Our hosts made us some Ridiculously good Louisiana grub and we fished for trout under the dock lights.  I didn't know it at the time, but my small fish streak was just beginning.

 
 

 
 

Saturday morning we were up early to start our adventure.  

This is The Dark Horse group:

 

Left to right--Jeremy Lemieux, Gregg Dudley, Jody LeBlanc, Bisch, Reed Dudley, Josh LeBlanc

That part of the gulf is abundant with oil wells, drilling platforms, etc.  It was cool to have Jeremy along because he is very knowledgeable about the oil industry and really gave us an education about it that added to the experience.

We started out catching bait along one of the unmanned oil platforms.

Then we were off to catch fish.  Strategy #1 was to slip in behind (or sometimes in front of) the shrimp boats and fish with live bait,  The trick was to see where the game fish were feeding, slide in, let out line, and slip it into neutral  There is an art to the process.  This sequence shows the Four Play sliding into the pocket in the last picture.

The first couple of fish that we caught were bonita.



This was the only fish that I put in the boat all weekend!  Everything else was a shark that we released at boat side.

This one was about seven feet long

My partners were on!

Blackfin:  


 


 
 

Strategy #2 was to "chunk" bait with a drifting current on oil structures and that's when my bog boy caught his big fish.   Lean in close and I will tell you where we were...  NOT ON YOUR LIFE!

Reed's 100 plus Yellow Fin!

On the way back in we tried strategy # 3, trolling floating grass lines.  For those that don't know, the currents push floating vegetation into lines of debris that provide shade and cover for bait fish and are patrolled by game fish.

This strategy paid off with a dolphin for Bisch.

Looks like an awesome time!!! Congrats guys!!

The Four Play guys were having fun of their own...

I should stop there.

When we got back to camp there were stories to be told, food to be eaten, and fish to be cleaned.  Jody, Josh, and Travis cleaned the fish for us and Jay, Bobby, Jody, and Clint Goudet fixed the dinner.

Temple meat; the start of Clint's jambalaya:

 

Bobby's soft shell crabs:

 

Jody's dove breasts with jalapeños and cream cheese wrapped in bacon:

 

Jay's burritos and venison sausage, and about three other varieties of sausage.

 

Sunday was a lot tougher fishing.  I still managed to catch another shark, my fourth.  Bisch caught a blacken, and Reed caught a couple bonita.

I know that I am ending this suddenly, like a bad novel, but i'm wiped out.  I can not thank Jody, Josh, Jeremy, Jay, Travis, and Bobby enough for putting this trip together for the St Jude's auction.  It was truly a trip of a lifetime and it exceeded my expectations on every level.  This boys are first class and they busted their tails to show us a good time.  if you ever get a chance to go outdoors in The Sportsman's Paradise with them, don't think twice.

It was a pleasure! We had a blast.

I have a lot of respect for those guys being able to do that for 72 hrs straight when fishing tournaments.

If you look close at one of the pictures, I'm holding Bisch's belt to keep him in the boat. I don't think he would have went over, but it gave him a few good jerks when he first hooked up. One of those timed right with the roll of the boat could get interesting.

Another great St Judes adventure and as always Gregg your pics are awesome. Looks like a wild and fun time. Congrats to Reed on that WHOPPER of a fish and thanks for sharing !

THIS IS SO KICK A$$!!!!!!!

QuoteOriginally posted by gregg dudley:
[QB]  

Can someone please for God's  sakes send me this picture  i. its original format as big as possible thank you so much