Begging to be Spooled in Florida

Have you ever wished for something bad to happen to you? lol I have and in the fishing world it's called being spooled! It's not quite often I get the chance to fish down in Florida, but when I did, I took it slow... Fished all the way in back of the canals, even got kicked out by the harbor master, then eventually evolved into shore fishing. It took me awhile to find out what various saltwater species were going for, hence glass ghost x-rap, once I did, catching Snook was a blast. I gotta admit, I was a bit weary of saltwater fishing knowing what lurks in these waters and of course watching the movie Jaws. We always joke in the freshwater hobby about people being attacked by musky, but when you get attacked by the apex predator in saltwater, this is no joke folks. Nothing to underestimate, even if the movie Jaws blew out of proportion how terrifying predatorial fish can be in saltwater.

I have to say though, once I got the hang of saltwater fishing. I was all for it, I was hooked, after smoking a shit load of snook along Naples beach. I was just begging to hook into something larger, sure I landed a nice redfish at Marco Island, but still, this wasn't exactly what I was looking for. By the end of the trip, talking with a few locals and hearing that a lot of Tarpon fishermen fish the Marco Island bridge, I headed over there with my largest glass ghost X-Rap. Then when I finally hooked into something big and I was thinking I was beginning to get spooled, the species changed direction on me. Little did I know, I had hooked into a Stingray lol. Even though I was a little dissapointed, I really wasn't catching and fighting a stingray was the weirdest fight I ever felt. This bad boy could stop on a dime and change direction on you in an instant! Some of the locals were flabbergasted that I had caught this predator on a Jerkbait lol.

A month earlier, I was talking with a few other fishermen that fished this bridge, saying they got spooled using a giant swimbait. It sounded so thrilling to me to hook into a larger fish species, it's sad it didn't happen, but you can bet your ass I'll be going back down there again soon as I get some time off work. I never knew saltwater fishing was so intense, right up my alley, I would say Tarpon, Shark, and Goliath Grouper is the next evolutionary step from musky fishing. If you've seen any of the videos on youtube, these videos basically make musky fishing look like Child's Play.