Another Destin Trip, Not So Great!

Fishing is a lot of fun, no doubt. But it’s to be expected that you can’t be successful all the time. Sometimes, fish just won’t cooperate. That’s one fact that every fisherman and fisherwoman has to accept. There is no absolute guarantee that you will catch fish. Buoyed by the success in Panama City, we decided to go to Destin again, only a few months later. With the better-than-expected performance in Panama City, we felt that we really got the hang of fishing, and that we would experience a lot of success in the neighboring Destin.

This time, we booked a room at Inn on Destin Harbor. The location was perfect. As the name indicated, it was right on Destin Harbor and provided us with a beautiful view. It was located not far from the Okaloosa Island Pier. Free breakfast was nice too, but I would rate it a little bit below what we had at the Club Destin. There weren’t any hot waffles, cold boiled eggs instead of omelets, and the dining area was small. For some reason, the toilet didn’t flush well, so that was a big minus.

So we went back to the Okaloosa Island Pier with a lot of expectation. But for some reason, we didn’t get a single bite. We casted our silvery lure, but there were no strikes. We thought may be we were fishing at too shallow of a depth, so we moved to the very end of the pier. Still there was no luck. But we also noticed that other people were not doing much better. Some people were catching a few baitfish for king mackerel, but we didn’t see much action.

After hours and hours of no action, I finally caught a fish. It was very strong, and gave up some good fight. The fish would leap out of the water and thrash about, and I even had to open my reel to let the fish tire itself out. I’ve heard that how furiously reeling in a strong fish could stress the line and result in the much dreaded broken line and lost fish. The fish I landed looked silvery, long, and had sharp teeth. I was told by an elderly man that it was a ladyfish. He said it is very bony and therefore not good to eat. I was disappointed, but I did enjoy the good fight. A few minutes later, my husband caught one too. Ladyfish must be schooling fish, we thought. Later that day, we switched to shrimp bait and managed to catch a few hardtail fish, which didn’t look very appetizing either. We threw them back, and surmised that we’ve seen better days.