Fishing with my son

[joshuaream]

We had plans to go fossil shark tooth grubbing near Venice Beach this weekend, but my wife got a manicure/pedicure on Thursday and didn't want to go to the beach and ruin her nails. I asked my son if he wanted to go fishing instead and save the fossils for next weekend.

I called around to a couple of the local charters and found one that had a couple of spots on a 5 hour charter yesterday, and negotiated a good price for my son and I. (My daughter looked at me with disgust when I asked her if she wanted to go...)

We headed out past the local reef and tried for some game fish in about 150 feet of water. We managed to land several Bonita around a buoy and a big cargo freighter anchored out deep, which were fun for my son but I was worried about. They look like tuna but taste like old anchovies... We put several of the Bonita on live rigs and trolled for awhile, we got one small hammerhead but it cut the line about 40 feet from the boat. The two other paying customers (a couple from Canada) on the boat landed some baracuda.

We moved up closer to edge of the reef and managed to catch some king fish (a type of mackerel.) I wasn't too excited about eating mackerel but it was better than the Bonita... We ended up with three keepers.

Here is my sons first Kingfish. Not big enough to keep, so overboard he went after a picture with the guide. (The guide was holding it at arms length out because it was flipping around, it measured 23".)



Catching the bonita. I think we caught about 20 of them because my son and one of the other paying customers enjoyed going after them. (Light tackle, lots of action, easy for a 7 y/o boy and a 50+ y/o lady to reel in.)



We passed the Oasis of the Seas coming out of Port Everglades (Ft. Lauderdale). I think it's the biggest cruise ship out there.





My son with his biggest kingfish.



Next week fossils with the new floating sifter that the kids and I built.

[comanche]

That is so Nice ,,,,Kids at this age can get really excited about fishing.
Thanks for sharing your trip with us.///c

[Palmwood]

I still get excited about fishing, and hope I always will.
Looks like fun.
We caught some Kings and Dorado out of Destin once, and they were both very tasty.
We found some small shark teeth out of Galveston once. You could find them by walking along the water's edge and catch them when the waves rolled in.
Brown sand and black teeth.

[ghost recon]

Looks like a great day on the water to me. Nice pics and fish. That cruise ship is gigantic, looks like 8+ stories tall.

[joshuaream]

We were in a 40+ foot boat, but the Oasis was like sailing near an aircraft carrier... It was hard to get it all in one frame without being so far away that you loose the details. When we docked one of the crew on another boat said it went out with over 8,000 people including crew two weeks back. It's so much taller than wide that it looks unstable, but I guess it's so big that it takes a lot to move it.

We also saw Judge Judy's 150 foot super yacht called the Triumphant Lady. The guide said she paid 12 million for the yacht, but had to buy the 8 million dollar mansion beside hers because she didn't have enough water front to dock it at her place. I guess yelling at idiots on daytime TV pays better than I thought... I bet Judge Wapner never made close to that much.

Dorado are probably my favorite fish (to catch, eat, or look at.) Small kingfish aren't bad, but the big ones are inedible to anyone who isn't Japanese (a lot of people there love the strong Mackerel taste.) The other problem is that they don't freeze well raw and have a strong taste if you don't prep them correctly and quickly. They fight enough that they come out of cool water warm to the touch, and they hold a lot of body heat while flipping around in the ice chest. You have to bleed them quickly and get them in an ice bath or they'll spoil and get funky.

We had some grilled last night over charcoal, fish croquettes for lunch and made up more frozen croquettes, and fish chowder for dinner... And we gave away about 8 pounds of filets. Maybe next time a grouper or snapper will bite... But it was all fun.

[Trask]

This is great to see...Kids need to get a chance to build a backlog of positive experiences like this..It makes good young people Looks like a super fun time was had!

[Rick Hicks]

That last picture makes the whole trip worthwhile, What a smile!

[marksimerson]

Kids and fishing is a natural! Memories he will not soon forget.

[IowaCollector]

Looks like a great day!!!!!