Chris Colbert

I had just got out of school and was one day away from turning 15 when I got to go fishing with Ryan Collins. Ryan is my cousin, and for years we've been sharing ideas about where to fish and what to use, but we had never gone fishing together.

I was fine with occasionally sharing spots and ideas, but earlier this spring we crossed paths and finally set a date to go fishing.

I let Ryan decide the place and time for many reasons, but mainly because he’s been fishing since I was a baby (and maybe even before I was born).

We eventually decided on a spot and debated about either going in the morning or the evening, but considering it was Father's Day, we decided to go in the morning to get it out of the day's way.

More...

4:45am June 18th, 2017

Our meet time was set for 4:45am, and all my gear was ready to go. All I needed now was a good night's rest before a morning of fishing, however when I woke up the next morning, I immediately knew something was wrong, but what could it be?

I went through the procedures:

The problem was - I had overslept!

Fortunately I had stayed over close to where Ryan and I had planned to meet at 4:45AM, so I thought to myself...

"If I run, I can still make it."

So I started running with all of my gear, and once I reached the beach I saw Ryan down the shoreline and realized he was not that far ahead of me. Phew!

We soon started fishing together and as usual, the fish did not bite right away.

Here is a basic overview of our situation...

Conditions

It was a perfect morning, at least for fishing. There were thick clouds but no rain, the wind was calm and the ocean was too. We had sweatshirts and raincoats just in case it started to rain (which it did later on).

The air temperature was nice and warm and the water temperature was cool. There was seaweed in close to shore, so it would have been easier if I had waders because I could have walked beyond the weed like Ryan did.

Gear

Ryan and I were using different setups for our rods and reels but they both worked great. I was using a Penn Battle with a 9 foot rod and Ryan was using a VR175 Van Staal reel with this 9ft Lamiglas rod.

Lures

I used a Cotton Cordell pencil popper to start, but when Ryan landed the first fish on a Danny plug, I switched over to a Danny plug as well.

As for all of our other gear, well Ryan pretty much had everything we'd ever need (cameras, first aid kit etc.).

6 Stripers to Start my Summer!

Now that you know what we were working with, I will tell you how everything played out. We caught 6 fish altogether, trying new spots along the way.

The fish fought real well for their size. The average size bass was 20 inches, but they fought like 30 inches. We started at one spot and slowly worked our way down the shoreline while fishing and discovering new things along the way. For example, some spots were hot with fish, while others were dead.

After we finished our fishing journey it was time to head home. I decided to jump off the rock I was fishing from, but my foot got stuck and that is when my rod went straight into a big rock and snapped!. Oh well, I guess I learned my lesson to always take it slow and be safe rather than sorry.

Overall this trip was a success!

We caught fish, explored new grounds, and I broke my rod. Okay the rod breaking was not a success, but the story is.

Now that I know how to fish Danny plugs I will be fishing them a lot more often this summer, and hopefully I will catch my own "monster" striper.