One of the highlights of my fishing year for the past few years has been the annual trip to Venice, LA fishing primarily for redfish. This trip started years ago with a group of men organized by Johnny Cace. Johnny came to Longview from south Louisiana and was a successful restauranteur for years. The restaurant is closed now but his descendants still sell some of their more famous recipes as take-out dishes.
The group Johnny started was called the Delta Fishing Club and the remnants of this group still make regular trips to the mouth of the Mississippi River to continue the tradition. Originally the group stayed at a fish camp owned by the Cace family but it was destroyed in a hurricane. Now we stay in a VRBO – can you spell wifi???
I learned about this group shortly after #ShoppingBeauty and I got married and thought it sounded fun. For several years when I was still working, I would get a call, usually on Saturday morning, asking if I could go on the fishing trip – tomorrow. “I’d love to go but I really should give my boss a little notice before I take a week of vacation.”
One year, #ShoppingBeauty and I were invited to go on the couples weekend. Now, the Delta Fishing Club has traditionally been a male only event, Sunday to Friday. But for one trip a year the guys would extend their trip through the weekend and invite any spouses that were interested. #ShoppingBeauty really likes to fish and we enjoyed our weekend with another couple on their boat.
Finally, the invitation came early enough and I had vacation time so I said yes. Thus began my love of inshore fishing. I look forward to this trip every year. This year the trip is November 10th – 15th. Now if you know anything about anything you know that those dates are the highlight of the year for another reason – THE RUT!!! This might be a harder decision but this year I haven’t seen any super bucks on my game cameras and the really old guys need the #OldManInTheWoods to load and unload the boat.
I started something new this year to get ready for the trip. I had heard about Salt Strong before and watched some of their videos to learn new knots, etc. This year, I signed up as a member and really have enjoyed the community, reading about what worked and didn’t work for other members. One of the things I learned from these guys that really helped me last year was using artificial lures like Gulp! Shrimp. For the first few years we generally only fished with dead shrimp on ice but now I use artificial in most circumstances.
So, now my tackle box is pretty much stocked, the Action Packer is ready to load and it’s time to start working out the details. Last night I sat around the fire with #OldAg and #TSip planning our meals for the week. #OldAg is the boat captain; it is his boat after all. #TSip has dubbed himself first mate. They were the breakfast crew for the original Delta Fishing Club so they’ve done quite well for themselves in the promotion department.
All that remains is the grocery shopping adventure. A few years ago I offered to help with the grocery shopping. #TSip and another member of the crew, #HeadDoc, had always handled the shopping so my idea was to just go along, maybe fetch a few things, and help with the loading and unloading. Now you know that I’m married to #ShoppingBeauty and when I go to the grocery store with her she has a list, usually with the appropriate coupons paper-clipped to the list. The list will be organized by grocery store because don’t you know that Kroger has pork chops on sale this week for $1.99/lb and Albertson’s has chicken breast for $1.69 (actual prices from this week’s add beside her chair).
Well, shopping with the crew was a learning experience for me. I had never spent four hours in a grocery store before! We started at the produce section on the north end of the store just like normal – everybody starts in produce right? We got about 4 aisles over, canned vegetables as I recall, and realized we needed to go back to produce for onions. We continued this 3 aisles forward and 2 back routine all the way to the meat section where we realized we’d forgotten potatoes. Just give me the dad-gum list!!?!
I survived that trip and last year got promoted to head cook which meant I got to make the list. That list made #ShoppingBeauty blush – done in Excel with a column to sort by section. 30 minutes in-and-out! This year #TSip said “Why don’t we shop together?” Just shoot me now!!
Hope I survive till November 10th…