Skeet’s Beat – Back to Work

I guess I should probably update you all on a couple of trips since I’ve been gone so much and haven’t been here to do a blog. But, everyone needs a break every once in a while, you know?

I’ll start with my Golden Dorado trip to Argentina with Roy Halladay and Chris Carpenter, and his brother-in-law. Compared to last year on the Amazon with the peacock bass and the anaconda attacked native fisherman, this trip was quiet. But, it wasn’t quiet on the fishing front.

Steve Yatomi from Adventure Travel Alliance had told me about the golden dorado and said they were some of the best fighting fish I would ever experience, so we decided to go to Argentina. I had Wright & McGill Co. make some special Golden Dorado models of my signature rods and we headed to Argentina.

Steve was right, those things will whip your ass. They have these hard, bony, toothy mouths that make penetrating with hooks really hard, so the hook to land ratio is really not great, but when you do, it was worth all of the lost fish. I caught a bunch, mainly on topwater because I was having so much fun watching these big fish blow up on six inch topwater baits. The landing ratio on those was even worse, but so exciting.

It was a lot like fishing for bass on the Tennessee River lakes. Really, it was like fishing below the dam on Pickwick, the fish positioned around eddies in the current below the dam, and it made me feel comfortable fishing for them, because it was a lot like how I fish for bass on the Elite Series.

My two biggest fish were over 40 and over 50 pounds and they go airborne during the fight. All I can say was that the fight was unbelievable, I can’t really find a way to describe it.

The lodge at La Zona was awesome, and the food was great, and it was really cool to hear those whining pitchers complain about how much the fishing was hurting them more than their off season workouts. Poor babies.

After I got back, our family went on our Mexican vacation, instead this year, we went to Cancun, and it was much different than what we are used to. Cancun is much more commercialized as it is a huge tourist area. So, while we stayed at a resort, we took a ferry and stayed on the island Isla Mujeres for a couple of days so that we could get some quiet time of our own on the beach.

The island was excellent with sandy beaches and light breezes, like a little Key West really, and it was there that I did my only fishing during the trip. I took a little Wright & McGill Co. pack rod and one of my victory reels and fished off the beach with 8-pound-test Berkley Nanofil and caught two little toothy snakey looking fish about eight to 10 inches long, but that was all the fishing that I did.

Overall, we had a great time, got in some relaxation and fun, but now it’s back to work. The Classic is only a little ways away, so it’s time for working out and organizing tackle.

Vacation’s over, time to get back to work.

If you want to see pictures of my fishing trip in Argentina, check out my Skeet Reese Professional Angler Facebook Page or my Twitter Feed