Another fishy morning – pardon the pan! I got up earlier than usual as I wanted to try some bottom fishing – I had a few kingfish and that crab from yesterday, so I figured I can not go wrong… When I got there, it was still a good hour before dawn, turned on my headlamp and set up two rods – one for the crab, the other for the kingfish with a two-hook rig. But when I waded into the ocean to get some water, I was sooooooooo pissed to see all the seaweed floating in the surf! Grrrrrrrr!!!!

Luckily, the grass was but a few meters from the shore, after that the ocean was clear. And with surf rods high up, it was doable. Of course, while it was dark, I knew was going to be pestered by small mucharra, so I did not use the kingfish and the crab, I stuck to squid and sand worms… Yes, yes, my bait try was a regular laboratory, a bit of everything! Sure enough, got a few muchaara, and even a small palm-size sargo on the squid… As soon as it dawned, started casting the lures but without any success, for lures would be rolled in grass during the last few meters, and it was a nuisance to keep them clean.

After it finally got light enough, I saw the sky was completely cloudy… What on Earth was going on – forecast said sunny and sunny, and this is Algarve afterall – here it gets cloudy something like 5 times a year!!!!

After wrapping up the kingfish and the crab with the binding elastic, I casted out and went back to weeding the ocean with my lures. And you guessed it – nothing happened. Another fellow sufferer arrived, and started doing the Raglou as people here usually do. He walked up the beach for a good 200m away from me and then stopped. I could not hear him, but I saw him weaving me there, so I grabbed the spinning rod and ran up the beach his way. And as yesterday, there was a small school of 30+cm spotted bass and we had a bit of fun in the shallows. I stuck to my 7cm BayRuf but the fish were much more active than yesterday – they would chase it up quite aggressively and once hooked put a fair fight for their size, some of them even jumping up theatrically… BUT, as yesterday, this lasted about 15 minutes and it was over – the bass disappeared without a trace. Still, I managed to get 4 and had another one on which threw the hook in the surf… Naturally, we persisted for about another 30 – 40 min, and eventually gave up.

I went back to my surfcasters, and recast. The crab was eaten in less than 5 min and as I did not have anymore crabs, I switch back to squid. The kingfish rig I casted quite close by, in the shallow, for this is where I would see and expect bass. And just to pass the time, I put a needlefish rig on my spin rod with almost immediate results… Of course needlefish were about and quite active. And in all the commotion my kingfish rig went off! The bait runner let some line, I ran over there, and sure enough, something was pulling on the tip, not aggressively, but continuously, as a big fish would do. All excited I struck and lo and behold – a freaking needlefish managed to swallow 2/0 hook with the kingfish😊😊😊… Oh, boy, was I disappointed!

But, something was happening, and as it was cloudy, there were no tourists, so I carried on catching the needlefish while I was waiting for something bigger. I had few more mucharra on squid… Another needlefish on the big hook rig😊… I also got 3-4 weevers… But the highlight of the day was around 10 o’clock – some 100 – 150m out, right in front of me, a whale swam by. Big, black, majestic! It came up 3 – 4 times and then disappeared. It is nice to see something like that right there on the beach!

Still, a good day out – I can not wait for tomorrow!

This morning there were PERFECT fishing conditions. Heigh tide around 5:30, absolutely no wind to speak of, and just an occasional blade of grass here and there… There were LOADS of kingfish and mullet on the surface, but… Predators were either not around or too lazy… For about 2 hours I casted into what seem an empty bath tub and around 8 finally saw one fish follow the tiny BayRuf 7 into the surf, virtually 20cm shallow.

A bit later I moved closer to the sunbed area for tourists and there I had my 15 minutes of fun – a friend of mine spotted some kingfish in the shallow and got one spotted bass on raglou, so I went over to him and indeed, there was kingfish and some spotted bass around – not too many and not too big around 30 – 35cm, but they were so sluggish! They would come up behind the BayRuf into the shallow, but there was no aggression, no precision. I had more than 15 times a bass made a boil after the lure, or jumped to what it seemed against it, on the side… I manage to hook up 3 times and none of the fish offered any resistance, they were quite literally dead weight… I do think something was off this morning… But again, this was just enough to keep me going back.

