East Matagorda April 25-27, 2014
We had 8 PACK anglers participate
this year for the trip to East Matagorda.
The trip officially started Friday morning at 7:00am where we met up
with a few special guests on the beach.
We met up with a crew working on a story for Field and Stream
magazine. They had a lot of gear to
organize and Brad, Shawn and I were itching to get on the water so I pulled up Google
earth and showed them where we’d be.
Brad, Shawn and I continued down to three-mile cut where we headed back
to our spot. Once we got back there we
saw that Tim Boone was already on the water.
We unloaded our yaks, prepared our gear and were about to hit the water
when we spot the Field and Stream crew headed our way. They had a couple of Yamaha side by side
ATV’s with kayaks loaded on top. It was
a pretty awesome site to see. We hit the
water and spread out looking for hungry redfish. Fishing was pretty tough, halfway through the
day Brad had one flounder and I had one redfish. It wasn’t looking like a lot of fish were
going to be caught so the photographer for the Field and Stream crew asked if I
could help him take some shots of the redfish I caught. He took out his underwater camera housing and
we did about a 45 minute photo shoot with this redfish. It was pretty cool to be a part of this and
see how they get all those fantastic pictures you see in magazines. We continued fishing after this and I spotted
Jim and Barry who had joined us a little later in the morning. I was heading over to see how their day was
going when I spotted three reds cruising about 30’ away from me. I made a quick cast and immediately hooked
up, landing a 22” redfish. Jim paddled
over and we chatted for a bit. I decided
to call it a day and start working my way back to the truck. On the way I saw Brad hook up with a
redfish. We all met back up at the
launch where another photo shoot happened with the few fish that were
caught. We enjoyed a few adult beverages,
cleaned the fish and headed back to set up camp. After everyone got situated we fired up the
grill and camp stoves to prepare dinner.
Brad made blackened redfish tacos and I grilled some venison sausage and
chicken on the grill. It was a fantastic
meal. We enjoyed a few more adult
beverages and got to know our special guests a little more.
The next morning we decided to try
something new and make the portage across Parkers Cut into West Matagorda
Bay. We ended up on a huge flat with
scattered shell. Not much action was happening
when all of a sudden my bait gets slammed by an upper slot redfish. I get the fish all the way in and reach for
my Boga Grip when it came unbuttoned.
Brad, Shawn and I met up with Jim and Barry who were just starting their
shore lunch. Barry kicked it up a notch
by preparing a hot shore lunch with his jet boil. After lunch we decided to head back to the
vehicles and head back to the flats on the south shoreline of East Matagorda
Bay. I had a few opportunities at
tailing fish that I screwed up and Jim had a shot at some tailers but he
couldn’t get them to eat. We fished till
about 6:00pm and decided to call it a day.
No fish were caught on Saturday.
We headed back to camp where Greg prepared fajitas for part of the group
and the rest of us went to a new restaurant in town. The crew from Field and Stream met up with us
for dinner.
Everyone seemed to sleep in a
little Sunday morning. The winds had
picked up and the fishing was slow, so we enjoyed breakfast and took it
easy. Several PACK members were
interviewed by Field and Stream and we all signed model release forms for the
photographer. After breakfast we broke
out the fly rods. Those of us who throw
whippy rods tried out each other’s gear and practiced casting into the wind. We used Barry’s coffee cup as our
target. We packed up camp and headed
into town for lunch before we all parted ways.
Not a lot of fish were caught but
that didn’t matter. We enjoyed being outdoors
and swapping stories. Thank you Ron
Romeis for putting us in contact with Field and Stream. Wish you could have been there, we miss you. |