One week from tomorrow morning I'm going to role out of bed an hour before sunrise and put together the Daiwa Atrika travel surf rod that I'm taking and then I'll grab some of the ' extra stuff ' I brought along and go fish. My house in Mazatlan is looking an awful lot like mt garage in Alaska but ya know when you're a professional fisherman you gotta have THE stuff. In Maz I have about 10 different surf rods, some missing eyes and eye inserts as the heat in my closet melts the glue that holds the inserts in and when I open the case every year they fall out on the floor. So this year in my ' pile ' I also have my rod building supplies and my slow turner for doing a nice job on the farrel resin.
The Stradic is a gift for my friend Alejandro , I have a brand new one waiting there for me. The Daiwa is for a loaner when any of you guys come down and want to go fishing, I gave last years loaner to our favorite bartender for a birthday present. And the nice Plueger Patriarch is my new # 1 back up in case I do something stupid and break my Stradic.....Then you see assorted bug dope, itch sticks, a new Kershaw fillet knife that I fetched out of the river just the other day and some cool Cabela's multi tools for gifts....
My friend Rafa runs the Surf fishing store in Mazatlan called Pesca Maz and he's for sure got ' the stuff'.... problem is that he sometimes runs out and sometimes things are sooooo expensive and sometimes I feel kinda bad for not buying it all from him so I make it up for it my being a kind of gringo liaison for him and send people there that I meet and want to fish....which is a lot. And of course me and the rest of Team X buy plenty of shirts , lead jig heads, the hottest color swim fish that you just gotta have and don't, you know the deal.
Those 3 things above for me are the essentials. Ya gotta have the Power Pro plane and simple, it's the best. Casts long, doesn't weather too badly and doesn't seem to air knot as much as some of the braided line. 20 pound for me is the ' do it all ' line but on my big outfit for the Roosterfish I have 30, Power Pro of course. I like the 1500 yard spool so I have plenty in case my friends don't and I've found that you always have your spool filled properly and you don't have to 'guess' at it when using backing like we do on big reels.That Mirro Lure Catch 5 shallow diver in 7/8 ounce caught all my Snook and Corvina last year as well as most of my Snappers. It's a 2 to 3 ft. diver , perfect for fishing the rocks in between tides and when It's high tide and those rocks are under 7 or 8 feet of water I use that 77 M in 1 and 1/4 ounce.
I can't resist a sale and Trusty Hardware has the best end of season deals known to man... I sure hope they're making money because we need them in this town. That 2 ounce P'Line Lazer Minnow is the long distance champ for me. When I see fish at the very extent of my casting range on goes the Lazer Minnow. The only problem with them is that the paint is gorgeously life like but not very durable, no problem, just buy more.... The Spro feather jigs were on sale for a buck and a half, we fish with them a lot and the home made ones in Mazatlan we call ' Pluma's '. Speaking of homemade, the small 1/8 to 5/8 jigs on the left there I tied up 3 dozen of. These babies are killer when you see the water right at your feet get what I call 'nervous ' ....it's usually snook or snapper chasing the really really small sardines, sometimes you'll even see the mini sardines jumping....it's a Snook. These little guys also work really good in the rocks and off jetties as they're so light they just swirl around and don't sink right into the rocks. Kinda rewarding to catch fish on your own crafted lures....
For only the second time in all the years I've written Mile 14 I have to mention our loss. Chris's brother and my friend Jim Fejes passed away unexpectedly last week....Alaska has lost an original. I've never met anybody as full of life as Jim. He was like a walking talking full time event. Born and raised in Alaska he had thousands of hours piloting Super Cubs. He was a master guide, a commercial fisherman, he ran a ' high fence' hunting operation in Texas, he refinanced my house when he was in the mortgage business. He raised some great kids and....well I loved that guy and I hope all of you Feje's find comfort... Happy landings Jim, R.I.P.
So have you tried out your Daiwa travel rod? What is the lure weights on that?
ReplyDeleteIt's 2 to 4 ounce so we'll see....that's a lot of pieces for throwing hard and I'm thinking that thing will ' grocery sack' as Geno used to say. But it's a quality rod so we'll see, stay tuned
ReplyDeleteI hope it works good for you otherwise CTS will make any of their blanks in 5 pc and build your own mine only weighs 12 oz
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