Last night high tide was around 18:50. After a somewhat stressful day, I intended to try Ria Formosa. Even got some octopus and cuttlefish to try and ward off the tiny seabream which normally plague the Ria Formosa fishermen.

But by the time I was ready to leave, it was getting too late, and as traffic calmed down, I could hear the weaves from the beach. Eventually, I popped by the Praia da Alagoa main parking and as ocean was sufficiently noisy, decided to stay at the beach. I fished with remainder of bibi I had from the boring night session, cuttlefish and squid... And to my surprise, it was not completely uneventful. I had quite a few bites, mostly small fish, but I was kept busy baiting hooks and recasting, and so I was content to stay until around 23:00. End score was 2 mucharra, one pan size spotted bass and two sargo of about 20cm. By no means a colossal catch, but after the last 4 sessions, a welcome change of pace. Oddly enough, I got all the fish quite late, when the water had already receded.

Boring night session...

Woke up at ungodly hour and headed to Praia da Alagao to be there for the high tide at night… set up three rods, 1 with sardine, one with squid and one with bibi… Stayed there for about 2,5 hrs and had 3 tiny nibbles. When I paced it up, I threw away the original bait. It was extremely calm, warm evening, slightly overcast.

A compound report about my last 2 sessions… After my success last week, I hurried down to Praia da Alagoa, right in front of the restaurant, for some more exciting action… Alas! The ocean has calmed down completely – almost no weaves and crystal-clear water.

And of course, this means that the fish are not active – at least not during day. A friend of mine and I started some 2 hours before high tide and carried on well into the afternoon after the high tide – standard setups – shrimp, clam and sardine… A perfectly wonderful day with no action whatsoever. Well, I did get a flatfish, but that does not count for it was less than palm size. It is amazing that a pregado so small can swallow 3/0 hook and entire sardine – I had trouble unhooking the poor thing.

I even had my line towed by a kayak some 200+ meters out, far beyond what is a normal casting distance – and even there I could not get a bite! It was quite depressing…

So, the following day, I though I get some small sargo in Vila Real de Santo Antonio pier. Got some bait in the local tackle store and took out my carp rod set up with 15gr sliding float out of storage… I was not the only one with this idea! However, all I can say – another 2 hours of perfect weather and NO BITES at all… Also, I did not see anyone get anything either, and there were quite a few fisherman on the pier. SO now, the only thing that remains to be checked is if they would bite at night – tonight I will have to wake up at ungodly hour to chase after hight tide and hope of some action… Fingers crossed!

After my latest success, I naturally hurried back to the beach. Conditions were pretty much the same, strong current, big weaves, only it was one hour before high tide. I set up two rods with two hook rigs, baited with sardine and again 180gr pyramid weight.

Unfortunately, this time not a nibble! Well, something packed away on one of the sardines, but it may well have been crabs.

Next to me, a friend of mine got one spotted bass and a regular seabass, both around 35cm on a shrimp.

Yesterday I started with low tide around 14:00 at Praia da Alagoa, in front of the Restaurant. Intention was to enjoy the afternoon with three rods. BUT, the weaves and the current were soooo strong that I barely managed 2 rods. As soon as I cast, the rig would drift to the right, in direction of Manta Rota, and be eventually cast out onto the beach... So frequent recasts, and lots of work. Standard 2 hook rigs – one with squid, the other one with sardine. Soon, I had had to switch to 180gr pyramid weight, and even that drifted fair bit.

While the tide was low, I had no action at all – save for the hard physical labour of recasting every 5min.

When the tide started to rise – almost at the very point of it turning – so still very low – I got my first bite on sardine and landed a fair size spotted bass.

But the rig was so heavy that I had no idea if it was on until it started splashing in the shallows. Immediately on the next cast, the rod just bent town and stayed like that for a while – I was 100% sure it was weaves or grass on the line. Then it came back to its regular position and I left it for a while. After a few minutes I wanted to recast and as soon as I lifted the rod from the its stand, I felt that there was something on the other end. With such a big weight, and such strong current, a swimming fish had to be big! And sure enough, after a few minutes of back-and-forth dance, and me walking down the beach a 100m or so as the fish followed the rightward current, I managed to get it to ride the weave onto the shallow bit. As soon as the weave retreated, the fish was beached! And what a fish it was!!!!

