Finally – a day that I’ve been waiting for for much too long. This morning, I chartered Eldon from Missouri – he loves to fish but has not done much saltwater fishing at all, and no light tackle fishing at that!

We packed up the Parker and headed out the inlet – and it didnt take long. After a short ride, we were covered up in MASSIVE schools of Bonito! Some as large as football fields, they were breaking all around us – crushing huge schools of silversides and bay anchovies. For a while, hookups were constant with fish smacking topwater plugs and stingsilvers right next to the boat. To quote Eldon – “It was the most exciting day of fishing I’ve ever had…except the day I caught two 10 pound largemouth bass in one day.” Now that’s a pretty big statement! We caught a good number of 3-5lb fish with one beautiful 7-8 pounder and probably 20 mroe fish that we lost. The bite slowed later in the morning but we were able to pick away at several scattered schools and jig up numerous bluefish and black seabass while we waited. All fish were released, except for one poorly hooked fish that I kept for dinner.

Among the turtles and dolphin – we had one really cool site today. Drifting along I saw an unusual fish in the water – swimming on its side. Low and behold – a TRIPLETAIL! Rarely seen north of florida, it’s the first one I’ve seen in years and in 63 degree water to boot! We threw a few jigs at him before I bounced a DOA shrimp off of his head and he sounded.

I think we have Eldon hooked on the salt, and I think I’ll be hearing from him when he makes his next business trip to NC.

Bonito are a HOOT on light-tackle and I think it will only get better and better over the next couple of weeks as the water continues to warm! I still have great PM dates open this week as well as good dates over the next two weeks!