Days 11-15, May 31 to June 4, Titusville, Florida

I am blessed. Not only do I have the most generous, kind, and loving wife who tolerates my wanderlust, but I also seem to have an angel sitting on my shoulder these days. I don’t know how much longer my good fortune will hold out, but I will always be grateful for what I’ve already had, and die happy.

As I write this, I am sitting on the balcony of a modest but beautiful little resort on the ocean side of Key Largo. A cool breeze is blowing through my hair and before me the sun is shining on a broad expanse of shallow water which, in angling parlance, is a fine-looking bonefish flat. When my friend Bill Nelson and I arrived this afternoon, having made a last-minute reservation for a room in which I had planned to spend the night on the sleep sofa, our kind host Debbie offered us an upgrade to the best suite in the resort, at the same low price. I’d like to think it was my charm, but probably it was Bill’s, or perhaps it was just the happy vibe we’re both throwing off after three of the most interesting, pleasant and rewarding days of fishing we’ve ever had.

Although I’ve said it many times, I’m not actually sure that a picture says a thousand words. But in this case? Well, take a look and decide for yourself:

That’s how it was the on upper St. Johns River in central Florida, where Bill and I roamed with Captain Paul Cave on Wednesday and Friday. Paul, an easygoing pirate with a genuine passion for fly fishing for bass, guided us to some of the most exotic and mysterious pools and bends we’ve ever seen. While big gators patrolled the depths across which we cast small popping flies, we tried not to be distracted by the possibility that we were ringing the dinner bell for one of those river monsters. Our reward? Dozens of bass ranging from 8 inches to 10 lbs. The cherry on the sundae was a cornucopia of wildlife – herons, egrets, bald eagles, ospreys, sweepers, stilts, and ducks, among many other birds, and river otters, and even a water moccasin, an extremely venomous snake that we feared even more than the gators. It was like fishing on another planet, intoxicating and dangerous. When I caught a small gar, and briefly hooked a three-foot-long gar, I started thinking that the planet isn’t even in our solar system.  Here's what a little gar looks like (that's the gar in the foreground and me holding it):

Here’s a 1.5-minute video montage Bill helped me put together that illustrates the nonstop action and fantastic scenery we witnessed on the St. Johns River:  http://youtu.be/kp8NhKdfDHc


In between the two days cruising with Captain Paul, we spent five hours on a late afternoon and evening with Captain Shane Ryan in the Ponce Inlet area, which was another strange planet entirely. Weather conditions for that trip weren’t ideal and it was tough to find the fish we wanted to target, but Shane put us on a big school of ladyfish and a couple of them burned our reels. Bill and I accomplished two things Shane had never seen before, although he’s been fishing in the area all his life: Bill caught a big sailcat on a fly, and I caught a 1-inch (that’s stretching it) pinfish on a fly. A sailcat is a type of catfish with beautiful fins, a rare catch on any lure. I had never heard of that species before I actually saw one. The pinfish I caught was the tiniest fish I’ve ever hooked and landed. How it got stuck on the hook is beyond me. We had a lot of laughs and talked about coming back in the winter when the redfish schools are abundant and visible.

I said I was blessed, and I truly am. As I was driving to the Orlando airport to pick up Bill before the above events occurred, I was contemplating the fact that I am getting to do exactly what I want to do from all the choices available to me, a luxury to be sure. But it also occurred to me that life can never be “perfect,” no matter what we choose, because it is human nature to always want more than one thing at the same time. I want to be home, sleeping in own bed. I want to be with my wife. I want to see my friends from home. I hope and plan to spend a lot of time doing all those things in my future. But for now I choose to travel and fish because for many years my ability to do that was very limited. Some people are paralyzed by choices, or they spend too much time thinking about the choices they didn’t make. I made my choices and I revel in them. Regrets and indecision are a waste of time.

We’re heading out to dinner soon. Last night we ordered Royal Red shrimp at Dixie Crossroads in Titusville, and they were the sweetest, best shrimp we ever tasted. I don’t know what we’re going to eat tonight but I’m 99% sure it’s going to taste great.