First Time at Rudee Inlet

It's been a busy month, and it's going to continue to be busy for me for a couple more months coming up.  It has also been killing me to see pictures of other anglers getting big migrating stripers earlier this month, and I wanted to get out and catch some big fish too.  So with the one weekend I have free this month, I originally made plans to go to Cape Henlopen State Park to try to see if the big bluefish would be back from last year.  However, thunderstorms and strong winds forecasted for the weekend put a damper on those plans.  Luckily, I had a plan B to check out Rudee Inlet in Virginia Beach.  After some back and forth of emails between some of my fishing buddies, Dao agreed to join me at Rudee Inlet on Saturday.

Although I have been wanting to try fishing Rudee Inlet for several years now, this was my first time going there.  I didn't have any idea of how large a body of water it was, or how to fish it, or anything.  I just had other fishing reports to rely on, most helpful of which was Comeonfish's youtube videos.  He had been to Rudee Inlet several times this month, and did pretty well in catching speckled trout, bluefish, and even a puppy red drum.  I've read reports of flounder being in the area too, so I also was looking forward to catching some flounder as well.  It's neat that you have so many options in one body of water.  With those options, I had the following lures packed and ready: soft plastics for red drum, mirrolures for speckled trout, x-raps and bucktails for bluefish, and gulp mullets for flounder.

Shellfish at low tide.

Launching out of the boat ramp, I was surprised at the scenery that I was presented with.  The place seemed kind of marshy with tall trees past the shoreline.  It reminded me a little of Mattawoman creek or something.  Anyway, I hoped to start out by catching some speckled trout or bluefish, so I put out some x-raps and immediately began to troll parallel to the shoreline to see what I could hook up with.  I noticed that the water by the shore would slowly slope down from 1 to 4 feet, and then drop quickly to around 8 feet and continue falling deeper to 30 feet or so.  I tried to follow the little ledge as I trolled along.  Not after too long I hooked up with a small bluefish that spit the hook before I could get him to the boat, but it was still good to see that there were fish in there!  Unfortunately, that was actually the only action I got for most of the morning.

I wanted to explore the rest of the inlet before committing to fishing any area, so I followed the shoreline all the way around lake Rudee, into lake Wesley, and then through the mouth of the inlet to check out the ocean.  I didn't hook into a single fish that whole area, and didn't see other boaters, kayakers or shore anglers catch anything either.  One cool thing that happened in the morning was kayaking next to a school of dolphins.  I was just pedaling through Lake Wesley, and all was quiet when I heard a big crash in the water behind me.  I thought something was thrown into the water, but I later realized it was the sound of the dolphin coming up and blowing air out of its blowhole.

The scenery at lake Rudee.

I jigged some gulp mullets by the inlet for a little while with no luck, after which I decided to head back toward the boat ramp to continue looking for the speckled trout, red drum or bluefish.  From watching Joe's videos, I could tell that he was catching fish by the marshy areas, and not in the busier, populated areas of the rest of the lake.  After returning to the launch area, I really felt like the shoreline would be the most likely place for the trout or red drum to be, so I proceeded to spend the next hour or so casting mirrolures and jigs to the shoreline.  I caught a couple dink striped bass, but that was all I had to show for my efforts.  All the while, Dao and Paul (another kayaker who joined us for the day) were trolling large soft plastics in the middle of the lake and catching bluefish pretty consistently.  I feel like these guys have got the kayak trolling technique down pretty good.  Wherever they are, they can always catch fish trolling.

30" bluefish.

I eventually gave up on trying to catch anything by jigging, and joined my trolling buddies.  I started out using a light jighead, and a shallow diving x-rap to troll through the middle of the lake.  Dao gave me a pointer that the fish were deeper, and that he was using some heavier jig heads than he typically would use.  So I switched things up to a yozuri crystal minnow that dove a little deeper, and also to a 3/8oz jighead for my 6" soft plastic paddle tail.  That switch seemed to make all the difference.  I finally started boating bluefish, including a nice big 30" bluefish that really gave a workout on the drag of my Penn Battle 3000.  The fight he gave was a lot like the fish we caught at Cape Henlopen last year.  I've gotten my big bluefish fix for the year.  Haha.

Beautiful day!  Dao's headed to stretch his legs on the beach.

