Well, after two weeks at Cape Hatteras, it's back to the old grind. While the weather was great and I had a fantastic time, the fishing could have been better, even for mid-summer.

The speckled trout fishing was nearly non-existent, 20 to 25 hours on the sound with only 1 speckled and a bunch of bitten off tails to show for it. Seems every day at about 11 am a school of blues would come thru and eat the tails, amazing how they can get within a fraction of a millimeter of the hook. The few I did hook up took another gulp and went trhu the 6 lb test like butter.

On the ocean side, only managed a couple blue fish and a ton of croakers (as usual). The wind and weed would not cooperate, when the wind was good and the water clear, the weed would blow in. Then the wind would change, the weed would go, but the sand made the water murky, effectively shutting down the blue and spanish bite.

Did hear of 1 - 14lb cobia caught on the beach where I was, and a 59 lber caught at the point.

First day out, I had some bunker (pogie) on my heaver for the cobia. Not much doing, and I saw a school of spanish and blues go by, so I spiked the bunker pole and threw some metal at the spanish for a few minutes. No hook ups, was just quitting and about to pick up the heaver, when the sand spike goes down and the pole heads east. (This was with free spool!) I just grabbed the butt end before it was gone into the surf. Now I got two rods in my hands, one reel full of sand, and line peeling off so fast it was unbelievable. Tighten down the drag a notch, start to reel, and gone.....30 lb florocarbon leader broken (or bitten?) off at the hook and at the sinker. Will never know...cobia...ray...shark?

I suppose the highlight of the trip was the make up charter I went on. Between six guys, we got about 150lbs of dolphin (Mahi-Mahi), one of which was a cition (36 lbs) and another pretty close (34 lbs.) and spanish mackeral. We had a sailfish on, but the guy who touted himself as Joe-Pro all day managed to lose it after about thirty seconds. Gotta take up the slack before you start pumping the rod, Mr. Expert. Had fun, though. Those dolphin fish are really colorful, they almost look fake. The flying fish were also pretty neat to watch.

All in all, a great trip.....too much fishing (okay, not TOO much, what's that?), a lot of blue crabs, good food, great swimming, is it next June yet?

Well, gotta catch up on all the posts (work, what's that?). Hope you had fun at the Rhody leg of the tourney, and when is the next one?

Welcome back Steve. Sounds like a fun trip even though the fishing was slow.

Glad you had a good trip. Life is quite relaxing there and the pace quite a bit slower compared to what we are used to here in NE.

Nice to hear you had an enjoyable vacation Steve. Sounds like you got into some fish. Well back here it is summer and you know what that means, nightime is the right time.

Hey, when you get to spend time on the beach or on the water with no work, no phones, etc. its a great time. Fishing is important, but its only part of the vacation. As long as you have a little action... a couple fish you can hang your hat on.

We spend a week or two in Nantucket each fall and I do alot of fishing, but ya know, as long as I catch a few, I'm happy. I know the fishing on the Vineyard is better at that time of year, but the beaches are packed with fishermen. I have Nantucket to myself.

Life slows down, I spend super quality time with my wife and kid. We always hit a bluefish blitz or two... I usually hit a couple decent bass.

Fishing for me becomes alot less important when on vacation. Granted, it has to be part of it, but I don't obsess as much.

Steve, you missed great food and some good BS'n, but the fishing pretty much stunk at the RI leg. Conditions seemed right, but unfortunately, the fish didn't agree. They call the shots. My prediction is that the fall legs will be a different story.

Check out Got Stripers' and Slipknot's posts, not to mention Fisherwoman's... Some nice action going on in Mass right now.

Glad to hear you had a good time.

