While the winds sucked over the Easter weekend, at least there was good sunny days. But it didn’t have the same feel down at the the usual ‘campground’ this year. Maybe it was the rigged out golf carts with 12″ subs hitting hard all day long, being ‘driven’ by 13 year olds. Or was it the un-manned red solo cup ‘boat races’ that were being held along the beach? Or maybe it was the entire island who thought us gringos to be undercover cops. Could’ve been the guys who wanted us to join them for a grilled barracuda and marlin lunch. Might have been the stories of grilled permit and bonefish burgers back home. Or the fried mullet for breakfast? It was a very interesting trip this year, on land, and on the flats…
Making good time through the Keys on Friday morning, we stopped at World Wide Sportsman for some new boat kicks, and at Florida Keys Outfitters for a few different permit flies. Aside from the annoying gale that was blowing, it was a sweet day in the islands. Managed to check in early, around 10:30 or so and get our gear stuffed into the trailer and the boat tied up at the dock. There was a large family gathering brewing on either side of us. We were openly welcomed by some, and got a few hard-ass looks from others. Very comical and entertaining! They had no idea that Ka$h Flo was in the house.
We threw some fly rods in the boat and busted our way through some chop on our way toward the flats. Right away we had a school of bones appear out of nowhere, and float exactly where they should. I made one bad cast, and picked it up and laid it back to them. 3 or 4 strips and I came tight to a nice little bonefish. 
That happened within 15 minutes of shutting down the outboard. But an hour or so later we hadn’t seen anything else. Re positioned with the wind, working our way around a very good point when 2 nice permit cruised by, stoppped 40 feet from the boat (dead into a 20+ wind) and tailed. Everett gave it a shot, but we ended up wrapped in flyline, and the permit fled. Once around the point, it was a dead zone. Nothing but tiny sharks, maybe 18″ long roaming the flat. On that note, it was time to head in, open a cold one and grill up some steaks…
I felt the trailer listing back and forth in the wind throughout the night, and wondered how ugly the crossing of open water was going to be in the morning. It was pretty ugly, but with full raingear who cares. We started in the same area, on an opposite tide as the day before. Nothing. Everywhere we went, Nothing. We staked out on a notoriously good cuda/shark/permit highway and nothing. Hung a dead cuda over the bow, 12 wt in hand to play with some sharks, Nothing…..So we loaded the baitwell with pinfish, and headed to 3 different bridges. Chummed, and Nothing! except for undersize snapper and grouper. Checked out one last shoal marker which has provided dinner on several occasions, and Nothing!!! Bummed we weren’t going to eat fresh snapper for dinner for the first time in 6 years on this trip, we headed into Big Pine and grabbed some sandwiches, and made the drinks a little stiffer that night.
The wind was just a little lighter on Sunday I guess, and we decided again to start at the original flat, but this time stake out every 100 feet or so and give it a couple minutes. Even took a handful of shrimp, diced them up and put them in the chum bag to soak next to the boat. Nurse sharks and rays showed up first, sniffing out the shrimp. Small blacktips or lemon sharks moved in and it was only a few minutes later that the first school of bonefish ‘floated’ in. Everett was in good position and unrolled a nice line to the charging fish. It wasn’t but a couple of ticks of the fly and he came tight. Butit didn’t stay connected. The hook must have been back in the crusher, and bent out. The sound the hookpoint making contact with those ‘teeth’ was very loud, and Everett’s fly came back at him, bent. He was pretty deflated, but just fed his first bonefish on fly! A few minutes later I set the hook into a bonefish only to have it get spit back at me as well. Mine wasn’t bent, but didn’t stay connected just the same. And on cue, Steve got his shot and was hooked up to a fun little bonefish, this one, landed. 
We weren’t killin’ it per say, but we were having fun. Once we gave up on the bonefish, Permit point needed another look. As we had hoped, almost to the point, a massive wake was being pushed directly perpendicular to the bow. It was going to be a 90 degree crossing shot, across a stiff 15-20 knt wind. I somehow managed to get the fly to the fish, in what I thought was the right place, and when the fish arrived, I shook the crab fly, waited, stripped, and nothing…But got my heart racing. I stepped down to get a drink, and relieve Everett on the platform. Just another few minutes, and we saw a big fish, in real skinny water, doing some strange things. When we got closer, the fish tailed with half its body out of the water. This was a nice permit. Steve had the shot, and it looked like it was going to land right on its nose, but was pushed by the wind and landed closer to its tail. And it blew off that flat like a rocket. That was it, the shot of the weekend! With the permit waving tails at us, it was time to go home. Next year, Sugarloaf Lodge, Parmers Resort? The RV resort has been good to us for 6 years, but it’s time to get into some fresh spots….
