Perhaps this should be in the "reports" section...John, feel free to move it if you think it should be there.

Just got back yesterday from my annual fall trip to the Outer Cape. In summary, "Wow!".

I met seven of my buddies out there last Tuesday night. Collectively, my conservative estimate is that between the eight of us we probably caught around 50-60 fish apiece through Sunday morning. 95% bass, 5% bluefish. Would have caught more, but there were quite a few beer breaks and we slept in one morning.

We had bass to 35 pounds.....many in the 25 to 30 pound range. Forty to forty-five inch fish were plentiful. Largest fish I actually saw with my own eyes was a 46 incher that weighed in at 39 pounds on the nose. As I'm sure you all know by now, a 58 pounder was weighed in and rumor had it there was a 62 pounder caught by a local. Every beach on the Outer Cape was on fire.

I relearned a valuable lesson.....when it is so windy that it is almost impossible to fish, it is actually the best conditions you could hope for. We continually fished one bar that the strong Northeast winds were hammering, pushing bait over to waiting fish. We had to come up with some inventive ways to get our plugs even 10 yards from us, but that's all you needed. If you could get a plug in the water, you were catching big fish. The beauty of is was that only people with a fair amount of surf fishing experience could handle the conditions, so while most people were complaining that the Northeast wind was killing the fishing we were just hammering them.

This trip renewed my faith in our supply of stripers. This was a slow summer for me, but for the last few days it seemed as if every striper in the world was in the water right in front of my section of beach.

Caught some bluefish on top as well, which is among my favorite things to do.

This was some of the best fishing I've ever been a part of...it made my season. Which, by the way, is not over. RI, here I come! These big fish should be getting there any time now.

Sounds like a heck of a trip.

I think most folks had a fairly slow season, so maybe some payment for our patience is due. I kinda wussed out this past weekend and used the weather as an excuse to get some much needed sleep. Should've been out there givin' it a shot.

Congrats on the great fishing.

Way to go Blitz!!! I was originally going to head up to Ballstons/HOM Saturday night but between my bro-in-law not being able to get to Rhody until after midnight plus the rough weather it just wasn't in the cards.

This trip renewed my faith in our supply of stripers. This was a slow summer for me, but for the last few days it seemed as if every striper in the world was in the water right in front of my section of beach. I wish that I could feel that but even after seeing a massive school of big fish, my fear is that there should be many more of these massive schools out there. It's not unusual to go near the main staging areas like Race Pt, Block/Montauk and such and find big schools of big fish fairly frequently as that's often where they are supposed to be. But what scares me is that these big schools are not happening (as far as we know) in many locations at the same time. I dunno, I've just always had the feeling that when 2 skillfull guys say they've got nice fish and 20 skillfull guys don't, there might be a problem...

Good luck in Rhody Blitzseeker - maybe I'll run into you down there....

Schoolie,

The first morning the NE started to blow I used it as an excuse to sleep in as well. Luckily, I was able to hear that the fish had been in that morning and didn't make the same mistake twice. I had my line in the water at 4 AM the next two mornings, and I was rewarded handsomly. The tale that a hard NE kills fishing out there proved to be very wrong in this instance.

John,

I expect you are correct. I've just been so depressed about the fishing since about mid-June that I'm probably letting the euphoria of a good trip get the best of me. In reality, I'm still worried as well but I'm a little less worried having seen what I've seen the last several days. Rest assured, though, that while I'm not as experienced as most of you guys(only a die hard for about 4-5 years now), this was the most big fish I've ever seen pulled onto a beach in one place. By a very substantial margin. So I have more hope than I did before.

Interesting thing is, last year we went the same week to pretty much the same spots and caught tons of bluefish but almost no bass. This year we caught almost all bass and no bluefish. Who knows why?

Thought for sure I was going to set a new personal record(45 inches, 36-38 lbs using length girth method last July), but not to be. If I could get over my reluctance to use eels until last resort it would probably help me out. I'm currently fishing plugs 90% of the time and eels only about 10%. But that's up from 0% two years ago.

Sounds like you had a ball, hope I get a chance to experience that yet this fall, but to date I've not seen a single "big fish" bite in my waters this fall. I also played rest and relax this weekend and wimped out, but everyone needs some down time. Well everyone except FW, who is still out on MV fishing through the pain :).

Now if they can just make it through the gauntlet at the mouth of the Chesapeake they may be back next year. You should see them banging jigs off the bottom stem to stern around the first island.........

Fishpart - did you get out while you were down there?

Few times, usually around the James River Reserve Fleet. Mostly schoolies up on the top between the ships. It's tough when you need to bum boat rides. I never really met anyone in the know on the surf so I misse dout on some good fishing throught he spring and fall.

