Bugs and crabs with Matt 1-24-10

[Sherm]

I got out last night with Matt. We have been threatening to go hoopin together since the PAL party at my house. We hit the water early and paddled the yaks out to our spot. The paddle out wasn't bad with a pretty steady wind at our back. We did have to wait for an aircraft carrier to clear the harbor before we could cross the bay.

I know Navy security has a job to do. However....as the carrier was getting closer to us a navy boat with four guys on it (one guy on the 50 cal) come up to us and tell us we have to clear the area. We were about 200 yards away (well outside the channel) from the carrier and we were on kayaks. What were we going to do? Rush the carrier? This boat stayed between us and the carrier giving us the stink eye until it passed. Kind of a weird experience.

We finally arrived at the spot and set the hoops and waited for 1st pull. I ate the awesome yellowtail sandwich the wife had prepared. Enjoyed an after dinner cigar and went to pull. The first pull came about a half hour after it got dark. The wind hadn't died yet and the 1st couple pulls were tougher than usual.

The bugs were crawling though. Nothing big last night. The week before the storms had yielded some quality bugs but these were a lot of clickers and some just barely legals. Lot's of sorting through shorts to find the legal ones.

I did manage some nice size crabs last night too. Matt wanted to try one so I gave him one a kept two. We hooped until 9:30 and decided to head in. Matt had three keepers and I had seven. I missed counted somewhere during the night. My bugs go in the tank behind me on the yak so it's hard to turn around and see what's in there while sitting on it. I thought I counted six when putting them in but when I got home there were seven. SWEET!! Bonus.

The wind had died and we made it back to shore around 10:30. Good crawl between 7pm and 8:30. Lots of activity.

Gonna have to go again soon.

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