Sunday, February 13, 2011

Chokoloskee Island Park - A Fishermans Hangout

So we just got back from our first trip to Chokoloskee Island.  This island is just 3 miles from Everglades City and 30 miles East of Naples.  Overall, the island is setup for primarily fishing and other outdoors activities like bird watching and hiking.  The place is just 90 minutes from the house and from what we have heard (more on this later!), there are a ton of fish here.

Vivian at the Chokoloskee Island Park Marina
So, we arrived on Friday and the weather was less than ideal, 65 and cloudy with pretty strong winds 15-20.  We were certainly not going out in the kayak so we setup on a bridge in the middle of the causeway with good current.   Fished a while with nothing to show for it.  Finally, about to leave, Vivian (as usual) hooks into what turns out to be a really nice small but legal Flounder!  Prior to this, she missed another.  These fish are wierd to catch and seem to hang on sandy bottoms looking for food.  She caught it on a jig tipped with a frozen shrimp.

Not huge but the first flounder we have caught and legal!
So we finished up the end of the day with a bit of fishing and a little bit of catching. 

Cold but still giving the fishing a shot!
Off to dinner at the Oyster house where we had Pompano which was extremely good.  After a great meal, it was off to bed in hopes, as the weatherman predicted, of a warmer clear day.  Wake up Saturday AM, hoping the cold front has passed with the early morning showers.  I guess the cold front went through as the air temp was low 50's with grey snow cloud looking skys and 15-20 mph winds.

Early AM Saturday, certainly not a day to check out a new kayak location!
So that was a low point!  On the good side, the accomodations were great and 100 yds or so from the launch site.  The place was clean, comfortable and thank God it had heat!

Simple, clean, reasonable and very nice. Chokoloskee Island Park
So we spent the day exploring Chokoloskee and Everglades City.  Pretty much fishing villages with eco tourism and kayaks everywhere.  It felt like a ski village but for kayaks there were so many.  For dinner Saturday evening, we went to the Rod and Gun Club in Everglades City.  This place was built in 1864 and is very cool.  This is the place where my parents Maynard and Jane have brought our Hatteras 36.  It is beautiful and has a great feeling inside.

Rod & Gun Club 1864 - Very interesting history, you should visit
 Finally the weather turned a bit on Sunday AM.  As the sun came up, the clouds had gone and the wind dropped a bit to 12-15mph.  The only issue was that it was now 48 or so and the wind had blown most of the water out of Chokoloskee bay.  One by one, the flats boats showed up at the ramp only to realize there was absolutley no where for them to go with the water nearly gone.  Good side of a kayak, we just passed them by and launched.  Out we went, still windy and cold but we finally got our kayak out in Chokoloskee!

Vivian out in Chokoloskee Bay with a fresh wind and wierd tide
So, we were out and chasing some of the guys from the forum which helped us understand where to go.  There was very little water but it was coming in slowly.  The most amazing thing here are the oyster beds which are everywhere.  These things hold a lot of fish food which makes the fishing very good but when you hit one, they are not friendly to your kayak.

Oyster beds - you can see them on the right of the mangroves
By this time, the weather was really turning.  Wind dropped to 8-10, moved more easterly which is far better for this location.  The fishing was not great, likely due to the bitter cold temps the night before.  We actually did not catch anything this day but we had a great time learning these waters and experiencing a truely unique place.  Where else can you dodge oyster beds and see dolphins going crazy doing their own fishing while viewing hawks and eagles circling overhead looking for their catch but Chokoloskee, surrounded by Everglades National Park waters.

Everglades National Park on a cold but sunny day
So we paddled around some more and passed many kayakers, all like us, happy to be out on the water finally... 

Fellow kayaks enjoying the day in Chokoloskee
We visited some really cool mangrove rivers and saw many amazing and wonderful sites.  No navigation issues or hard groundings, all in all, a very nice day. With the weather turning even nicer, we headed back to the ramp to pack up and head back to Miami.  Once back at the ramp, we cleaned the kayak, loaded it up and had a great relaxing picnic.

Now this was a nice place to have a cold one!
So, that was the trip.  We had a great time and will definately go back on a nicer weekend to see if we can catch a few of the fish which have made this place famous.