I hadn’t been on the water in South West Florida the last week or so, and with a few charters coming up, and family in town, my son and dad were able to escape for a few hours to Estero Bay. My boy was dying to try his new fly rod he got for Christmas, but the strong winds kept us from being able to break it out. We started fishing around some of my favorite islands and oyster bars, but it appeared the chilly wind and water had the flats pretty well shut down. With that we headed to find some deeper water around the mouth of Big Carlos Pass. The tide was flooding in nicely and my dad and I started getting some small snapper and sheepshead to the boat, as my boy threw our favorite lure. Next thing we know, my boy hollers fish on as the drag starts singing and a nice snook breaks the water. One more jump and it spits the hook and lure. A few more casts and he hooks up another even bigger snook. He battled the fish strongly away from the docks, but then a little too strongly closer to the boat and broke it off. It took a few minutes to take away the sting of the lost biggun, but a black drum over the rail peaked his interest to try fishing again. Next cast using a shrimp, he gets a nice black drum to mark off on his caught species list.



He also added a nice sheepshead that we kept for dinner.



With an upcoming lunch date with Nana, it was time to get off the water way to soon. But we had another great time with the boys in Estero Bay!