A report from SteveL for mikescatchreport.com
Ed and Matt dragged me out of the house to fish Sunday mid morning. We went to fish a spot and accessed the beach by cutting through a right of way between a golf course fence and a private property wall. It was weird walking on the golf course and every now and then waiting for people to tee off. The whole time I expected some security person to show up and chase us off but that never happened. Ed just laughed about it because he'd done this before.
Anyway, they walked way out to cast inside of the reef and I stood about a 100 yard off to the right and blind-casted into a deep pocket. I cast around that area for an hour then got a subtle strike that slowly picked up steam.
I watch my line angling sharply to the right with the reel whining at a high pitched scream. I held on and watched the backing disappear. The fish must have run well over a 170 yards.
The fish finally stops and I started the long retrieve of all that line. It felt like I was reeling in dead weight the whole time but every once in a while it would give a kick and take line. I got almost all of the backing in and saw my fly line after about 10 minutes and then everything goes slack. The fish was unhooked.
It had to have been one of the largest I've hooked in awhile and maybe the biggest. Not even the 8-pounders fought like that.
Sigh--just another fish story now.