Its been one of the driest springs on record in Florida but its still a wet place! It has lakes round every corner and of course its surrounded by water! The fishing in Florida is wonderful and you only have to turn on the TV on any day of the week to find programs featuring lucky fishermen landing the fish of a lifetime from a Florida Charter boat.

Yes - but I'd never get away with a fishing trip to Florida!

Are you sure? We're not! Let me tell you why. Some of the very best sea fishing in Florida is to be had “on the flats”. Now while the most famous flats (the ones you see on TV) are in the Florida Keys, the great thing is that there's a lot more to flats fishing than the keys. On the Gulf coast, there are thousands of square miles of flats to fish. OK, you're not going to find record-breaking but you will find lots and lots of fun! Its the same on the east coast in the Indian river miles and miles of great fishing.

Dean and I went fishing with Capt. John on the east coast near Crystal River where you can swim with manatees. We had great fun in the cool weather of March and the wind didn't help! We boated about 40 fish – redfish, and speckled trout mostly. On a variety of baits, fresh shrimp, and jigs. Good sport with every fish bringing a real smile to our faces.

And then, about 4:30 - later than most charter captains will find themselves on the water - Dean got THE hit. Well, we were fishing with 12lb line and fresh shrimp on 5ft rods -



light tackle. Dean is a very experienced carp fisherman and well used to coaxing large carp to the net. However, this was different! This was clearly a non-compliant and large fish. He was only hooked in 4 ft of water but we could tell from the size of the swirl on the top of the water that this fish was old and experienced. He used the tide that was now really beginning to run to drag the boat close to and eventually over a sandbar!

We got sight of the fish after about 30 minutes. The water was pretty cloudy due to the running tide but at last we got confirmation that this was not a large stingray but a Black Drum. Eventually we boated it and then came to weigh it. Unfortunately, we'll never know how heavy it really was since our scale bottomed out at 30lbs – its maximum. However, the experience and the photo is what we all took home!

What I forgot to tell you is that while we were fishing, the girls had gone shopping in Orlando. We had rented a really great vacation rental home near Disney (backing onto the golf course) and only 5 minutes walk from a fishing dock with BBQ area!