# Upper Coast 2/8/14



## Zoo (Mar 25, 2014)

The weather on Saturday was out of this world so I decided I couldn't ignore the itch any longer. On Sunday the 8th I visited my friendly shopkeeper (long time; no see) grabbed some cheap little white squid and took a girl plus a couple friends to the surf for some fun. 

My buddy just got to TX and is on an extended stay in my spare bedroom. I don't complain because he's held me up when I needed it. Not to mention he is a four star bait dropping recruit. So I loaded up the yak and hoped to get him a little practice going in and out of the surf. Unfortunately, it was as I feared - big south winds had the surf all churned up with decent swell and chop. Pete, the trooper that he is, was all ready to roll but I had to pull the plug on his trip (Rule #0: Practice safety at all times). 

I used my 8000 class eggbeater on a 9' graphite and a 4oz spidey to launch some double drop squid into the deep end of the second/first gut. In order to try to hit the 3rd gut, I took one walk in to cast from the first bar right around the afternoon high tide. The result was my first waist deep trip into 5x degree water in quite a while (it's not so bad once you go numb) and cast perfectly in the middle of the 2nd bar. 

Bite was slow. We spent most of our time tossing beanbags and getting sunburned. In the 2 years since I had the boards made I've still only lost once. Pete asked lots of questions and learned a lot about fishing the surf but he wasn't brave enough to rig up his own setup - too overwhelmed by the complexity of it all (I remember what that feeling was like) and the temp of the water (poor little babe!).

As expected, the BUs haven't showed up yet (at least not for me). The good news is that I wasn't skunked! First fish of the year! It's a cause for celebration and an obligatory picture to commemorate, of course! You may notice my disapproval of the species. Was fun nonetheless.


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## 535 (May 23, 2004)

the sunburn part sounds nice... cool you got to get out

WELCOME TO THE FORUM!


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## Zoo (Mar 25, 2014)

Thanks. Seems like a great community.


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## iamatt (Aug 28, 2012)

Zoo said:


> Thanks. Seems like a great community.


They make these things called waders so you don't have to get wet! Check em out! Squid is killer hardhead bait too btw lol. Maybe try some large shrimp and crab right about now!


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## TexasTom (Mar 16, 2011)

Thanks for sharing your report with us. Keep after em, big ugly time is near!!


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## Zoo (Mar 25, 2014)

Last time I spent $20 on crab the catfish swam home happy I trucked home hungry so I think I'm going start cutting out the slimy middleman and keep the crabs for myself.


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## fultonswimmer (Jul 3, 2008)

*Surf*

From your post it is kind of hard to figure out what you were fishing for. Try a piece of dead shrimp and a strip of FishBites next time and see if you can hook a red, drum, pompano or maybe some decent croaker. Shrimp is cheap depending on where you live and FishBites can be cut into small pieces and put on the same hook as a piece of shrimp for a "sandwich". Squid is a tough bait and it stays on the hook for a long time but not exactly considered "sushi" by some game fish.


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