Yesterday’s session was a bust – so much so I did not even want to write about it. I woke up before dawn, rush down to the beach with an entire arsenal of lures a thought may did the job, only to be greeted with cloudy sky, strong South wind and piles of grass in the surf.

So, today, I was reserved. Still got up early, but had no hopes of a good session. When I got there, I found one guy fishing with raglou and he had one spotted bass in the bag. I set up and started casting myself… BayRuf did nothing… So I switched to Du DC Bullet 7cm… That got me a needlefish on the first cast… For a while, that was it. I switched back to BayRuf and got another needle… and that was about it. I did not see anything following the lure, or swimming in the surf.

There was a guy trolling lures from a kayak, just out of the reach of my casting distance. He did have about 10 spotted bass… So it would seem today they were a bit further than I can cast… Fingers crossed about tomorrow… Hope afternoon tide does not pick up all the grass which is now scattered all over the beach, just at the edge of heigh tide line.

First spinning sucess this year!

After almost a week and a half I decided to try it again this morning. Yesterday morning there was loads of grass in Altura beach so I did not have much hope for any sort of action. On top of all, heigh tide was around 4 this morning, so by the time I got there around 6:30, the water was half the way to low, meaning it was extremely shallow for a good 50m. And so, all I brought along is my spinning rod and 10 or so trusted lures.

There was very little grass, the ocean was so calm in the morning it was very, very inviting. I immediately started with BayRuf Manic 115 as top water action is the only thing possible in the shallows. About 35 min later, I tried trusty Kastmaster 1 Oz to try and reach further… And yet another 20min later decided to try and catch a needlefish or something small to bust my spirits, so I switched to BayRuf Manic 75, tiny little lure with tiny little hooks…

And on the second cast I thought I saw a giant shadow swimming after it, but dismissed it in disbelief… No way this can happen!

I moved about 10m down the shore and immediately a seabass scooped it from the surface in a typical and yet so visual attack…. FISH ON!!!!! I could not believe it!!! I was just prying for it not to throw the hook in the shallows – afterall, the hooks ARE tiny!!! Luckily, it all went well...

 

 

All excited and happy, I took the photo and went back to casting… And then I could see it clearly, another 5 – 6 times a BIG bass would come charging towards the lure and turn around at the last moment. One followed it all the way to my feet, I could almost touch it with the tip of my rod. So the first shadow I saw was a BIG, BIG BASS as well, not the shadow of a breaking weave.

It is nice to know they are around, but now the mind game starts – what on Earth shall I cast! What action will give me more results. They obviously go for small bait, so regular poppers and my usual 10+ cm arsenal will not help…

Weird days…
Mood:  irritated
Temperature of the water is indeed nice… Almost 20 degrees. Wind goes around the compass everyday – one day it is South, next day North with East and West wind in between. There is no stability of any kind and on top of everything there is a patch of seaweed on Praia da Alagoa which seems to move closer and further away from the shore with the wind. No matter the tide – heigh of low, when the wind is South the grass nestles there in the surf and it is impossible to fish. I think the worst of it that there seems to be NO FISH at all of any kind anywhere !

I have been trying for a few days to find the fish, waking up in the middle of the night, chasing the tide, chasing the Sunrise, changing location, bait, rigs, doing lures… NOPE!!!! NADA! ZERO!

I mean, need I say more – the sand worm stays on the hook for about an hour or so – not even kingfish or crabs to peck it off of the hook.

And so, yesterday after so much disappointment, I broke out the floating bid rigs for needlefish, and fished for them… Needlefish seems the only thing around, but even them will take ONLY a piece of sardine, and only when it is freshly put on the hook. Forget about casting twice with the same piece. I got 10 in about an hour, hour and a half and I honestly thought about going back today for more – that how desperate I am for some action☹.