After getting a few bluefish on our stringers, Dao and I decided to go back to the inlet to jig for flounder, so we pedaled back over to the inlet and jigged our gulp mullets by the bridge pilings and the channel through the inlet.  Unfortunately, flounder fishing was very slow for everyone as far as we could tell.  We gave it a go for about an hour before giving up and going back to the lake.  We proceeded to troll for bluefish a little while longer, as the wind picked up.  Dao hooked into his own chopper bluefish, which he unfortunately lost to a bad knot.  Let that be a lesson to all!  Don't skimp on the knot, even if you're tying it on the water.

I didn't expect to bring home a fish that large...

By about 2:30, we headed in to pack it up and head home.  There was only a little bit of traffic on the HRBT, but traffic was light after that.  I got home by 7:00, unloaded my gear, and filleted the 4 fish that I brought home.  The kids had a kick out of playing with the big bluefish's tail before I cleaned it.  I grilled the big one the next evening with some salt, pepper, mayonnaise and old bay seasoning.  It was pretty good!  Actually, I think anything cooked on a charcoal grill tastes good...

She's almost as big as the fish

Reflecting back on the day, I have a couple thoughts.  THANK GOODNESS FOR A HOBIE!  I don't know if I would have had enough energy to last the entire day with my paddle kayak on my first salt-water trip of the year.  I especially don't think I would have ventured through the inlet and back to the lake twice.  Also, Monster drinks work pretty well to keep me awake, but the crash at the end is brutal.  I don't know how some of these older guys are able to do 1-day trips down to Virginia Beach.  Even though I didn't catch any speckled trout or flounder, I had fun catching bluefish with some friends.  I think I would go back to Rudee again if I were given the chance.

July Meet & Greet - Lowe's Wharf

It has been a long and busy first-half of the year.  Baby Ruth arrived in March, and we moved into our new-to-us home in May.  Even if I wanted to go fishing, I felt guilty about it with all that was going on.  Things are settling down now, and I've gone fishing here and there during the past month, but haven't had time to write about them...I may get to them later, or maybe report on all of them at once in a single report.  Anyway, one of my friends insisted that I start reporting on my trips again, so I hope I can keep this up again!

This trip was a Meet & Greet with the MKF gang at Poplar's Island, launching out of Lowe's Wharf.  I think this has been the largest gathering outside of the CBKA tournaments that I've seen.  It was fun meeting old buddies, and meeting new people.  Another special part of this trip was that I got to spend time with my dad.  His first exposure to kayak fishing was at Pt. Lookout last year, and I've been wanting to take him fishing again.  I also wanted him to meet some of the other folks from the forum, so that he knows the kind of people that I'm fishing with (My parents think I'm nuts for meeting up with random people from the internet to fish).

My dad with the sun rising over the marina behind him.

My dad and I left the house around 4AM, and arrived at the Lowe's Wharf ramp a little after 6AM.  There were already a handful of kayakers unloading their cars by the time we got there.  There were more to come later, and in total I think there were over 30 kayakers at this meet up.  I chatted with a few familiar faces, and was out on the water with my dad probably a little after 6:30AM.  I gave the Ocean Kayak Prowler 13 to my dad to paddle today, while I paddled in my Tarpon 100.  I was slightly nervous about how difficult it would be to paddle a shorter, wider kayak...but it tracked fine and I did a lot of paddling.

My dad and me trying to catch spot. (Photo Credit: Mark)

I had never fished at Poplar Island before, and didn't have much time to do research before the trip...so the simple plan I had was to use fish bites to catch some spot, and to use spot later for bluefish or striped bass.  I also brought some raw shrimp to try to catch some croakers.  So the first item of the day was to catch some silly spot!  I remembered how easy it was to catch some during last year's CBKA tournament, where I quickly found them in 4 feet of water.  However, I had the most difficult time catching them this time.  I tried water at 4 ft, then 6 ft, 8 ft, 10 ft....eventually, I heard someone on the radio (Frogsauce from the MKF forum) mention that he was catching spot left and right.  What the heck?  I asked for his location, and he shared that he was smack in the middle of the channel in 15+ feet of water.  Alright!  Time to change location.