 

 

As the water kept rising, I had quite a few bites. As it got dark, hooks were empty all the time. But it was all small fish, and I was using 3/0 hooks with whole sardine on it. so no way I could catch a sargo or a mucharra. As the small fish started pestering me, I packed up and left around 18:00 -I had had my fun for the day.

There were also other people fishing by the other walkway, a few hundred meters in the direction of Manta Rota. A guy was walking pass me on the beach, and he told me they also caught a few spotted bass, and seabass, but in 30cm mark... also a few sargo... so there is fish in the surf.

No fish anywhere in site!

Another compound report about this entire week - was it not for the brilliant photos I made, I probably would not have bothered to do this entry, as there is nothing major to report or note!

It seems in January all the fish disappear from Altura, Praia da Alagoa - they are all GONE! the surf is empty. Several days ago, high tide was perfectly timed around 17, so I went to the Praia da Alagoa with three rods and high hopes. I could catch one hour of dusk before high tide and another hour of dark with outgoing tide - in my mind this spelled fish, and lots of them! Well... All I can say is in 3 hours with 3 rods I did not get so much as a nibble - I had to throw away the bait I had put on the hooks when I arrived and leave! Still... Nice, calm weather, and a nice, evening photo.

So, next day, in the evening, not willing to admit defeat, I went to the Praia da Vila Real de Santo Antonio – and again, the same story. Not a nibble!!!

The following day I had something to sort out in Tavira, so on my way back, I stopped by the Ria Formosa in Tavira, right across from the island ferry boarding platform. Here, there are loads and loads of small seabream. The rod would simply not stop quivering – and the hooks were stripped of bait in no time. Over there the only sensible thing to do is fish with a piece of cuttlefish, or a piece of octopus – everything else is a joke. And indeed, I am gearing up to trying that one evening, for persisting on Praia da Alagoa, makes no sense at all. Anyhow, I did manage to catch one small seabass – not even half kilo… and of course, another lovely photo

The only thing left to do is to try in Altura, Praia da Alagoa at low tide… and so I did that too. I had a great day on the beach with my son and some friends, and I kept casting, and casting… To no avail – again, not a single nibble, despite the fact that there was quite a current in the ocean, weaves were roaring, conditions were perfect for some bass… And yet again, a nice photo for the albbum

 

 

 

First catch of the year…

After somewhat turbulent New Year’s night, I went down to the beach with my family. It was more of a family beach day than a serious fishing session, still, it is not possible for me to go to any body of water and not have at least 1 rod😊. And besides, it is a sort of tradition for me to fish on January first, just to kick off the year!

The weather was simply brilliant! Low wind, lots of Sunshine… But the ocean was much rougher than expected for these conditions, and as we were approaching, I immediately regrated bringing only clams as bait – as I said, not a serious fishing session, plus I expected calm ocean so I did not bother with anything else, even though I had squid and bibi in the fridge… Oh, well…

I had 2 rods out with clam and it was receding tide.

Quite a few of our friends were out as well and there was a lot of laughing an talking…

The line on one of the rods went slack, I did not even see the bait, and I reeled in my first fish of the year 2022!! Happy New Year everyone!!!

 

After everyone had left, in the first hour of dark, I caught another 4 spotted bass, and bigger – but this one got the photo moment😊. Anyhow, it appears there is not quite a few spotted bass in the surf, and I will do a serious session soon…

Seabass in the surf

Tuesday, 14^th December I could hear the ocean at night. Meaning the currents and weaves were strong. It was the beginning of the full Moon phase and the high tide was at almost its maximum. I generally do not like it when the ocean is that rough, but the day was sunny and warm, and I was getting restless around the house. My wife, God bless her, encouraged me to go and so I picked up a few frozen squid and my rods and headed to Praia da Alagoa, my usual spot in front of the restaurant.

