A little fishing, a little beach and a little monopoly

Today started EARLY! Like wake up at 6am on vacation early, but it was well worth it to spend the morning in the Gulf of Mexico catching fish.

We met Captain Matt at 7am and hit the water. Since Leo and Mike get a little motion sick, we decided to do the inland jetty fishing trip. The jetties were hand-built rock walls built in 1905 after the 1900 Hurricane that hit Galveston. It was a way to try and keep the channels open following the storms. The jetties are 6 miles long, and we were about 5 miles out along the jetty where the fish like to hang out. Even though we weren’t in really open seas, the ocean was still pretty choppy today.

It was beautiful but a little windy. Someone did not listen to their mother about a sweatshirt and was freezing, although he would never admit it. (oh to be 15 again).

It was a great day for fishing! All the boys caught HUGE red drums, after a bit of a battle to get them in the boat

Mike actually caught his whooper on 25-pound line (smaller rod than boys) and had to battle him about half an hour before he was finally close enough to the boat to catch in the net. He was a 32-pound monster!

We also caught a few saltwater catfish, which I didn’t know until yesterday existed. You don’t eat these because they have an enzyme on their skin that can cause a terrible infection.

We have found that every time we go fishing one person in our group catches zero. Zero, like not even a nibble. This trip that was me. NOTHING came near my line, which was fine so I could take care of a couple in our group who felt pretty yucky.

Within a couple of hours, we caught our limit of the big red drums – even had to through Michael’s second one back because it was over the limit. And then look, a maritime miracle: we caught these two being friends not brothers ♥️

As we made our way back to Capt Matt’s slip, we had a couple of observers… who quickly multiplied when we started unloading the fish.

That’s a whole lotta fish!

We learned a few new random bits of trivia to share: fish gills look like giant teeth, pelicans will try to swallow stuff even if they can’t, and if you don’t stab a fish in the eye before throwing the head in the water, they will float back up after a day or so due to gases.

Eight gallon ziplocs bags full of fish, we headed back to our little VRBO. After our adventure getting into this place, everything has been perfect! Everyone has their own room and we’ve gotten all of our clothes washed and ready for the rest of the trip.

The boys and I decided to check out the beach after lunch, but I’m not sure how they swam in this cold water!

After a dip in the hot tub (to thaw out), we had a home cooked dinner with veggies, and then Michael challenged us to a game of Monopoly (because he never loses).