theboondork's RV blog

This post is very dreary

12/4/2016

A dreary day of Pier fishing on Padre Island

Good grief its still raining! There's a lot of places a person could be where your life is so dark and dreary that day after day of rain wouldn't make any difference, Seattle Washington for instance. But when you're living next to a beach you tend to want to be outside. But so far being outside has not been very frequent or very much fun.

Last night there were coastal flood warnings because of higher than normal tides, and inshore winds blowing the water even higher. The warnings predicted that the tide would be 2 feet higher than normal and probably cover the beaches up to the sand dunes. This became a concern for me because not being from around here I wasn't sure exactly what that meant for my safety here at The County Park.

I called the park office in the afternoon and they assured me that we RVers were safe in the campground, and the Gulf of Mexico doesn't "normally" flood the campground inless there's a storm. This made me feel a whole lot better since I'm not sure if the Arctic Fox actually floats or not.

I walked over to the beach just about sundown and the water was starting to come into the fishing pier parking lot, had already covered about half the beach and it was still about an hour and a half till high tide. I decided that the locals must know what they're talking about so it made no sense for me to worry about it, so I didn't. But I did look out the door every once in a while just to see if there was any water heading my way.

Tomorrow looks like it's going to clear up and get back to more normal conditions which are, sunny or partly cloudy and temperatures in the seventies. I can't wait.

I have come to the realization that I left my saltwater fishing gear in storage back in Colorado. I have a large tackle box that I keep my saltwater fishing stuff in including my old Mitchell 302 and 306 saltwater spinning reels. I carried this tackle box with me last winter while I was in Arizona, but when I got back to Colorado in the Spring I put it in storage to temporarily get it out of my way. yesterday I started looking for it and finally remembered that it wasn't in the Arctic Fox at all.

I've spent a considerable amount of time trying to think of someone to blame this fiasco on but when you're living alone passing the buck is extremely difficult, not impossible, just difficult. But I haven't given up yet on determining who could have done this to me.

What this means is I thought I was only going to have to buy a large fishing rod to fish from a pier, but now I don't have a reel either. I hate to buy another reel, since I've got two of them laying back in Colorado. What to do, what to do?

I do have a rod and reel with me thats suitable for inshore fishing, but I've found that fishing from a pier usually requires more hefty tackle than what you would use casting lures from the shore. But fortunately because of the weather I have plenty of time to give this weighty problem the considerable thought and attention that it deserves.

theboondork

A cloudy day at the beach Padre Island Texas

A cloudy, dreary day at the beach Padre Island Texas

A cloudy dreary day at the Bob Hall fishing pier Padre Island

Another cloudy dreary day at the Bob Hall fishing pier Padre Island

8 Comments

Old Fat Man

12/4/2016 05:33:38 pm

A fishing rod set up with 10 pound mono or braid will handle 95% of the fish you will catch at Bob Hall. Most of the fish will be less than 4 pounds. Fish the first four guts between the sandbars and have fun. You do not need big set ups for pier fishing. The big setups ore for the large drum and bull reds with a scattering of sharks thrown in usually out near the end of the pier. I do not find them fun to catch. Kinda like catching a car.

theboondork

12/4/2016 06:55:00 pm

Thanks for the fishing info Barney, I need all the help I can get. I haven't fished on the Tom Hall pier yet, mostly because of the weather. But I've walked out on it to the end a couple of times. And it seems like everyone I see is using either a large, what I would call saltwater, spinning rig or what looks like a 5 foot boat rod with a large bait casting reel that looks suitable for offshore fishing. So I figured they either knew something or were just very optimistic.

I think what concerns me the most is the rod and reel I have with me, as I have mentioned before, is a 6 1/2 foot St. Croix medium heavy action with a Shimano Stradic C14 3000 spinning reel, which is about the biggest thing you need in Colorado. But the tip of the rod is very fast and I'm concerned about lifting even a smallish fish up over the pier handrail without breaking the tip.

I know you're supposed to use a lift net to get the fish up out of the water but that's just something else I'll have to find a place for in the already corpulent Arctic Fox. So I was thinking that maybe a shorter rod with a stiffer backbone would allow me to lift an average size fish up to the top of the pier especially something like an Ugly Stick which are all but unbreakable.

I would like to use the rod and reel that I have, and I may end up doing just that, because I know it will handle any trout, or "specks" as they're called in Florida, or drum or redfish or even Snook. In Colorado I landed a 3 1/2 foot long pike with this rig. I'm just not sure if I can lift a fish from the water to the pier with this thing.

Maybe it would help me if I knew what rod you used for pier fishing and how you get the fish up on the deck without breaking something, and do you use one rod for all your inshore fishing, inquiring minds want to know.

Tom

12/4/2016 08:14:16 pm

Both f my rods and reels are not nearly as heavy as yours. I have 2500 series Shimano reels. One with 12 pound mono. The other with 20 pound braid. The rods are both rated 6 - 14 pound line with light action. I "flop" all the fish I catch over the rail unless they break off.

12/4/2016 09:05:02 pm

Well thanks for that Barney. That's the kind of specific information that I had been lacking. I guess now I will buy myself a combination fishing license and get out on the pier with everyone else.

I will have to buy some tackle, I have a small freshwater tackle box with me and I doubt if I have a sinker bigger than a half ounce, so that will give me an excuse to roam the fishing tackle Isle at Walmart. Another question, where could I find a large tackle store, I see they don't have a Bass Pro or a Cabela's in Corpus so where I could see some really cool saltwater tackle.

Tom

OFM

12/4/2016 09:55:07 pm

Go back into Corpus a little way past the big high bridge and find ROYS on your left hand side. It is not a small bashful place. Keep control of your credit card and emotions when you enter that place. You can likely ask nearly anyone in the campground or on the pier for info about ROYS.
On into town at Everhart is an Academy with lots of stuff also. Walmart should be your last choice for area specific equipment.

12/5/2016 09:27:25 am

I looked up Roys on the Internet this morning and it does looks like the kind of place where I should leave my credit card at home and wear handcuffs. I think a person's fishing hobby could turn into a dangerous obsession in that store. But I'll be going into town the next day or so and maybe I'll stop at Roy's and just "look in the window".

Shuperduty

12/5/2016 05:22:48 am

I don't know your area at all, but when I go to the shore on the east coast I find a pawn shop to look for saltwater gear. Guys will buy fishing gear when their on vacation the pawn it when they head back inland.

I enjoy following your travels and hope to do something similar when I retire.

Save travels,

12/5/2016 09:33:20 am

Thanks for the idea about the pawnshop, that had never crossed my mind. I did see a pawnshop in town so I will stop in there and have a look see.

Full time RVing is a great life, all the folks I meet say they've never been happier.

Tom

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This post is very dreary

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