Due to real gusty winds, we took our beach cruisers down to the old 7 mile bridge on Tuesday and rode the 2 mile crossing over to Pigeon Key. The key was a camp setup in the early 1900s during the railway construction. An interesting tour guide showed us some of the original buildings, photos and history. Quite an amazing feat of engineering and determination to build the railway extension from homestead to Key West.
The windy weather finally moved on after a couple days, so we were able to get back out on the boat on Wednesday. Ventured out to the reef line in search of yellowtail, but the day started out quite slow. Moved around to a couple spots with limited success other than a 23″ grouper which Cindy caught, but 1″ short of the minimum size regulation..
Made a final stop in a bit shallower on the reef and started chumming again and the action finally turned on for us. Ended the day keeping a nice mutton snapper and 4 yellowtails. Also caught a bunch of other species such as kingfish, spanish mackerel and bonito.
Nice mutton caught on a bottom rod with a live ballyhoo
Headed back to the house around 5 to get cleaned up and enjoyed a spectacular fresh fish dinner with salad and grits. Filleted the fish on the half shell which works out great when grilling it. Basically just means leaving the skin on, then grilling it skin-side down minimizing any loss of meat in the grill grates.
Snapper dinner for a few days
Fish awaiting their cleaning by two chefs
Chris, Cindy, Charlie and Cecily’s Adventure Blog 