I wouldn't say the spot fishing was fast and easy at the new location, but it certainly was better.  Soon enough I caught 6 spot on fish bites blood worms, and also on some live bloodworm that I got from a forum member I met, Dao.  Most of the spot were on the large side for live-lining, and I also got a surprise croaker in the mix on some shrimp that I tried out.  No matter, though...big bait = big fish, right?  Also, the bigger spot actually felt larger than they really are.  They won't pull much drag, but they do give up a feisty little fight.  My dad fished with me here too, and I think he actually had fun catching spot.  He ended up catching a bunch more spot than I did, which we took home for dinner.

So many boats....

I was under the impression that the fleet of boats to the north of us were live-lining for stripers, so I planned with my dad to split up for a bit while I checked out the rocky shoreline of Poplar Island, and then to meet him towards the boats to try for some striped bass.  I later found out that those boats were actually catching spot to use as bait for live-lining elsewhere.  Anyway, I started my long paddle toward the island, trolling an X-Rap behind me the entire way.  I didn't get any hits the entire paddle, but I was hopeful, because I saw several large pods of baitfish that were swimming along the surface.  I tried fishing my X-Rap through the schools of fish, but to no avail...

The tide going out on the rocks of Poplar Island.

I finally made it to the rocks, and was surprised by how shallow the water was around there.  It was 3-4 feet deep, and there were submerged boulders scattered around away from the wall of rocks.  It is nice to have a paddle kayak where you don't have to worry about submerged rocks!  Anyway, I worked my way along the rock wall, casting my X-Rap close to shore (maybe within a foot or two of the rocks), and swimming it back toward me.

So close...

After a few minutes of this, I actually had a strike!  I pulled it in, and I estimate it was about 15 inches...I didn't take a picture of it, but it was a little smaller than another fish I caught along the rocks later.  I did get a picture of that one, and measured him at 17 inches.  It was so disappointing to see the fish on my ruler, coming juuuust short of the legal limit.  I really wanted to take a rockfish home for dinner, so it was very hard to let him go.  By this time, it was around 10:30AM, and I wanted to meet up with my dad to try to do some live-lining for rockfish before we headed in for lunch.

Well, I turned around to paddle towards the boats and all I could see was the picture I posted above.  How am I supposed to find my dad????  He didn't have a cell phone, he didn't have a radio, my radio was just about out of battery, and I didn't see a single kayak in the midst of those boats.  There was a boat within a short paddle distance from me, so I went over and politely asked the people fishing on it to help me look for my dad.  Luckily someone on the boat had a pair of binoculars, and while he couldn't make out distinct features, he could see a yellow kayak out on the other side of the channel, not really near the armada of boats.  I am really grateful for those boaters, because I did not even notice the kayak until they pointed it out to me.  I thanked the people for their help and paddled to the yellow kayak.  Thank goodness, as I got closer, I could see a dark figure on the kayak with a wide brim hat, which my dad was wearing.  I was glad he was okay, and told him about how I had a difficult time finding him.  He thought I was overreacting because he said that he could see me the entire time.  Well!  Next time I take someone fishing, I'm not splitting from him.  The funny thing is, that when I left him, my dad was preparing a rod for live-lining for rock.  When I found him, he was fishing for spot again.  haha!

Spot!

By this time, all the spot in my bucket were dead, because I pulled it out of the water to reduce drag as I was paddling to and from the island.  I had been paying attention to the radio the whole day to see if anyone else caught any rockfish, and no one had...so I gave up on catching a keeper rockfish, and just rigged up my rods with top-bottom rigs, and fished for spot with my dad. We ended up with a cooler full of spot, and started the long paddle in.

Before we started heading in, I switched paddles with my dad so that he wouldn't get fatigued as much.  I took the heavier paddle, and gave him my Werner Camano.  With a longer kayak, and lighter paddle, I thought we'd be able to paddle at the same pace.  However, no matter how slow a pace I tried to keep, I was steadily paddling faster than my dad.  I'm really surprised by the speed of the Tarpon, and also by the difference that paddle technique makes!  I tried to convince my dad to paddle with his waist and core, but I could see him paddling with his arms.

Dinner is served...

We got back to the ramp, loaded the kayaks, had lunch at the marina with the gang, and went home.  When we got home, I let my boys hold the fish and play with them for a while, and then I cleaned and filleted some of them for dinner.  I told my boys to thank grandpa for all the fish he brought home today, and they even asked for seconds during dinner.

