Binge fishing

I had Friday off (instead of Monday) for Independence day. My beautiful wife allowed me to fish until Saturday afternoon with the strict instructions to be back in Richmond by 4:00pm. So Thursday evening comes around and as soon as the wife got home from yoga, I was off to the HRBT. I launched around 10pm into light and variable wind (the weather man was wrong). I started off catching flounder. Ended up with 4 with the biggest being 18.25"
Par for the course, I had about a dozen lil' croakers too. In with the mix I caught this little guy.

Then after finding the schoolie striper, I got 13 of them to suck on the end of my line. Ranging from 20" to 23", they were very aggressive and very fun to stalk along the lights. Some of them even did some aerial acrobatics right after the hookset. Gulp, Yozuri crystal minnows, and Tsunami swimbaits did the job. I got off the water a little before 4am and passed out in the car.




I got up at 7:30 and headed over to ocean's east tackle for some bait then called my friend Thom for a wind forecast update. I spent all day in Lynnhaven for about a dozen dink flounder and one of 15.5" Sheepie. I took a break about at the launch around 5pm. After the wind died down a bit, I went back out to see if I could find anything under the bridge. No love. While packing up around 8:30, John Heintzman decided to accompany me back to the HRBT. After flapping the gums and picking up some Wendy's we launched around 9:45pm. The wind was nuts and the water under the bridge was like a washing machine. I thought to myself that if I didn't find fish under the first light we should leave. Well we pull up under the bridge and the fish were all around the light line. Needless to say, it was on.



Check out this crazy looking "frankenstriper"


My biggest striper went 26"


I got off the water around 2:30am. Passed out in the car.



Up at 8am. Met John at Chicks beach with fiddlers and clam. Made the long paddle out to the island and started looking for spades. I immediately start getting nibbles. They weren't the little fluttering bites, so I knew they had to be something good. But the bite disappeared, never to be found for the rest of the day. The few fluttering bites I did have ended up being 3" Black Sea Bass and some oyster toads. No love from the togs, sheeps and triggers either. On the way back I saw a couple of big shapes cruising the surface. I did a quick 180 and gave chase. They were what I thought they were. Two big ass cobia. One looked to be around 30-40# and the other was a biggun around 50-60# (guesstimates). I tossed the bucktail I had on from jigging flounder, knowing I would probably get spooled if I actually got one to take it. The first toss went unnoticed. The second toss had one turn and look, but didn't take. By this time, I got pretty close to them and they went deep. I desperately looked for them, feeling my nerves firing and adrenaline pumping, I look across the bridge and there they were. I gave chase again and as soon as I was in range.....

They disappeared.

Long paddle back keeping an eye out only to find rays.

Drove back to Richmond ending the fishing binge, for now.

Happy independence day everybody!