Dauphin island

We started to leave at 10:30 ish

Its 1:02 and we are only five miles out of Baton Rouge but Irina is driving like she’s Danika. Patrick ‘s twin sister from a different mother. Kathryn and I nurse a beer in the back seat like it something everyone does as the trees roll by and the wipers work against what appears to be a Louisiana constant . We stopped at a BBQ joint in Mississippi called the Shed……the place was cool in a ramshackle way with multiple structures I’ll call buildings. The Shed was all but deserted at 2 ish but the beer was cold and the BBQ was good ,we walked the grounds and their several docks , complete with the don’t feed the gator signs . The place had the feel of a Walking Dead stage with a cross of bayou slasher film with no one around , but you could tell the place was a really happening one in the good weather, with a stage and people showing up in boats and the multilevel outdoor areas. The Shed was well worth the price just to see the eclectic structures……..and of course cold beers.

Dauphin Island awaits and should be an interesting adventure, with fishing and perhaps some beer.

We arrived in the fading light and a light rain…….UNBELIEVABLE! Karen had rented a 2 bed 2 bath condo just a block and a half from Lynn and Mary Beth’s condo which was most convenient.

We had rain,mist,fog and rain and locusts…….ok, maybe no locusts….suffice to say the weather sucked……but the people were good. Mary Beth and Lynn took us out surf fishing in what would have been a gentle rain but the Wyoming like gale force WIND transformed the drops into a billion tiny pebbles, pelting your face with a audible smack………well maybe it wasn’t that bad but the continuous rain coupled with a wind that reduced my casting ability to about seven feet was starting to wear on me. As you might suspect a seven foot cast puts your bait in the zone and water depth where mothers bounce their 18 month old infants when introducing them to the wonders of the ocean. After flailing at the force field like wind for an hour I noticed Lynn and the other experienced fisherwoman , Linda had migrated to the other side of the spit of land/ sand to the bay side. Accepting defeat at the hands of mother nature , I loaded up the “ sandwangon” with my pole and trudged across 150 yards of soggy towards the “smart” people. Linda had recently upgraded her wagon with balloon tires made for dragging 8 fishing rods, $1,700 worth of hooks , sinker , plastic baits and all the other accouterments that catch the eye of fisher people around the globe . The aforementioned crap that we all are guilty of buying catches way more fisher people than fish……but this is the sacrifice we all make in an effort to keep capitalism churning. Thank goodness for the new tires as I barely noticed the 150# of gear and the required beer and ice . Once I got within shouting distance , Lynn greeted me with “ where have you been? They are jumping everywhere !”

Thanks Lynn……….but I was busy dislocating my shoulder trying to cast out 8’.

The wind was at our back on this side so I was able to cast out almost 15’…..I don’t think that was in the feeding zone of the fish either , but I felt better that my bait was in 3’ of water as opposed to 7” like the other side. All three of us were getting bites, I assume small croaker, too small to take the hook but it was action by god! And fisher people like action, an occasional snag is enough to make you stay out there exercising your futility genes. Lynn showed us up by catching a scate ( sp) which looked like a stingray looking thing to this Wyoming boy, I was happy she had to take it off the hook……we all know what happened to the alligator man.

The sun popped out for about 37 seconds and fooled us into thinking we were almost warm…..by second 42 we knew it was a trick, and a sign that the warm condo,dry socks and a cold drink awaited the now “ successful “ fisherpeople,thanks to Lynn ! No one wants to quit at fishing and thus being forced to say “we didn’t catch shit”, Lynn saved us from that terrible fate.