After the weekend of intense social engagements and my son’s activities (for which I am the designated taxi driver😊), I could hardly wait to hit the water last night. Around 19:00 I rushed down to Praia da Alagoa in front of my house. Water was at the maximum, it all looked simply great from the distance. However, when I got close, to my dismay, I saw that the entire beach was strewn with seaweed, and that there was quite a bit of it in the surf. Perhaps fishing would even have been possible, but I was unwilling to clean the line every 3 minutes. Of course, there was LOADS of mullet in the surf, I could clearly see them in the weaves some 5 – 10m out… God I hope they eat all the seaweed😊…
Quite disappointed, I crawled back to the car without even casting once. But I really needed to do some casting – three days without fishing causes unnecessary stress and tension 😊.
So, I headed towards Guidiana in Vila Real de Santo Antonio. And on my way, I stopped to check out Monte Gordo beach. It is mere 7-8 km away, but the ocean there was crystal clear. There was an occasional seaweed here and there, presumably blown there by the strong wind, but nothing like Praia da Alagoa. The water was receding, so I quickly set up 3 rods. One floating bead rig, one regular 2 hook system and a bottom long line rig. Bait was a piece of squid all around.
On my first cast, while it was still daylight, I immediately got a spotted bass – a small one, about 25cm. but the bites and activity continued – I had some spectacular misses and forceful strikes – rod would bend all the way down to the water… The baitrunner would roll out 10m of line… and it was active and exciting. I got another 3 spotted bass, a bit bigger but nothing to write home about. But as water kept receding, the activity went down. Some 50m out, there is a sand bank which goes parallel to the beach, and with heigh tide all the activity was this side of the sandbank. With the water going down, I started casting over the sandbank. And for about 40min there was not a peep. I just about decided to pack it up, but as I was fiddling with my gear, one of the rods bowed and started dancing. I got a very nice seabass! Wow! Finally, a FISH! So, I stayed another 40min and got a big sargo and few more of those forceful misses… On the whole, I am under the impression there is a lot more fish in Monte Gordo, and that terrain is a lot better - water deeper and that sand bank does make a difference. I will have to test my theory this evening though😊
