Then our whole world changed when we discovered a way to successfully chase the big mammas. Now giant Tarpon are a completely different breed of fish when it comes to pursuit. The juveniles (anything under 50 pounds is considered Juvenile in the Tarpon world) can sometimes be very easily fooled and on a good afternoon catching 4 or 5 is not impossible. But the big kids are as they say, a different kettle of fish. Not easily spooked they are just sometimes (most times) plain indifferent to your offerings and they are obviously not nearly as plentiful as their younger brethren. But our time did come.

We were doing some maintenance on our workboats one afternoon. Our boats are moored in a wide canal leading onto the North Sound which is about 800 metres long and perhaps 150 wide at its widest point but for the most part is about 30 to 40 metres wide. We were busy reglassing the starboard transom corner where one of the cleats had pulled out during a storm a few weeks before and taking our time about it too. It was late summer, gorgeous afternoon and the beers in the cooler made working slowly rather easy. While waiting for a layer of glass to cure and enjoying our second beer, sitting on the back platform feet in the water the miraculous happened. A pod of tarpon suddenly materialised just off the stern of the boat. Moving slowly and lazily with the air of confidence only big fish can as they cruised by us and up the canal. As you can imagine all thoughts of work, not that there was a lot to start with, vanished and there was a blur of movement as Dylan and I both made a mad dash to the car to grab our rods which, naturally, went wherever we did. The only tackle we had with us was our bait-casting tackle. Our 7ft casting sticks matched with a Shimano Calcutta 400 and Dylan with and Abu Garcia 5000. Not exactly the right tackle to be taking on 150 plus pound fish. Or so we thought. But we figured what the hell lets just try and jump one anyway. The initial strike and first jump is what Tarpon fishing is all about. Its helluva difficult to keep them on much longer than that anyway because Tarpon have a doctorate in hook throwing techniques but we were game to give it a shot anyway. What fisherman would pass up the shot at a 150 pound fish on beefed up bass gear?