This week I am supposed to head down to Marco Island for four days of tarpon fishing with local guide, Andy Lee.
My wife goes on tis trip and stays busy sunning herself on the last spit of sand this side of Miami Beach.
She’ll even jump in the boat one day given the right conditions and a decent a book to read. We walk to great restaurants and indulge in a massage or two. As they say here in Alabama, “It don’t get no better”. Here’s a little secret about Marco Island. Most all of the toilets there are the tall variety, something my aching back has come to appreciate.
Today April 18th, 2020, the Marco Beaches are closed. A few restaurants are serving to-go only and you can’t get to Ft Myers on Delta in the same day from here in Birmingham unless you drive to Atlanta. The return options are just as bad. So, let me tell you about Plan B. Start the day by checking your favorite Insta fishing posts. Most of those are posting reruns. Sort of like watching Gilligan’s Island. Watched a decent Costa Rica tarpon film this morning called, “The Jungle’s Edge”, posted by Venturing Angler. Thank you. This afternoon and after some honey-do’s I walked across the street to my fishing buddy mother’s house. She has an expansive front lawn. There I cast the 11 weight as if tarpon might slide down the cul-de-sac. Where’s the sun when need it. Stepped off 86’, my best. That’ll get you a whole lot nothing when the fish are really coming at you in a cross breeze and a bouncy chop. Not sure what the neighbors think.
Then I pulled out the Tail July/August issue out of the stack I maintain in my closet. I recalled a lobster tail recipe with fried plantain tostones that sounded yummy. Yep, that’s what it has come to. Cooking seafood recipes out of fishing magazines. My wife walks in from her own errands and curiously asks, “what’s this all about?” “It’s fishing week, baby” is all I can utter back.
She smiled as I scurried about in the kitchen about as well as if Andy Lee stepped down from the platform and handed me the push pole. We did manage to deliver a great meal, the two of us. Teamwork is always key when it is fishing week.
I am not sure tomorrow holds.
Leftovers, I guess.
S. Culp
Tail Subscriber
