On 20 April 11 Burt Rogers of Hollywood, Michael of Hollywood and Maurice from Clinton took off early from work and headed to Solomons Island for a fun fishing trip. The weather looked good and if all went well we should be able to get our limit in a timely fashion. Well we rushed because in my opinion we were running behind schedule for a fishing trip I usually like to be in the water at sunrise. This time I barely had the lines in by 10:30 am. Well with excitement I mentioned to Maurice (a 20 year Army Vet) that if all goes well within an hour we should get a pull down on the rods and right on time there went one of the rods. A green Tandem rig off of the planner board! Well I grabbed the rod off the top rod holder and handed it to the newbie at trolling and watched him struggle pulling in his nice 38 inch rockfish for his very first time! The look in his eyes when he saw the fish come to the surface next to the boat reminded me of myself when I first seen one of these cows. The disbelief I see in people when they realize how big and beautiful these fish are is very rewarding. Well within a half hour another pull down and once again I let Maurice reel it in. He said this one put up a good fight! Wow that was fun Maurice said! This one measured 38 inches also. Well I explained we could only keep one each this particular day so I started reeling in the rods and sure enough another one jumped on a line. Pulled it in and it also was 38 inches! Not bad for an hour and a half of fishing I’d say. Anyway Maurice said this was the biggest fish he had ever caught and wanted to know if we could go again! LOL! Anyway the season for trophy rockfish is open now until the middle part of May 2011 so if you are interested in catching a fish of a life time I would encourage you to give it a try. If you’re not too comfortable with doing all the work yourself call the charter boats nearest you and they will try to get you out there so that you too can catch a fish of a life time. Good luck and have a great spring season!
