Grand Isle Weekend Wrap-Up Article
This weekend my crew of high school buddies went down to Grand Isle for a weekend of relaxation, beer drinking, and hopefully some fish catching. This marks the 2nd straight year we've made the trek to the island with our kayaks but this year the size of the group grew so we upgraded to renting a camp in lieu of a motel. Man, that was a great decision. If you've never been to Grand Isle, I highly suggest going. It's a special place that no where else can duplicate. It's an area that is 100% about fishing. As you're on your way in on Highway 1, both sides of the roads are lined with folks fishing for reds, specks, or anything else that will make a poboy. In addition to the bank fisherman you have kayak guys everywhere as well as john boats, bay boats, and big-money offshore boats. With all that pressure one would think the fishery would be overfished. Nope. Not even close. It's amazing to think that a community that is all-in on fishing, crabing, and throwing cast nets for anything else would still be one of the premier fisheries on Earth.
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As we're pulling in we see a truck pulled over with 6 woman all fishing and you can tell they know exactly what they are doing. And they weren't the only group of ladies only we saw. Where else will you see woman, with no men, who can all out fish you on any given day? Only in South Louisiana.
The first thing you need to know about the weekend was the location of the camp. It's location could not have been more perfect. We were situated right across the street from Elmer's Island off Highway 1 (on the north side of the road). The camp had a gravel boat launch, dock, and was surrounded by marsh you could fish from a kayak. It slept 7, we had 6, and was roughly $800 for the weekend so it was cheap. Bait shop two blocks west of us and the access road to Elmer's was across the street. Chris Moran's marina/restaurant/bar was 6 miles west and Artie's was 6 miles east. Central location. The small yellow dot is roughly were we were.
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As you can see from the dock, the mangroves and marsh were so close you could be there in a matter of minutes. The launch and dock also gives you the luxury of only of having to load and unload your kayaks once as opposed to traveling to a launch.
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I took a wide frame screen shot of the marsh north of the camp so you can get the picture. Not only are you fishing in minutes, you have endless options. This is the perfect kayak home base.
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Now to the good parts, the fishing. We got everything unloaded and were on the water by 3pm on Friday. The heat of the day is not the prime time to fish and there was also little tide but I figured I could put something in the box and do some prime scout for Saturday morning. Everywhere colored blue or yellow is the general area I covered on Saturday. It's different marsh than I'm used to fishing in the East Biloxi marsh. Much more mangroves which is pretty cool. I found what areas where shallow and where some oyster shells were. I threw everything I had in the box: spinner baits, topwater, and even had live minnows for "insurance". Caught 1 rat red and 3 catfish. The highlight of the day was when I was paddling across some open water I noticed a slick pop up so I threw at it with the spinner bait and it immediately gets nailed. Drag is coming off and the rod is bent. I'm pumped thinking I just stuck a legal red. Nope. 24 inch gaftop catfish. It was a fun pull nonetheless. The best piece of information I gleaned from Friday was the portion of mangrove shoreline I colored yellow was stacked with big mullet. They were so stacked along that whole shoreline, I'd get right up on them, then they would spook and run right in to the side of the kayak. I also saw some shrimp too. This shoreline was the most alive area I saw but I couldn't buy a bite with a live minnow or spinner bait. Was disappointed with the lack of fish but headed in for some grilling and beer drinking with the boys.
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In typical fashion, Friday night was a bit too much fun if you catch my drift. The old crew has been picked off one by one with marriage and/or children and we just don't get the opportunities like we used to. We just sat under the camp grilling, drinking beer, and laughing about old times. That caused me to get a late start Saturday morning. Actually, the first thing I did at 6am was run to the gas station for the hangover fix: rolaids, tylenol extra strength, gatorade, and a red bull. By 7 I was lucid enough to venture out.
I met up with one buddy who was right were the yellow line starts out of the cut across from the camp. He had already caught a trout and there was some bait so I stopped with him to get started. We were literally 5 minutes paddle from the camp. I caught 2 undersized trout and a 18 inch red for the box. It slowed down, probably because of boat traffic coming out of that cut all morning, so I moved northeast to that cove where another buddy had already caught 2 trout but I didn't have any luck. I went back east in the main canal just covering water and throwing a spinner bait and never got a sniff. By this time it's 915 am and I have one fish in the box. One buddy was already heading in for a bit to cook breakfast for everybody but I couldn't come in with one fish. I decided to go back to that mangrove shoreline where I saw all the bait friday and where I started Saturday and caught a couple off the bat. I also decided to do what it calls for when things get desperate: bait shrimp under a popping cork.
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Bam, it happened. A 25 inch redfish right off the bat and one more vital piece of info: he inhaled that bait shrimp down to his crushers. I had to cut the line and leave the hook in him but I found out that shrimp is what these fish wanted, not minnows or any artificial. I'm not too proud to fish bait shrimp under a cork so that was the new game-plan. I work that mangrove shoreline that I colored yellow and stopped and fished about every 100 yards. It was a bite every time. Now it might have been a catfish, a bait stealer, or one of 7 rat reds I caught but it was action. My 3rd fish in the box was a bonus ground mullet. After I got my 4th legal red I pushed a little further west looking for the last fish. At the west most end of the yellow line it's kind of a little cove with a power line on the bank of the mangroves. As I'm easing in a see 3 shrimp explode out of the water and dance across the surface. Then I saw the redfish blow up of some bait about 10 feet away. This was my limit fish I just had to catch him. I threw out and popped the cork a few times and then BAM! He hit my cork. I popped it again and he hit my damn cork again. I'm literally saying out loud, "Find the shrimp, find the shrimp, find the shrimp..." and then the cork takes off sideways in what was the final fish of the day.
As soon as he hit the ice, I cut on the trolling motor and cruised the K12 back in and was back at the camp at 1045. I was a little late for breakfast but when everybody asked how I did and got to say, "limit of reds", it made the weekend worth it.
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We sat around and regrouped and the next stop was filling up a cooler with beer and heading over to Elmer's. The next few hours was a blast. All we did was drink beer and cast in the surf trying to get a few trout. I had one dink and my other buddy caught 2. Noon to 3:45 probably wasn't the ideal time to fish for trout in the surf but it was a blast. We drained a cooler full and headed back in. One thing that was pretty damn amazing about Elmer's was despite the 2 foot seas, the water was green and had 2.5 feet visibility. I can only imagine what it looks like when it's flat calm. I see why trout love that surf.
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For dinner we made a trip to Chris Moran's Steakhouse in Fouchon. Allow me to suggest the Seafood House Combination or the Cowboy Bone-In Ribeye. They were the stars of the table in my opinion. From there, we went back to the Island, hit up a drive through daiquiri stand and watched the rest of the LSU game at the camp.
It was a great weekend from almost every aspect. If you've never been to Grand Isle, let me suggest a trip. Round up some buddies and make it happen. You won't regret it.
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