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Bonefish Video Hi Speed Only

I work way too much. Especially in the winter months when we are in high tourist season and the roads are filled with cars with license plates from all over North America. I will herein refer to the people that drive those cars as ³snowbirds² with no disrespect intended. It¹s these ³snowbirds² that I work for day in and day out. ³Dave, can you help me with this?² or ³Dave, you have a minute?² is all I hear day in and day out until the middle of May when the lakes thaw and everyone heads back to the north. It¹s also these ³snowbirds² that I desperately need to escape from on my day or two off each month. I have recently found my sanctuary deep in the everglades where the cell phones don¹t work and all I have is snook, redfish, and tarpon on the brain. I also enjoy fishing with a guide on these days because down here if you want to fly fish and do it right, you need to have a decent boat and someone to pole you around. So the second weekend in January 2006 rolls around, keep in mind we are exactly one week into our tourist season, and I am already burned out, but ready to spend a couple of days fishing. One problem. The strongest cold front of the winter is blowing through out of the northwest at around 25-30mph and fishing here is not really an option. Its Saturday evening and I have the next two days scheduled off. I jump around on the internet looking for some hope, a place where my cell phone might as well be a boat anchor, a place with decent weather, a place without a hint of ³snowbird², oh yeah and a place with tons of fish. So I stumble upon this obscure little website, www.bahamasbonefishing.net. I give this guy a call, and he convinces me to come over the next morning. The plan was to catch an 8:00 am flight out of Ft. Lauderdale to Freeport, GBI, Capt. Phil was going to

pick me up at the airport at 8:50 am, and have my first bonefish on around 10 am. The plan worked. I was greeted at the airport on time and shuttled off in Capt. Phil¹s van down the left side of the road, which was partially gravel, for the next 45 minutes. Phil and I believe his son P.J. told me where we were going and what I just signed up for. It sounded too good to be true, but shortly after we arrived in McLean¹s Town, GBI and pulled straight up to the concrete town dock where I was greeted by my guide Bernard. I grabbed my rods, threw my pack into Phil¹s van, and Bernard and I were off. Keep in mind I just signed up the night before with some random guy in a foreign country, got driven to who knows where from the same random guy, threw all my non-fishing belongings in a grey van, and jumped in an old Maverick skiff with another random guy who tells me that they have a room at a house arranged for me to stay in and that my gear would be safe. Ten minutes later I hooked into a 5pound bonefish and nothing else really mattered. We spent the rest of the first day wading a beautiful flat, seeing bone after bone and catching way more fish than I probably deserved to, with no one else in sight. This place is magical. Its not one of those ³destinations², its an easily accessible, affordable family run business in a small town with no hotels, restaurants, or grocery stores. Which brings me to the food. I was getting hungry and wondered what I could do about food. ³What do you eat from the sea?² Bernard asked as he pointed at an exposed conch on a grass flat. We grabbed it, a couple others, we speared a few lobsters, caught a couple of jacks each day and upon arrival to the dock to call it a day we brought the cleaned creatures to a woman up the street who kept me fed while I was there. After we ate, Phill picked me up in the van, with all my gear in tact, and took me to the next town where he had arranged a small room directly on the beach with one of the most unbelievable views anywhere in the world. I tied a couple flies and crashed out hard. The next morning I woke up for the sun rise, swept the sand out of the room and back onto the beach and was back on the water as soon as the sun was high enough to spot the bones. Bernard poled me around spotting fish, some that I could not even see. ³12 o¹clock, longer, longer, yeah drop it there man. Strip, strip, stop, strip, got him!² All day long. We found most of our fish on shallow grass flats, but even found a few mudding around in some deeper water. Lobster and conch were on the table when we called it quits at 4:30 pm. I filled my belly, grabbed my gear and got back to the airport at 5:55 for my 6:30 flight, and was back in Naples by 9:00. My 2 day last minute adventure was over, but I¹ll be back. Maybe in a week or two. Hats off to Capt. Phil and Mel for the arrangements, to Bernard for one of the best fishing experiences of my life, and for shooting the digital memories of it with my little Cybershot