Our first charter of the year and it was downright nasty out there. We almost cancelled the trip after peeking at the inlet a few times but I’m glad we didn’t. We were one of only 8 boats out there in a 25 mile radius and the rest of the boats were over 70 feet long, all party boats. After a scary ride through the inlet waves we made a left turn towards the North and there were schools of bait as far as the eye could see, but no fish chasing them. We tried a little bit of everything, swimming live baits, casting lures, trolling spoons, and jigging. At the advice of a good friend I tried something I never usually do, drifting with chunks of dead bait and that turned out to be the ticket. We landed only two fish out of three hooked but they were the right species, Stripers. We’re all eating Striped Bass tonight and it was a great way to kick off the season, we took the risk and reaped the rewards. There was so much life on the water today, schools of Menhaden everywhere with birds bombing away on them. If the weather holds up for us I’m predicting another bountiful spring on Archangel, things are setting up beautifully and the Bass are right on time.
