Telling my Dad and Uncle, George A Pyland, better known as “Unkie” about the great luck that Gary, Vic and I had at the Quarantine Station this past Saturday, primed them to offer to go with me on the coming Friday. One problem, both men were retired, but I had a great, sales job and needed to work. But, as someone famous once said, “There’s always room for ice cream”, so there’s always a way to slip off for fishing!

Slipping off turned out not to be a problem so, as before, we launched my “new”, second boat at Pleasure Island Fish and Bait, cruised under the two causeway bridges, under Pelican Island bridge, through Galveston Harbor and anchored up on the east side of the Quarantine Station. The tide was running in bringing clear, green, Gulf water, the wind was light out of the southeast, the sun was just breaking over the horizon, ushering in a perfect new, day!

Because it was Friday, we were the only boat anchored up, so far, and we let fly our casts using the same rigs that Gary, Vic and I had used the past Saturday. Slip corks set around nine feet, but my Dad and Unkie both had new reels, Ambassaduer 5000’s, the latest reels on the market, and I still had a direct drive, model, poor me!

We all cast out , and not simultaneously, as on my past trip, we had strikes from good fish, landing three, two pounders. Unkie and my Dad could cast out their rigs so smoothly, these new reels were a cut above mine, but we spent the morning catching fish and having a lot of fun!

As the tide peaked, Unkie and my Dad had big strikes, real good fish! They began their “waltz” around the boat, circling it three times, these were really good specs they had hooked. Both specs made several exciting runs, the new, reels handling these runs smoothly, then it fell to me to net the fish. “Hit ‘em in the nose with the net” my Dad instructed and following his orders, I successfully netted both fish, almost six pounders!

The tide slacked before 11:00 AM, the specs quit hitting and we called it a day with forty-two in the coolers. Yes coolers, because we had to put some fish into our “lunch” cooler, too!

On my way home that afternoon I stopped by Oshman’s and purchased me an Ambassaduer 5000, pictured to the left. This old reel, purchased in 1966 has caught a lot of fish, it is still quite usable, but newer reels are smaller, lighter, have advanced drag systems and are, virtually backlash free.