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Redemption!
- By Capt. David Azar
- Published 09/13/2005
- Trip Reports
- Unrated
Hello to all,
Sometimes we may think that things don't go our way because we've been bad or are undeserving. Then just when it seems darkest someone turns on the light and we are redeemed. That's how this year's albie fishing has been. For the past several weeks I have been hearing reports of sporadic albie sightings...but not what it should be by this point in the season...and I hadn't heard of anyone hooking up. Yesterday there was only the tiniest glimmer of hope as the sightings, while continuing throughout the morning, were very, very thin BUT a few people did manage to hook up. Some anglers I spoke to told me they covered some 80 miles motoring back and forth along the Rockaways trying to find some of the few fish popping here and there. This morning I met my client at the dock but the forecast, which was terrible, did actually come true (a rare occurrence,btw) and we had to reschedule. By mid afternoon I couldn't take it any more and decided to go back to the marina and see if the wind had abated. Lo and behold it had and the 3 to 5 foot swells that NOAA was STILL reporting were nowhere to be found, in fact conditions were downright excellent. As I got to the Breezy Point jetty it was just the beginning of outgoing but I spotted a lone albie coming right at the boat and it disappeared beneath my hull. This was the sign I needed and waited there for the tide to start moving. About a half hour later it was as if somebody flipped the switch! Birds began diving over a pod of busting fish. The splashes were small and I feared it might only be cocktail blues, so I cast a tin jig just to see and got several follows from what were clearly false albacore. I immediately switched to the fly rod. From then on fish and birds were working in earnest for the
next 3 hours. To make this long story a little shorter I'll tell you that of the five or six other fly-rodders that were out there they all seemed to be hooking up. I was having my usual albie-induced fit, what with tangles in my line, hooked sea gulls (hooked 2 on fly...does anybody know if the IGFA keeps records on these things?), and then only to be broken off after finally hooking up for real, because of a huge knot in my fly-line. But I persisted and was finally redeemed. Just before the sun went down and the light went out for another day I hooked and landed my first albie of 2005! It's good to be alive!
It's almost anti-climactic but there are scads of bluefish out there as well and some of very good size. Last Wednesday all fish over ten pounds were reported taking flies very well in our area. Friday while looking for albies over on the Jersey side I got into a school of big fish as well, including this 11 pounder on fly.
Now this report was only about me and I'd really rather be writing about you! So give John or I a call we still have several prime dates available and the time is now!
Tight lines,
Capt. Dave
TO BOOK A TRIP CONTACT
"ONE MORE CAST" CHARTERS
CAPT. JOHN MCMURRAY, 718-791-2094
CAPT. DAVE AZAR, 917-287-5822
or LOG ON TO OUR WEBSITE AT: http://www.nycflyfishing.com
Sometimes we may think that things don't go our way because we've been bad or are undeserving. Then just when it seems darkest someone turns on the light and we are redeemed. That's how this year's albie fishing has been. For the past several weeks I have been hearing reports of sporadic albie sightings...but not what it should be by this point in the season...and I hadn't heard of anyone hooking up. Yesterday there was only the tiniest glimmer of hope as the sightings, while continuing throughout the morning, were very, very thin BUT a few people did manage to hook up. Some anglers I spoke to told me they covered some 80 miles motoring back and forth along the Rockaways trying to find some of the few fish popping here and there. This morning I met my client at the dock but the forecast, which was terrible, did actually come true (a rare occurrence,btw) and we had to reschedule. By mid afternoon I couldn't take it any more and decided to go back to the marina and see if the wind had abated. Lo and behold it had and the 3 to 5 foot swells that NOAA was STILL reporting were nowhere to be found, in fact conditions were downright excellent. As I got to the Breezy Point jetty it was just the beginning of outgoing but I spotted a lone albie coming right at the boat and it disappeared beneath my hull. This was the sign I needed and waited there for the tide to start moving. About a half hour later it was as if somebody flipped the switch! Birds began diving over a pod of busting fish. The splashes were small and I feared it might only be cocktail blues, so I cast a tin jig just to see and got several follows from what were clearly false albacore. I immediately switched to the fly rod. From then on fish and birds were working in earnest for the
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It's almost anti-climactic but there are scads of bluefish out there as well and some of very good size. Last Wednesday all fish over ten pounds were reported taking flies very well in our area. Friday while looking for albies over on the Jersey side I got into a school of big fish as well, including this 11 pounder on fly.
 |
Now this report was only about me and I'd really rather be writing about you! So give John or I a call we still have several prime dates available and the time is now!
Tight lines,
Capt. Dave
TO BOOK A TRIP CONTACT
"ONE MORE CAST" CHARTERS
CAPT. JOHN MCMURRAY, 718-791-2094
CAPT. DAVE AZAR, 917-287-5822
or LOG ON TO OUR WEBSITE AT: http://www.nycflyfishing.com
