I hopped aboard the Gambler out of Point this morning. It was a beautiful day on the water, high in the 50′s flat seas…maybe too flat. The boat started out North and around Shark River Inlet layed down the throttles. We were greeted by bird activity on Shrewsbury Rocks. It was a good sign but only 1 short and 1 30″ fish was caught by the 50 anglers. We continued to fish in and around the rocks and Ambrose Channel. We also hit the Elberon Rocks on the way back. At the end of the day there were only two keepers and about four shorts caught. There were several spineys caught and I had an eight inch squid. I debated on keeping it for the table to avoid the skunk but after a short debate re-hooked it and sent it down. I had a run-off on it but did not hook up. It was supposed to be a half day trip with the Holiday coming and Bobby did his best to put us on fish moving around a lot and trying a dozen or so spots to find fish. We ended up getting back an hour late of the half day return time. All in all it was a nice day on the water with some die hard fisherman.

I guess it is only the trip of the year since I have no intention of stopping with this mild weather. I think I am going to switch to blackfishing though since that seems to be better right now. There are also some small schools of mackerel showing up so may get that chore over with. One trip should load the bait freezer for next or should I say this season.

I did not want to come out but decided it was for the best. She is hauled, blocked and winterized. Now it is time for the annual cleaning and polishing. We did not fish as many days this year but caught a heck of a lot more fish and the decks are filthy.

I am a firm believer of putting the boat away clean. I get criticized by everyone else at the marina but I typically launch in the end of February or beginning of March and usually, maybe not this year, but usually it is damn cold that time of year. So with this mild weather I have gone ahead and washed and waxed the entire outside of the boat. I may need to apply a non-skid traction agent to the decks yet but can do that later. I recently switched to Interlux’s product, Premium Teflon Marine Wax with Cleaner. The boat came out much better than last year, it is whiter, shinier and smoother. Last season I had used the Meguire’s boat/RV product. I know many people recommend the Collonite products but they are much harder to use and if you miss the small window to remove the wax it is a real pain in the but to polish off. I guess we will just have to wait and see how it holds up with weekly fishing trips. I am hoping the Teflon in the product will really help prevent bait, slime, guts and the like from sticking and staining the decks, gunwales and other nooks and crannies of the boat. Now it is on to cleaning the interior and installing new electronics and gadgets.

We had our last two trips of the season. It was a tough call but I decided to pull the boat next week. With all the warm weather and lack of threat from freezing temps it was a tough call. After getting some house work done if it is still warm I will put her back in early (end of January) if there are good reports of fish hanging around similar to earlier this year.

Saturday we fished from the bathing beach up to Lavalette. The entire ride down from Manasquan to the bathing beach there was absolutely no bird action. We marked a lot of bait and some fish. Trolled south from Lavalette to the bathing beach, picking up and running to our usual spots along the way. Our total for the day was 13 fish to just about or just over 28″. Since they were so close and our recent visit from a conservation officer we decided not keep any. Most fish were caught trolling from North to South or West to East and all fish were on blue and white shads. We tried chartreuse as well as pearl and neither got touched except by a few blues.