Annual Family Beach Trip

My family takes a week beach trip to a North Carolina beach every year.  This year we went to Topsail Island for a week of fun and sun.  I manage to take a few surf rods each year and I usually charter an inshore boat for a day of fishing with my brother and at least one other person.

I'd read online about some people catching pompano and whiting (sea mullet) from the surf around Topsail using sand fleas.  This year I surf fished here and there, mostly in the early morning and caught one pompano, one whiting, and ~8 small sharks.  My camera didn't make it out to the beach, so I snapped a few of both fish before I filleted them along with my little helper.

We made it out one day on an inshore charter targeting topwater redfish in the New River inlet near Sneads Ferry, NC.  I brought a 6'6" MH baitcaster setup, one of my bass rods, specifically for this type of fishing.  I also brought a Bomber high-pitch Walkie Talkie (looks like a large Zara Spook).  We had a tough time finding the reds and only managed to get one small school to strike our topwater lures.  I caught the first one on my own rod and lure, the guide hooked another and handed the rod to my brother.   Both fish were netted and those were the only redfish we saw all day.  Photo is just before they were filleted back at the beach house.

We continued to search for good water and were fishing a small cove next to a grass marsh.  I got a big strike on my Bomber, set the hook, and before you know it the drag was screaming!  This fish took a few good runs and also made multiple attempts to shake the large plug from it's gnarly teeth.  We netted the fish and it was a big inshore blue (est @ 10-12 lbs).

The fishing wasn't stellar this year, but I had a good time hanging with the family.

Topwater fishing for redfish at the coast was exciting.  Makes me want to go back and target them again, maybe from a canoe.

Striper, Largemouth, and Goats ... Oh My!

My friend Mack called me a last week and asked me to reserve the following Friday for a fishing trip.  I told him I could go, but I'd have to take a vacation day.  We spoke on Wednesday to discuss our options for a trip and Mack suggested a river I'd never fished before.  I was skeptical to say the least as I wanted to make the most of my vacation. 

After checking river data and weather, I agreed to Mack's suggested locale.  Mack brought along a friend (Mike) and we all met at the put in around 6:30 am to shuttle cars. 

We launched around 7:15 am and made a short paddle upstream to some riffles under the bridge.  Along the way, I landed my first fish of the day, a nice largemouth on a Super Spook.

Mike mentioned that he saw some schooling stripers in the pool above and we headed up to try and catch a few.  I'd never caught a striper until today and man was it a good time!  After an hour or so of steady action, we pulled anchor and headed downstream and continued our streak of stripers for another hour or so.  All in all, I caught about 20 stripers today, most in the 2-4 lb range.  I caught two around 5 lbs and all but one came on a "walk the dog" type topwater lure.  I lost two lures to big fish that never made it into the boat, but that's a small price to pay for a morning filled with hot topwater striper action.  Here are a few shots. 

We continued downstream in hopes of catching a few largemouth.  The water was relatively clear but deep and I tried a few different lures (soft swimbait, lizard, frog) before settling in on the buzzbait.  I ended up throwing the buzzer most of the day and caught about 20 largemouth in total.  Here are a few of the fish, including a chunky 4 lber, which was the biggest largemouth of the trip. That fish hit my buzzer within 5 ft of the canoe at ~2 pm near a rock in the middle of the river and within sight of our take out.

Lastly, while passing a large island in the river, we came across something I'd never seen on a float trip.  A goat was standing on the river bank of the island surveying our fishing skills.  There was plenty of other wildlife seen, mostly herons and muskrats, but we also saw an eagle, an osprey, geese, and comorants. 

  

Today was topwater heaven and Mack gets credit for making my vacation day one to remember.  He also took some nice photos.  Thanks man!

-Jeff