I made the drive this past weekend to Matagorda. The plan was to fish the 2 mile rig then head out to the new artificial reef about 9.8 miles out. I arrived about 4:30 and enough time to make a quick trip to the rig and check out the water color. There was a pretty good breeze and a little chop but my Hobie TI cut right through and was at the rig in 20 minutes. I immediately hooked up and landed the first of 5 jacks. My arm was tired after that. Then I landed a small SMac then headed to the beach. That SMac was dinner on the beach. The camping was pretty good with a full moon, my hammock tied to the truck and trailer, the beach traffic was pretty light also. BTW, you need 4WD to get down the beach 6.5 miles unless the tide is out pretty good. There were some stretches of deep sand.
Saturday AM I got up and made coffee under the bright moon and some breakfast. Soon as the sun came up the T-storms got started so I sat on the beach for a bit until the lighting calmed down. Off to the rig about 9:30 and I could see several other yakers making their way out there also. When I arrived there were two other kayakers there and one was hooked up then there were six kayakers and 4 hooked up, all were jacks. I had one jack then the proximity alarm on the rig started going off. I left for the 7-8 mile rigs as those jacks were dominating the scene, plus 6 kayaks around one rig is a bit much for me. The new reef was only another 2-3 miles out but with a late start and the T-storms still around I decided not to go out there. I will be back though later in Aug or Sep to make that trip.
As soon as I arrived at the first of 12 rigs I hooked up, first king of many for the day. I would no more than release one and another was on. Most were all small <40” but you would reel one in and could see 4-6 cousins underneath them. The water color was not blue but a deep green with decent clarity. There were no kayakers and only 1 power boat at a rig about a mile away. I only fished two of the rigs and kept busy until my arms were tired. There were some healthy T-storms onshore along the beach to just inland, a lot of lighting and a lot of noise but none offshore in my vicinity. I made back to the beach a bit before 4pm and all the other yakers were gone.
One of many. I lost track of the number but probably 9-11 total for the day.
My tracks
SYOTW,
Earl