First I want to thank everyone who braved the high winds and warm temperatures to come out to my fishing expedition on June 23rd! To say that it was a wonderful, memorable time is an understatement.
Golden and I arrived at the rendezvous midafternoon on Friday and after establishing a beachhead, I set out to chase the fish. Clan members trickled in through the evening, a few fish were caught, and merriment was made. Joe the XO brought the last keg of our spring apple wine, while Sarah Stout brought homemade pulled pork tacos, guac, and pickled cabbage. A big thank you to Sarah!
Friday night, when the moon was high, Matt(The Red Viking) Johnson joined me for a midnight gigging adventure in Christmas Bay. We returned a with a beautiful 19″ Flounder and 3 giant blue crabs. The Flounder was cooked up by Momma T for the clan Saturday afternoon.
Saturday kicked off our first Sand Castle Competition and honestly, I was blown away by all the participants! Many of the entries took hours of work by multiple builders and the hard work paid off. I strongly encourage everyone to view the event photos, because they’re great. Ultimately, Susie, Joe, and Audrey’s full-sized sleepy dragon took first place. Honorable mentions went out to Golden’s dragon guarded castle, Jenn’s Viking longship, and Amy’s dragon head.
Several members wet their lines on Saturday but the only keepers were caught by Adam and Cody. Cody caught the largest trout of the weekend at 21 inches, but I had the fortune of hooking up with an absolute monster of the surf while wade fishing on the 3rd sandbar. Fortunately, the Red Viking was there to hold on to my stringer to keep me from being pulled out to sea when I jumped to say above water.
The fight went on for 35 minutes and took us a mile down the beachfront before we had landed what became known that weekend as Jörmungandr, the Midgard fish. As we left the water with this 44″ Jack Crevalle, a search party lead by Cody pulled up to us to give us a lift back to camp. In all my years of fishing the gulf surf, I have never landed such a beast and it was truly the greatest gift of the weekend. I like to think our fallen members in Valhalla were with us this day and helped land this fish.
With fish caught and eaten, Sand Castles erected in honor of our clan, and the keg drained, our first beach raid came to a close. I’m honored to have been the first to lead Njord’s Raid and I hope a Raid Leader steps forward to carry on the tradition.
Together We Are Tanks,
Captain ATs