Fishy business

Sunday we took a ride South to meet Keith and Marcia Russell.

We met at a restaurant near Lake Wales Florida and caught up over lunch. They were on their Goldwing so we followed them as they showed us around some of the area. We spent the afternoon riding throughout the countryside before we finally had to part company and head opposite directions for home.

Monday we drove the truck to Largo Florida near the Gulf. My Great Uncle, Max, lives in an Assisted Living apartment there and we had made arrangements to spend a little time with him. Max and my Dad were almost the same age even though he was my grandfathers brother. They lived in Montecello Indiana and we stayed in regular contact while I was growing up. I used to spend part of my summer vacation at their house and my cousin would spend time at our house as well. We used to have a great time.

Max is doing very well and we enjoyed our short visit with him. Here is a photo Rudee snapped of us before we left.

Max had to get to the Dentist and I just happened to have brought my fishing pole along ...... :-)

Rudee had no inclination to fish but was content to watch me as I tried to land something. We went to a pay fishing pier in Reddington Beach. I initially thought about just fishing from a public pier or even just off the beach. I researched and found that the non resident salt water license was going to cost $17 and if you go to the pier no license is needed and only costs $12. Of course the pier was only for 1 day of fishing but since we are leaving Florida Wednesday this was the best deal for us.

We paid our fee and bought some frozen squid for bait. The pier extends over 1000' into the Gulf and has benches to sit on every few feet on each side. We found a nice bench and settled in for some fun!

I was getting a few bites but they must have been pretty small because I could not hook anything.

Others around me were catching things pretty regularly. The lady a few feet away from us reeled in a stingray. No thanks, don't want one of those on my line!

We moved further down the pier and I started getting some more serious bites and it wasn't too long before I caught a small sea bass.

The wind was pretty brutal but we stuck it out and I caught several more fish over the next few hours. By 4:00pm we were both tired, hungry and I was out of bait so we called it a day and headed home.

We have decided to go ahead and head west towards Texas on Wednesday. We will spend most of tomorrow running any last errands and getting the circus train ready to roll again. I'll keep you posted.