This time I was lazy enough to use one rod only – quite unusual for me, but in my defence, the tide was rolling like crazy, I needed 140-gram pyramid weight to keep the usual 2 hook system in place. And so, I was more resting and talking to other fisherman than fishing… There were 3 of us on the beach that day. The first bass around a kilo mark was caught by my fellow sufferer to the left of me, and I had no interest whatsoever. After about an hour, I realized that all of us were trying to cast as far as we possibly could, and that yielded no results. I tried not 20m from the shore and almost immediately got one small spotted bass, not even 20cm... I released it and continued casting short distance. For almost an hour there was no action whatsoever – I would only occasionally check the bait as there was quite a lot of seaweed. The tide started receding, and it became quite shallow… I believe it was more than half way down, and we everyone had given up on fishing, we were all getting ready to leave when I finally got a bite! I ran to the rod, picked it up and started reeling in – the water was so shallow that I could immediately see the back of a big fish in the surf. And getting it in entailed more navigating the weaves to close the distance rather than tiring the fish as it was so shallow it did not have the depth to swim. After a minute or two I beached quite a nice bass, around 2 kilo… Needless to say, I was quite content with the catch.

 

 

Encouraged with my success, the following day, 15^th December, I went back. This time I used 2 rods. On the first cast I got a seabass of about 800gr, and had quite a few weak bites – in contrast to the previous day, there was quite a lot of small fish around, probably sargo or mucharra. The session went on with constant bait changing and recasting until the tide got low. Again, in shallow water I got another seabass, but this one was a real baby bass – it could not have been more than 300gr… One thing is clear – there is currently seabass in the surf!

Good old Praia da Alagoa

After having returned from The Netherlands, there was again loads to do around the house – it is autumn after all and leaves are all over the yard, lawn needs tending to, etc, etc… Again, in the evening I would rather fish than write about it so here comes another compound report.

I hit the beach in the evening of the first day I was back – NATURALLY!!!!:😊😊😊

The weather was calm, ocean to. I did not expect much in terms of catch, I just wanted to have some fun – standard setup, 3 roods, squid, white clam and white worm for bait. I was also thinking I can fillet the first mucharra I catch and wait a bit… Started around 4 and went on until 8 in the evening. To my dismay I did not get A SINGLE NIBBLE!!!! It was as though the ocean was empty! Even after it got dark there was absolutely no life, which is not natural, of course… Oh, well, off I went home, a bit rested and understandably confused. But hay! I had not been here for more than 6 weeks, so I had no idea of how things developed…

So next day, I hopped on a boat from Vila Real de Santo Antonio with a friend to check what was happening in deeper water.

 

We stayed around about 20m deep and tried fishing and jigging for squid. And even there the fish were completely inactive! Almost not a nibble. But squid jigging got quite interesting. I got octopus, big squid, big cuttlefish and quite regularly so, every few minutes there would be commotion on the boat… Some of the bigger squid and the cuttlefish were quite difficult to bring up in strong current, and would swim around… it was a nice change.

Now Playing: 6 weeks in Holland

 

It has again been ages since I posted – the thing is, I did g fishing, only I was sooooo busy with everything else that I had no time to write about it.

First, I had to go to The Netherlands to sort quite a few things out – loads of work, stress and awful weather did get my spirits down. I did sneak out for a few evenings when the wind was tolerable – I mean three layers f woollen clothes plus the winter jacket – I do wander how dd I survive in Holland for all those years. And then, when I was finally at the water, it all came into focus – I did manage to survive it precisely because of fishing – as cold and as comfortable as it gets, the catch is what kept me focused. Ok, so I did flat fishing with rug worm as it was seabass migration season – they were around in huge numbers, mostly small ones but also a few I took home and enjoyed with my family and a glass of wine… Location – good old Scheveningen pier m- the stones and snags of which I still know by heart. I do not deny I had my fun with whiting, flatfish and bass all in shallows and using a 2lb carp rod for my 12gr float, but to be perfectly honest, I do not miss it at all! It was just a necessary evil to feed my addiction under the given circumstances!