December 3, 2018 – Day Late, Schoolie Short – Monmouth County Surf

First cast curse.

Sunday was such a wash.  I was set to go fishing with an old buddy, Dolf, who actually re-introduced me to surf fishing some 15 years ago, maybe more, after doing it as a kid but taking a detour (my first of two?) after college into fly fishing and trout fishing in general.  I was packed to go mentally, but I spent Saturday walking in a local parade in support of our coop grocery store, so I was a little tired and so slept in on Sunday morning.  I woke to a text from Dolf, asking if I was in, and I fear my lack of enthusiasm pre-coffee contributed to him bailing when, after a second cup, I had come to my senses and was willing to go fish the second high tide of the day.  To complicate things, I had also floated the idea of meeting Pete, but by the time he and I connected, I had already been roped into other things around the house and had almost made peace with not fishing until Monday.  Pete did well, and he was kind of enough to drop me a pin in Monmouth County, so when I got in the car today, I decided to be a day late to the bite. Besides the high sun, the conditions were good.  Plenty of white water, good 4 foot swells breaking on the bars; bait was still around, and the loons and brant geese were still picking the sand eels when one was unlucky enough to be dislodged from its midday respite.

Certainly sporty enough to support a bite.

Besides arriving a day late, I probably cursed myself in other ways.  Firstly, I invited my dad who declined because he hurt his shoulder on Saturday moving furniture.  Because he mentioned wanting to eat a bass, I put a cooler in the ‘Ru, something I rarely, if ever, do.  Secondly, I walked up and landed a short bass on my first real cast.  That rarely ends well.  The high teens fish hit a 2 ounce T-Hex in the wash, as did another later in the afternoon and one about 12 inches that I dropped in the wash on the surf lip. 

The plug is 7 inches long!

I took a walk and fished around some jetties with nothing to show for it but some cool surfing footage.  The swell was perfect for NJ surfing today it seemed, and guys were having fun.  By the time I walked back to the hole and bars where I began, a small crowd was forming in anticipation of the flood tide and setting sun.  After seeing a dozen 12 inchers landed around 3 PM, my gut was saying go south, perhaps to a spot in Ocean County where I found slightly bigger fish last week, but as the crowd grew, I decided to stay and see what developed.  Not much, in the end.  The pick of very small bass continued until sunset, and no bigger fish arrived.  I attempted to haul my casts off over the bar because the dinks were in the wash, but by 5 PM, I put on a blurple Mag Minnow, just to get a bend in the line, something for all the effort, and ended with another dink before packing it in.  Oh, the highs and lows of surf fishing...

A few hopefuls remained as all hope petered out with nothing but 12 inchers showing in the end.