Pt Lookout Meet & Greet

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I've made a lot of trips to Pt. Lookout this year.  Even more than when I actually lived in Maryland!  Well, today was the monthly Meet & Greet with the kayak anglers from MKF, and it was held at Pt. Lookout State Park.  

Rise and shine!

The planned starting time for the event was 7AM, but I arrived a little earlier at 6AM to catch the sunrise and also to take a nap in order to rest from the 2.5 hour drive from home.  I snapped a couple pictures from the causeway, and headed to the launch area where I was surprised to see a few forum members already unloading their cars.  I greeted hello to them and proceeded to take my power nap in my car.  30 minutes later, I unloaded my kayak and headed out to the water.  This M&G was supposed to be pretty large, with up to 30 kayakers confirmed for the event - while on the water, it certainly seemed like it was close to 30....you could see at least one kayak in any direction you looked out on the water.

The Kayak launch site.

On my way out to the light house, I trolled a single Yozuri Crystal Minnow behind me hoping to catch something on the way.  I actually didn't have any other plan of attack...I intended to troll most of the day unless we found a school of fish that wanted to play with some jigs.  The winds were pretty light, the air was crisp but not too cold, and the sun was starting to peak above the lighthouse.  It was a most beautiful sight, so I took out my camera to try to get a nice shot of the lighthouse.  As soon as I stopped paddling and went to reach my camera I heard my rod bouncing behind me.  My first catch of the day came within the first 15 minutes of the trip!  Today was going to be another banner day!

First catch of the day!

The striper was 13 inches - 5 inches away from legal size - so I quickly snapped a picture, let him go, and proceeded to paddle toward the lighthouse.  There were already a few yak'ers right beyond the lighthouse pitching lures at the sand bar that extends far out from the lighthouse.  I joined in by trolling alongside the sandbar with my trusty Yozuri, but did not get any love from the fish.  After a while of trolling there, I moved on to trolling elsewhere, and then another place, and then another... I kept this up for the next 5 hours with nothing to show for it...  I did have a hit late in the day in about 17 feet of water, but I missed it and he never came back for seconds on my lure.

You know fishing was slow when I take more pictures of scenery than fish....

Unfortunately, most everyone else at the Meet & Greet had similar experiences.  I was actually lucky to have caught a single fish!  Today was not to be the banner day that I expected...but it was still nice to be out on the water, and it was good to see old buddies and meet new friends from the MKF forum.

The HRBT, The Gamble & The Kindness of Strangers

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About a month ago I got an invitation from some buddies on the MKF forum to go fishing in Virginia Beach this weekend.  I joked that he must have sent the advanced notice because I've had to decline the past several trips because my weekend had already been booked with family stuff.  It's tough getting out when you have a wife and two flounders...I mean kids.  Actually, we also have a third flounder on the way...it'll come just in time for Spring Trophy season.  I have mixed feelings about that... haha.

Anyway, the plan was to fish for some tautog at Kiptopeke State Park, but since it is such a rarity for me to be down in Virginia Beach to fish, and since I was off work on Friday for some volunteer duties, I decided that I would head down Friday afternoon to try again for my first light line striper.  Leading up to Friday, things were not looking very good at all.  It had been raining with heavy winds all week at home, and the same was forecasted for Virginia Beach.  I have a coworker who's a meteorologist by training, and he also recommended staying home - suggesting there would be 25-30 mph winds.  That really bummed me out, because I was looking forward to this trip for a month!

I spent my evenings looking at the weather and wind forecasts for the weekend, and the forecasts kept going back and forth.  It looked manageable, then looked down right dangerous, and back to manageable.  Finally, early Friday afternoon I made my decision...I'm going.  Whenever I get scared away by wind, I miss out on great fishing....so I'm going to tough this one out, and hopefully have an awesome trip.  It was a total gamble.  I texted my fishing pals, and told them I'm going down and that I would report the conditions to them.  That helped to finally push one of them, Mike, over the fence and join me.  We were to meet at HRBT that evening to fish the lightline.

Where is everyone?

