You can get me once, but you can't get me twice. Another Sabine Lake Fishing Trip May 22, 2009.

L to R: Rob, Larry and Henry with 3 of our nice trout out of a total of 22 trout and 3 red fish
(The fish in our hands may not be one we caught, this is a staged picture :))

This fishing trip was booked about 3 months ago. It is our pre warm up trip for Sitka, Alaska in two weeks - June 6, 2009 to June 13, 2009. We enjoy fishing with Dickie Colburn on Sabine Lake. This makes the 5th trip I personally have gone on with Dickie as the guide. In total, there were 6 of us fishing on two boats. It turned out to be a great and successful trip for us and a spectacular trip for the 3 other guys on the second boat.

Henry and I left for the trip on Thursday and drove over to Lake Charles for some gumbo, etoufee and crawfish pistolets. Our favorite place to eat is the old Steamboat Bills on MLK Blvd, not the one on the highway. The one on MLK has a lot of atmosphere and the food has always been great. Last time we were there the food wasn't up to par and this time it was worse. I hope it isn't on the way out, but based on our last two visits it will be just a matter of time before it shuts the doors.

Larry and the other 3 guys were at the hotel when we got back and they had brought a grill and cooked sausage, boudin, ribs, a pork loin, 4 huge steaks and corn on the cob. There was enough food for 25 people. It was really good and we enjoyed the evening getting to know the 3 fellows we would be fishing with the next day.

Dickie, our guide, picked us up at 5am on Friday morning. He had called us on Wednesday and told us to get a Louisiana fishing license as we would be fishing in the Louisiana portion of Sabine Lake. We headed out and drove almost an hour to the southern side of the lake and launched near Pelican Island. The boat ride was about 3o minutes. By the time we got to the fishing spot there were 8 other boats and it was about 6:30.

On my second cast, I caught a really nice trout on a dark plastic bait, bouncing it off the bottom. We fished there for almost an hour, more boats came in, 14 in total, the word must have gotten out. We left that spot and decided to go join up with the other boat. When we got to them we could tell they were in the fish. As we arrived, all 3 fishermen had fish on the line at the same time. Immediately we started drifting and the game was on. Any bait or lure that was used caught fish, it had to be dark colored, light color did not work. The most fish and action was on top water working the floating bait very slow, popping it and reeling very slowly and then pop again. At 9:30 the other guide and his party pulled up beside us and said they limited out on trout. A limit of 10 trout per fisherman for a total of 30 trout. The trout were not small trout, the average was 3 to 4 pounds and some 5 pounds and over were caught. The other boat of guys caught and released almost a 9 pound trout and a couple of 6.5 pound trout before they caught their limit. They wanted to go fish for some red fish and Dickie directed them to an area he knew that had been active recently. We fished for about another hour and our team ended up with 22 trout, I had 6 nice trout and had thrown back a flounder. The bite lasted a little over an hour and half.

Next, Dickie drove us to a reef in the middle of the lake where he had been catching red fish. On the first drift Dickie caught a red fish and I caught a nice drum. Larry and Henry each landed a red fish on one of the several drifts we made. I caught another small flounder. On two occasions I hooked a large fish. The first fish was absolutely fighting for its life and pulled drag for a number of minutes. After about a five minute fight, the line broke and the fish was gone. On the second fish, the hook was bent and came out of the fish's mouth. A lot of fun, I would have liked to have gotten a glimpse of the fish, since we were in red fish country I am almost certain they were both two big red fish.

About 1:30 the catching of fish stopped. We decided to head in and call it a day, cleaning the fish and a drive home was still ahead of us. When the other boat joined us at the loading ramp we learned that they had not only limited out in trout but they had caught their limit of red fish, 3 per fisherman for a total of 9. They said it took a long time to catch the 9 red fish, because trout were hitting their lines and they couldn't keep any more trout. They told us that they released 17 more trout for a total of 47 trout and 9 reds. With the 3 large trout that they released earlier in the day, their count was 5o trout and 9 reds. Our count was 22 trout and 3 reds for a grand total of catch and release for the two boats of 72 trout and 12 red fish. I did not keep count of the number of fish we missed, caught and put back because they were too small. There were a number however, the point being that it was a wild and furious day of fishing. I call it a day, it was only 6 hours of fishing time.

It was a great time, the weather was beautiful, the fishing was outstanding, the food was exceptional, the fishing friends were fun and I got to make some new friends.

Coming up in a few weeks, my blog will report out on fishing in Sitka, Alaska. Hope it is a good as the pre warm up trip turned out to be.