Florida Kayak Fishing

When I was a teenager I loved to watch fishing programs on ESPN.  I remember one in particular that featured Jack Youngblood, the famous football player, fishing for tarpon.  I remember thinking, "I'm going to do that some day." 

I hate to admit it, but I've lived in Florida for 8 years now and I still haven't been saltwater fishing yet - for tarpon, marlin, grouper, red snapper, red fish, Spanish mackrel - and I haven't been freshwater fishing either.

I did a lot of freshwater fishing growing up in mid-Missouri.  Sometimes we'd get off the school bus near the family fishing hole and not get home until nearly dark.  We'd roll in on our bicycles with 12 - 14 blue gill and bass to clean.

Later on, while in college, I spent many weekend afternoons and early weekday mornings before classes, fishing at the Little Dixie Wildlife Area.  I used the latest lure being hawked at the time by Bill Dance, the bass fishing guru from Tennessee.  It was a yellow spinner bait from Strike King and it did catch its' share of Missouri bass. It's 20 years later and I'm grinning from ear-to-ear remembering it all.

After returning to Florida to live for the second time, I briefly toyed with the idea of buying a kayak and heading to Fort Desoto for a weekend of fishing.  I don't swim well, so I talked myself out of doing that, but I do enjoy reading Brian's kayak fishing blog (TarnationPlantation.com) and DouGR81 Kayak Fishing Blog from time to time.  And if I do buy a kayak in the future, I hope I can rig it up like this one.

Next, I thought about buying some hip waders and heading out to the Causeway Bridge near Tampa, but then I had double knee surgery a few weeks later and never got around to it.

I did buy a pretty nice Penn baitcaster a couple years ago, but I never quite got around to spooling it with fishing line or actually mounting it on a fishing rod. But, I'm sure it could catch the you know what out of some grouper at the Skyway Fishing Pier if I did.

You know what?  I need to get my rear off the couch and out to the water.  Enough excuses are enough, right?  But, of course I'll probably want to wait a few weeks for the weather to cool off a little (LOL).