BLITZSEEKER WAS ON THE CAPE SAME TIME WITH MY SONS AND THIS WAS OUR BEST TRIP.WE WERE SLINGING EELS AT OUTER BEACHES AND FISH UP TO 40'' IN HEAVY SURF,ON THE BAY SIDE WE PICKED UP BLITZING BLUES.WE ALL WISH WE WERE STILL THERE.HEARD OF THE 58 LBS FISH WEIGHED IN AT NELSON'S.ALSO HEARD RUMORS OF ANOTHER FISH IN 50'S AND ONE IN THE 60'S.

Hesh2 - Welcome to SB!! We got a great bunch here and have a lot of fun... I heard rumors of BIG fish out on the cape too. Wish I was there. I was hoping to get there myself but too many things stacked against me :( ...

I may have to talk the family in to a cape trip this weekend....

My finger has to heal a little from casting last weekend into that gale or I would leave tomorrow.

The fall run is shaping up nicely and the fish are bigger then last year.

Blitzseeker, was on the Cape last week fishing Back Beaches - your report is correct, last Tuesday I nailed a 35 lb. Striper and my brother took a 30 lb Striper from heavy surf, windy conditions, pouring rain, outgoing tide. LOVED the conditions - Iceman ain't gonna melt away in no rain! We were the only 2 on the beach that night with only 6 eels (@ least we had a full bottle of single malt -yes it's a long story). Last 5 Stripers taken were on 2 dead eels that were dead for quite some time. Ended up with 13 big fish between us that night. Heard same reports of 2 fish in the 50's taken and one in the 60's. Took approx. 65 Stripers during the week with a party of 7 (at different times). Also was catching keeper stripers and blues during the day @ Long Point with the 3 sisters. Friday night was berzerk - heaviest surf I've seen in quite some time - could not get eel past first wave - should of stayed but left b/c was fishing with 2 nyc friends (easy on nyc as I live there myself as you all know by now) who were "newbies" - first time striper fishing for one of them. Went to bay side beach with wind at our backs ended up leaving after 10 minutes and a half cigar and headed To Chatham Inlet (I talked my oldest brother into going) and the conditions still sucked. Could not get to the strike zone - big mistake on my part and a learning experience. Thought the inlet would be calmer - it was not. Next morning time to leave - hit the same bay side beach from previous night and nailed about 20 blues between us right at high tide - very important lesson learned, we'll besides the fact that you should listen to your older brother - I hate it when he's right. It started out as 4 of us fishing this one beach, 10 minutes later there are 20 guys fishing - funny how word gets around QUICK. All Stripers/Blues caught 90% of the time on live/dead/half eels, 10% on surface plugs and lead heads with soft plastics (this during the day mostly). They are there Sandman - get there this week and fish outgoing tide any of the backside beaches, fish Long Point during the day with plastics. Can verfify Hesh2's report as he is the Iceman's Dad. RI next for me, no more time off, strickly weekends now. Well, I could call in sick as it is the cold & flu season.

Tight Lines,

Iceman 6

JOhn between Blitz, and Sand we are in the wrong ------- place thats not goingto happen here except maybe Block, they;ll be some cows caught to the West, but nothing like these guys had//// WE Just going to sit here???:mad:

clamdigger - get there. thinking about taking the 5 hour drive just to fish hard all day friday night/saturday. going through striper withdrawls, at least i get to play hockey tonight...

iceman

;)

Tough call what to do at this point, though. They've been getting lots of big fish for a couple straight weeks on the Cape now. I'd be surprised if they can keep up that pace very much longer. I would not at all be surprised if the fishing drops off dramatically very soon.

I'm sticking with tradition....when October hits I've always done better in RI than on the Cape, and some of the older crowd I fish with that have been on the beaches for 20-30 years say the same. Certainly, once you are in the middle of October it is no comparison, RI is better hands down.

This coming weekend I can't fish, but the following weekend I'll likely be hitting Watch Hill area.

YOYR RIGHT BLITZ,LAST YEAR WE WENT TO CAPE IN OCT. AND THERE WAS NOTHING GOING ON EXCEPT A FEW SMALL SCHOOLIES,AND THEY WERE FAR BETWEEN.I WAS ON CAPE IN AUG. AND FISHING WAS GOOD ALL MONTH FOR SCHOOLIES WITH A FEW 30'' FISH.IT LOOKS LIKE THE 3RD AND 4TH WEEKS OF SEPT. IS WHERE IT IS AT FOR THIS YEAR.HEADING TO RI WED AM AND HOPE TO GET LUCKY.