Five hours later, I arrived at the HRBT.  I held my breath as I crossed the bridge, hoping to see calm waters...  I was pleasantly surprised to see that the waves weren't bad at all, and the wind was pretty light - maybe I made the right decision!  But then, I arrived at Willoughby public boat ramp to an empty parking lot.  I actually drove past it at first because I didn't recognize it without all the trucks and trailers!  I thought to myself "Where is everyone?  Do they know something that I don't know?  What am I doing here...?"  It's a good thing Mike was going to join me, because the empty parking lot would have sent me home if I were alone.  Mike joined me soon after with his awesome dog, Mojo.  We unpacked and at around 8PM we headed out in a slight breeze to the light line with high hopes for an epic night of fishing.

For this trip, I wanted to focus most of my efforts on catching a light line striper...which meant that I have to find these guys first.  Early in the evening, there was a bit of current, so it should have been prime time for hungry fish to be prowling the surface.  I paddled along the light line in the shadow of the bridge looking for dark shadows under the water.  It actually didn't take long to spot my first striper.  At first I thought I was just imagining it, but it actually wasn't very shy and I was able to get pretty close to it to see it clearly.  I tried pitching a mirrolure, some unweighted soft plastics, and some floating crankbaits...and while it did swim in the direction of the baits I tossed, it wasn't interested and eventually disappeared.  I thought light lining was supposed to be easy!  At least anyone who's successfully fished the light line makes it seem that way...

It's kind of hard to get a good picture of the light line...

For the rest of the tide change, I patrolled the light line and saw some fish here and there, but didn't catch anything.  Then the slack tide came, and Mike and I just jigged the bottom to see what we might find.  Mike actually did pretty well by catching some flounder, grey trout, and a small speckled trout.  Me...I caught absolutely nothing.  The whole slack tide, I was skunked.

The current started up again around 1AM, and I went back to patrolling the light line to find my first keeper striper of the year (that's right, I haven't caught a keeper yet this year).  Though you could tell the current was there, it wasn't really ripping.  I had read that you want to find the stripers where the current is strong.  I paddled around to find some areas where the water ran stronger, but didn't travel far before I gave up.  It was getting late, and I wasn't seeing any more fish on the light line so I was about to give up when....another kayaker paddled by on his way back to the ramp and told Mike that he had caught some fish further out toward the bridge tunnel.  What?! Really??  I paddled off toward where he came from with renewed hope.  I came to catch my first light line striper...I must catch one!

As I got closer to the tunnel, I noticed that the current was much stronger.  I paddled a little toward the light line facing the current and was surprised to see the water churning so much.  Maybe this is what I should have been looking for all along.  So as not to spook any fish, I paddled in and out between the rows of pilings to inspect the light line for any signs of fish...and finally, I saw them.  There was a pair of stripers sitting by the edge of the shadow, waiting for some food.  I pitched a pink and yellow Mirrorlure toward them but overshot them to the left a good ways, and didn't get any interest.  I reeled it back in and tried again, and watched as the two fish swam toward my lure this time.  They disappeared under the water, but seconds later my rod bent over and my drag was singing.  Fish on!

My first HRBT striper!

This fish was strong and it did not want to come up.  It went around the pilings a couple of times which had me a little worried that my braid would rip as it rubbed against the pilings.  It was also kind of difficult to paddle in the current to follow the fish and unwrap the line.  However, I finally pulled the sucker away from the structure, and he pulled me over to the other span of the bridge where I finally got him to the surface.  I pulled the fish aboard, and happily had my first light line striper.  A healthy 24" fat beauty.  This fish was shorter than the 28" striper I caught earlier this year during C&R at the Susquehanna Flats, but it was much fatter and stronger.  That was a fun fight.

Look how high the tide was.

I tried for a little while longer to find some more stripers, but there was another boat nearby and I didn't want to encroach on his area.  It also was around 2AM by this point, and I was pretty tired, so Mike and I headed back to the ramp.  Back at the ramp, we were surprised to see that the water came up really high.  That was kind of interesting to see the piers next to the ramps submerged in water.  The water also came right up to the point where the ramp starts.

So Mike and I finished packing up and rested up for part 2 of our trip.  I only got one fish the entire night, but it was a doozy (enough of a doozy to write a whole blog post about a single fish)!  I have to thank the kind stranger who tipped us off about the stripers for my fish.  I would have felt so defeated if I had to paddle back with my second skunk at the HRBT...

So at the end of the night, I thought that my gamble of coming down to Virginia Beach had paid off.  The Kiptopeke trip will just be icing on the cake...but little did I know that the fishing at Kiptopeke the next day would be the highlight of the trip....to be detailed in the next post.