But, as the wind was South all night long, the only thing I could do is turn around and come back home….

Last night I took a stroll on the Praia da Alagoa, even though I knew there was a lot of grass, I simply had to check. And sure enough, it looked clean, but when I tried my spinning rod a few times, the lure came back full of grass… it was no use. So, this morning, got up at 3:30 an hurried to VRSA beach, heigh tide was around 6, so I was just in time! When I got there, all looked nice, big weaves, clear ocean… I had big hopes… Alas – in three hours of fishing with 2 rods, I got 3 bites, I missed one and caught 2 small sargo… I was not a happy camper – the fish was simply not about. Not even the pesky mucharra would strike far from the shore… It seems as though the fish have moved elsewhere. There was also another guy casting raglou on top of the jetty and for 2 hours also landed a big fat 0… Where to go now!!!??? Alagoa is not an option because of the grass, VRSA has no fish… decisions, decisions…

I went back to the VRSA beach yesterday. Conditions were quite different – this time there was very little current, no big weaves and the ocean was clear and warm. The catch was meagre – I got one mini spotted bass of 15 cm and two more post stamp size sole. Quite disappointing! I had maybe 4 bites in total, which made for a very dull fishing afternoon. No matter, at least it was sunny and I got to make the most of yet another day before June 1^st… After that it is only night time fishing…  

It has been a week since I did any fishing. The weather was pretty bad, very, very heigh winds and worst of all too much seaweed in the ocean, from VRSA all the way to Praia de Cataiana, all you get is seaweed… Yesterday the wind died down, and seeing as how it is around full Moon, the weaves were quite big, the ocean quite strong. I went down to Praia da Alagoa, and there was still too much seaweed. So I dug up quite a few sand worms, and set out to browse the coast in search of a fishable location. I thought I would start with VRSA and drive West – it has to be clean somewhere!

To my surprise, the water at the VRSA beach was clear, not a blade of grass in sight! I set up 2 rods and started casting with sand worms. Again, I casted close, into the surf and had immediate bites… There were loads of small sargo about, and for about an hour I was getting a fish every cast. But all of them were small, around 15cm some even smaller – makes you wonder how can they take size 4 hook!!! At least none of them could swallow it – so there is that…  I also got two spotted bass – again, in the 20cm mark – so all small fry. Naturally, I released all the fish back and just enjoyed the action and the anticipation – there has got to be bigger fish there. Perhaps bigger bait would do the trick. On top of it all, as of 1^st June day time fishing from the beach is prohibited on account of beach goers – tourism in Algarve must take precedent, I get that – so I was merely making the most of the day while I still can. I will do another session this afternoon – the wind is still low and the tide quite heigh… Hope I have as much fun as yesterday…

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😊

Yesterday I had a double session. Early in the morning I rushed out to try spinning. However, the tide was low and it was extremely shallow. Still, that did not stop me, I persisted with poppers and pencil poppers for about an hour, and did not get a thing!!!

Well, I thought, I better try clam, just to make sure. And so I did, and I still did not get so much as a peep☹. SO, finally I broke out my floating bead rig and put on some sardine to catch at least a needlefish… You guessed it – NADA! It is as though the ocean was empty.

And so, I went back in the evening around 19 – again with low tide, minimum having been around 21. As I was setting up my rods, I was AMAZED at the quantity of fish in the surf – I tell you, it was like a fish pond, everywhere you look there is a fish on the surface, and close to the shore, no matter the low tide. When a big weave would come by, it would lift them above the ocean level and you could clearly see and endless school of fish for a brief moment. I still do not know if it was mullet or spotted bass or something else, but I did get 5 small bass around 30 cm in the shallows, some 5 to 10 meters away from where I was standing… So, naturally, I will try to do another session this evening.