of that, we hit into a strong Spanish Mackerel bite on one of the local artificial reefs that kept us busy most of the trip. After the bite slacked a bit, we moved to a neighboring reef and got the cold shoulder-not a single bite. We moved inshore and trolled the beach and got a few, mostly small Spanish before heading in. But we had plenty of fish in the box and shared the bounty with our willing neighbors.

The Davidson family was staying in Indian Rocks Beach and really wanted a fishing trip. At first, we scheduled a trip on Dec. 26th, but as the date drew closer and the weather looked worser, Rob called and we decided our best window was the afternoon of the 23rd-light winds, calm seas and pleasant temperatures were forecast. So, we left the dock at 11:00 AM and headed west to do some bottom fishing for grunts and porgies (which are the standard fare this time of year). But our mate, Jose, suggested we stop at South County Reef and troll around the reef a time or two in case there were any Spanish mackerel stragglers who failed to get the memo about heading south for warmer waters and more bait. No sooner did we have a line in the water when we got our first hit-a nice 18" Spanish! With only a four hour trip, you really only have about two hours to fish, counting travel time to and from the reef. In that 2 hours, we put 8 nice Spanish in the box and landed at least 20 more, most of legal size but too small for us to justify putting in the fish box. We also landed (and released) a nice Bonita, which was also a surprise. We were back to the dock a few minutes past 3:00 PM, cleaned up the fish and had the Davidsons off to a nice fish dinner by 4:30 PM. Another exciting adventure on the Gulf of Mexico aboard M/V Gone Coastal; which just proves you never know what you might catch out there.