Fishing Trip – Offshore Freeport Texas

With great anticipation I have been eagerly awaiting this year’s opening of Federal Red Snapper season.  The recreational season is only open for a few short days each year in Federal waters (beyond 9 miles of the Texas coast).  Most years you only have a few good weather days that happen to coincide with the season itself.  For the first time in as long as I can remember, the forecast called for calm seas and low wind for the entire duration of the season.

This  would be my oldest daughter Ella’s (11 years old) first trip offshore beyond the sight of land.  I told her the night before that we were headed offshore and I could see the excitement in her eyes.  We woke up at 5am, made sandwiches, filled the cooler, and gathered the necessary supplies for our upcoming adventure.  On this trip we would going out with my father on his 25′ center console.  After meeting up with Dad at his house, we headed south to Freeport, Texas where he keeps his offshore boat.  In the truck on way to the marina, Ella made it clear how excited she was and also was looking forward to seeing a sea turtle.  I explained that we do see them a few times a year but there are no guarantees.

We cleared the Freeport jetties around 8am and found 1-2 foot seas.  We turned our bering South and settled in for the ride.  Ella was excited and ready for a great day.  The seas were calm enough for us to run a 28 knots.  Mid morning were reached our first destination, the A-19B oil platform, 47 miles south of Freeport, roughly 35 miles off of the Texas coast.  We found a water depth of 145 ft.

The red snapper action was quick and furious.  Ella was the first to hook up and Grandpa supported the rod as she reeled them in.  My snapper season started and ended with one drop on a tandem (2 Hooks) snapper rig.  I immediately landed a double with 2 – 17″ snappers.  Dad finished off his limit a few drops later.  Ella was tired after her 2 snapper and ended up laying down for a nap on the leaning post.

By mid to late morning the seas continued to flatten out.  Eventually turning the Gulf into areas of glass flat calm.  These are the type of weather days you dream of.

We moved away from the rig and put out a trolling spread.  We ran 2 large rapala trolling baits on the interior rods and 2 skirted squid jig heads on the outward rods.  The squid jigs were tipped with cigar minnows.  We trolled around the main rig and secondary platforms for about an hour with no results.

As we passed under the rig structure, I spotted a sea turtle surfacing next to the boat.  I quickly woke Ella up to she was able to watch him dive under the boat.  This of course made her day.

We were not having any success trolling this area so we decided to head north back towards port to try to find Kingfish.  We ran 25 miles back in and ended up a group of oil rigs roughly 20 miles south of Freeport.  We again put out the trolling spread.

Withing 10 minutes we landed the first Kingfish.  We continued to troll around the platforms, running 4 rods.  One of the reels screamed and Ella jumped on it.  As she battled with the fish a second and third rod took off.  After a mass of confusion and fighting 3 fish at once, all of the Kings were in the box.  One more pass brought another keeper.  It was starting get late so we turned the boat toward port and headed home.

We finished the day with our 3 person limit of snapper and 5 kingfish in the box.  Ella loved the trip and has asked me multiple times about when the next trip is scheduled.  This trip was a fantastic success!