February on Estes Flats

[Ron Mc]

Ron Mc

February 18, 2019 at 9:07 am #3423

This was a smoke test run for my buddy and me to see if loading two kayaks the night before and blasting down would work for a good day trip.

The weather forecast all week looked good for Saturday, and people have been reporting redfish in the afternoon sun, so that’s what we were hoping for.

The water is over 60 degrees, forecast was high 60s (never made it), projected E wind 9-10 kt.  AP low tide 7am.  60-degrees and light mist held all day, and it turned out the sun was never going to come out.

Blasted from SA at 330 Sat morning, stopped for great 5am breakfast at Agave Jalisco in 3 Rivers, and 7am at Palm Harbor launch, met up with a TKF friend who lives across the highway.  I had two fly rods and a 3rd rod holder stowed, but they would stay stowed for the day.

After a stretch at Sandy Point (southern tip of Talley Is), paddled due east to Little Cut, expecting to find fish on the rising tide just inside the cut.  Tide was very low as we approached the cut.

The low tide let us wade the middle bar at the inside of the cut and cast to the cut bank – we found a ripping tide current coming through the cut from Aransas Bay, and fish right where they ought to be.

We harassed and released a half-dozen tourist trout –

– could have stayed and caught more with lure change-up, but the little fish weren’t our goal, and we moved on.  For part of our plan, tried to paddle to the Trout Bayou cut, but there wasn’t enough water to get us there (we heard a powerboat digging back there about beer-thirty all the way through noon). At the duck blinds, we retreated on the east wind back toward Talley Is.
Setting up a couple of drifts, we saw hunkered redfish and their mudballs on both sides of Talley Is., but they just wouldn’t get up to eat.
Lite lunch and a good Corpus microbrew at Sandy Point

We talked about the mile paddle back to Little Cut, with the incoming tide lasting through late afternoon, but with no chance for the sun, decided to call it.
And we didn’t suffer.

It was a great paddle, a few fish, and we made it through Oakville early enough for a meat sandwich

Ask for the burned ends and you shall receive

here’s the chart if anyone wants to see where we were

[Jimbo]

Jimbo

February 18, 2019 at 11:13 pm #3479

Those Burnt Ends looks so good, I do the trip without catching a fish just to end up at Vans !!!!!!!!!!!!!

Love the roller setup on your rack for the kayaks, no barnacles sticking to you…………

Jimbo

[Ron Mc]

Ron Mc

February 18, 2019 at 11:21 pm #3480

thanks Jimbo – that’s Steve’s truck, and takes a system of 2 people to load 80-lb boats up there – the bars with rollers and saddles are Yakima.

He also has a nice trailer for 4 boats with J-cradles. (S. Padre 2 Novembers ago – we normally do fall trips to Estes and Arroyo City staying 2 or 3 nights in a canal house, and split the cost with as many as we can fit in)

I can single-hand my boat using a bed extender

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