Thanks for the welcome back, guys. You know it's funny, cause my wife asked me if I still enjoy fishing when I don't catch much. Ah, these non-fisherpersons, they will never understand! ;) Just being on the sound with no one else but the herons, the gulls, the pelicans, and the scenery will make me go back every time. Oh yeah, then there was also lots of the other "scenery" in town and on the beach. ;)

Unfortunately, it will be another week and a half till I can test out the Mass waters again. Lots of catching up to do around the house and at work, and then got a Stevie Nicks concert Saturday night at Great Woods (oops.....Tweeter Center, yeah right), so that rules out this weekend. Looks like July 21-22 before I'll get out, unless I sneak away from work early..........

steve welcome back . sounds like a good time at least the charter helped out on the fishing end . dolphins have to have some of the best colors in all the fish world and can they fight hard ,them big foreheaded looking freight trains I wish thhey were up here closer to shore and for longer periods .
we had a good time in RI good food and people . us high tech food eatin surf fishing gargoyles . I mean shrimp and strawberry shortcake,( and that happened 2 times this year) cell phones ,walkie talkies and helmets with strobe lights is alot more than im used too (rice and fishing) ! gargoyles cause of the way we perch on rocks and beaches .

Hey Steve,
I'm new in here :)
Been headin' down there since I was a kid, man has it changed (Kitty hawk, Southern Shores) I remember when the road just stopped and there was a sign that says Duck. Now thats all developed. :(

Did you head out of the Oregon Inlet or Ocrakoke for the charter, be interested to know what the price range is around now? Don't mean to be rude ;) .

Got skunk there last year, on Hatteras, but a pole in the water is nothing to complain about.
A Dolphin fightin' on the end of the stick sure woulda' made my trip.

Also thinkin' about takin a trip down in a few weeks, hittin a few stops on the way, do you know what they're expecting?

Welcome back Steve, nice to hear that you had some fun down there...

BTW - I think GS has a date with Mrs Nicks that night too.... Personally, she is one of the many acts that got overplayed in the 80s and I just can't listen to it more than once a month on the radio without switching stations...

Welcome back, and yes I too will be at the Great Woods show, along with my brother in law and his better half. Youv'e come back at a good time, because if you catch up on some reading, you will see there are some nice fish up in close right now.

Farquar - Welcome. I was staying in Avon and I went out on the charter from Hatteras Village at Hatteras Harbor Marina. It was a make up and it was $175 per person. Charters run anywhere from $850 to $1100. There are three or four marinas in Hatteras village, Hatteras Harbor, Teach's Lair, Oden's Dock and one other one I can't remember.

I've been going down since 1987 and it has changed a lot since then, although it is still a beautiful place. In a few weeks, you can expect spanish and blues in the surf, along with sea mullet, croakers, flounder (fluke), and probably some pompano by then, along with the ever present and sometimes annoying croaker. Offshore there will still be dolphin, maybe some wahoo and tuna, and billfish. Soundside can get you speckled trout (if they ever decide to make an appearance this year), blues and flounder. At the point you'll probably find sharks and rays, maybe some puppy drum. I would assume that if you are only going as far as Nag's Head, it would be about the same.

GS - we have lawn seats (regular seats sold out fast!) - will keep an eye out for you.

John - yeah it was overplayed, but she is the wife's favorite, so we go. She always puts on a good show. Her new album is pretty good, but I also can only take so much. I would prefer the master (Elvis Costello) myself. ;)

Elvis is DA MAN!

Any talk of the big fish kill in Palmico sound last year or was it the year before affecting the inshore fishing? I believe the cause was runoff from the HUGE hog farms in Eastern NC.

Fishpart - Last year the crabbing and shrimping was pathetic, but the speckled fishing was pretty good. I talked to the wife of a crabber who owns a seafood store down there. She said that her husband had to put out twice as many pots to get almost as many crabs as usual, and was still only breaking even cause of the extra cost of bait and gas. I was told that the runoff from the rivers on the west side of the sound caused by hurricaine Dennis and one other one in 1999 had caused a alot of crabs and shrimp to die, and that's why crabbing and shrimping was so bad. It had improved somewhat this year, as I did much better on the crabbing than last year. But shrimp and crab prices were still relatively high.

As far as the speckled trout missing, it is possible that it is the same cause with a delayed effect. I will try to find out from some contacts I have down there. However, I hear that the weakfishing in NJ (speckled trout are cousins of weakfish) has not been up to par with last year either, so it may be some other cause.

Canalrat - :) New album within a few months, I hear, and back to rock and role (Edit # 2 - Try roll, Steve, not "role". Geez!), not that the other stuff (Brodsky and Bacherach) wasn't great as well.