Day at the Hathaway Bridge

Last night Tin and I hosted the girls to a shrimp dinner.  Basically the same dinner from when Wee Happy came to the boat as the first dinner guests at Boot Key Harbor.  I was able to test out a new smaller grill that takes up less space on the aft deck.  Boo, Tin's sister decided to take a splash off the dock clothing and all! Must be growing pains.

Today Tin and I went to the Hathaway bridge fishing today hoping for a "Big Red".  But no, there were little pin fish stealing bait, Lizard fish cutting fingers, and puffer fish well, just puffing up!  Puffer fish put a real hurting on Gulp shrimp.  Those rat like teeth cut chunks out.

No sheep's head no red fish, we did hook up lunch, dinner,breakfast and some more lunch and dinner.  Using a "New Penny" Gulp shrimp I hooked up the Penn 4000 to a monster.  The drag spun for about half the line.  I was expecting to get spooled but the fish slowly turned.  I was So hoping it was a Red Fish and had no clue until a fin showed after about 5 minutes.  It wasn't a Red but what was it.  It wasn't one of the dolphins that had been swimming in the area earlier.  At the moment the fin cut the water Tin yelled "shark!"  It was still almost to the first bridge truss so at this point it could be...  After about another 10 minutes it was close enough to see it was a Cobia!  We had dinner if it didn't pull free.  So for about 25 minutes on the lightweight tackle I walked the Cobia back and forth under the bridge.  Without a gaff I needed to get him to the beach on the south side.  He had a couple more runs as we closed the distance to the sand.   Wading in trying to cut the distance he was finally in the breaking surf and beached.

Now the hard part carrying a Cobia to boat from here, 1/4 mile! I was glad to be at the dock and find a cart.  It was not just any Cobia but a 41" to the fork. That made for a great dinner.

41" fork lenght

Gulp New Penny shrimp with a fish head jig.

Key lime Cobia for dinner.

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