SW Florida: Boca Grande and more

This weekend I went down to my island house on Palm Island in SW Florida to do some more fishin again. On Friday my father, mother grandma, and I went out on the boat down to Boca Grande. It took some lookin around but we finally found live bait and proceeded to flatline a few while in the pass. Everybody on the boat except me was bottom fishing while I managed two flatlines, a shark rod, and the tarpon rod in my hand. I dont know why they weren't tarpon fishing... I mean besides the kings and sharks, tarpon is where its at. By the time it was 1pm they released a ton of short grouper. We kept and caught 1 several pound mangrove, a big trout, and put a 33" exact Cobia in the box. I cant say how many times hooks pulled or got broke off on BIG kings. I didn't have any wire heavy enough for the kings and they would either break the heavy mono or the wire. The cobia finally got caught and fought like a champ for only 33". After that my father wanted to "spend time with family" back at the house so we left. That night I went out shark fishing and from sunset to 12pm I lost count of how many sharks I lost. 10 mins. after putting out the cobia carcass I hooked up and it ended up being about an 8ft Tiger. Unfortunately the hooks pulled when the fish was 10ft away from the beach and I was by myself which is why I couldn't have leadered the fish easily. Then my sister arrived and she got to fight two sharks on the fin-nor spinner and she lost both of them somehow (I think it was her jerky motions that she was using, but I taught her how to fight a shark after realizing what she was doing). Basically within 1 1/2 hours I had paddled out 5 baits on two rods. The sharks the rest of the night wouldn't run with the bait long... just pick it up and drop it.
The next morning we went out to boca again and did the same thing as the day before. This time I got a 15lb kingfish and we actually marked some tarpon pods finally... They just wouldn't hit my rod. Everybody else on the boat released a lot more short grouper. My dad being the way he is, by noon we were heading in. I still don't get it because as we were leaving again the bait started moving in and fish were turning on and the tarpon were showin up good. I just gotta keep tellin myself "oneday when I get my boat"... So I hit the beach again at sunset and this time it was rougher and a lot of current. But it wasn't as bad as last week where I did a backflip while in a 12ft yak on a 7ft wave and a 13/0 shark hook went into my rib cage. Just more memories... So I put out the kingfish and 15 minutes later I hook up to a fish. I hate catching small sharks on larger tackle since its not much fun. Just a matter of dragging in the 5' 7" blacktip from 300 yds out. After that I packed it up, that tip had eaten the entire kingfish and the surf picked up with the wind and would of made it hard to fish alone. Plus my dad said would go offshore the next day which didn't happen thanks to him. So Sunday morning I hit the beach again and soaked baits for 4 hours without a hit. My neighbor caught on saturday a 13' hammer from his boat outside stump pass which is funny because he was trying for kingfish and he isn't even a shark fisherman. I would of loved to see him catch it because he was in a little 18' Boston Whaler. From what I saw this weekend there were probly more sharks running down the beaches or on the artificial reefs than in the passes. Just need more tarpon to show up.

Paddling out the first night

Not many beaches left in Florida where a busy day is 10 people over 3 miles.