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The day finally came for our short vacation
to Rockport, Texas, a fly fishing mecca on
the lower Gulf Coast. My plan was to fish
half a day with some friends from San Antonio
and spend the rest of the time visiting the
small art galaries in town and taking my wife
shopping at several shell shops. My friends
arrived the next morning and we took a short
ferry ride to Port Aransas to fish the jetties.
My friend Andy Dear told me there was a good
chance that we could see some tarpon in the
channel. Luck would have it, we didn't see any.
If I had, I wouldn't have been able to jump one.
I was fishing an 8 weight and using a shrimp
pattern tied on a size 4 hook. We were really
after sea trout. I did see several Ripley turtles
which I had never seen before in the wild.
After an hour of tossing line we decided to try
wade fishing the marshes. Andy spent the next
half hour showing me all the good spots and we
finally settled on one that looked fishy. Off
in the distance we could see two wade fishermen.
We parked the pickup near the bank, grabbed our
gear and started wading. After a few yards in
I started having trouble walking in the soft muck
while Andy and his friend appeared to be walking
on water. The years had taken their toll on this
old body...I fell three times trying to keep up
with my younger friends. I also forgot to put my
cell phone in a plastic bag. That cell phone is
now history.
After a while, Mike, Andy's friend, shouted,
"trout coming towards you at 11 o'clock." I
quickly turned to intercept the trout, fell
over again, swallowed my pride and commenced
to whip the water in the general direction of
the trout. I continued to cast and cast and
finally hooked something. Anybody know the
record for blue crab on a fly? By that time
it was really getting hot so we called it a
day. No fish but a good time had amongst friends.
Once back at the hotel we picked up my wife
and headed to a fine seafood restaurant. Over
a cold brew and some shrimp po-boys, Andy
apologized for not putting me on fish. I told
him it was ok but next time to take me to a cove
where I could at least fish standing up. We
enjoyed our lunch and my friends departed for
San Antonio.
The next couple of days I spent having some
quality time with my wife. She got to do her
shopping and I bought a couple of art pieces.
The fellow that owns the art gallery happened
to be a fly fisherman himself. He told me to
come back in the fall and we could do some
fishing together. He also diagramed a pattern
that he likes to use for redfish on a scrap
piece of paper. It turned out to be a Del
Merkin's crab. When the shop owner thanked me
for the purchase, a tall handsome fellow and
equally beautiful wife came over and they
introduced themselves. It happened to be
Larry Bozka, a very well known outdoor writer
and author in our part of the country. What
a treat.
One of the highlights of our trip, besides
being with friends and getting to meet Larry
and his wife, was dining at one of those
restaurants that serves food with sprigs of
vegetation sticking out of your food. While
driving down the main street I saw a restaurant
by the name of Aransa Zu. Being of Basque decent,
I interpreted the name to mean "a place of thorns."
We had to stop and eat there. Well it turned
out to be one of the best places that my wife
and I have ever gone to. I asked for flounder
which was not on the dinner menu and the chef
cooked a pecan encrusted flounder with ancho
mayo on one side and jalapeņo mango sauce on
the other. Another treat.
I did get to flyfish from the hotel pier at
night. Even caught a couple of trout which
I quickly released or they came off of the
hook by themselves. I didn't care...I was
having too much fun taking it easy. ~ Cheers, Ellis
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