Stoked to be Home...

Just got back from a long work trip...As you can see, several places were visited along the way. The purpose of the trip was to take a couple of engineers from our boat division in Japan to survey some dealers about some super secret kick tail new product...All in all, it was a successful trip. The two dudes from Japan were super cool. Didn't know a lot of english but I helped with that. They will go back with some Jonathon-Nese...
Unfortunately, I didn't take too many pics during the trip...
Here's a few though...
Johnathan Hillstrand from Deadliest Catch. We met him at a sushi place in Sarasota. Super cool guy. He sat down and rapped with us for about ten minutes. Said the new season that starts on April 15th is going to be off the chain...


Here's a few shots from fishing on Sat. in St. Petersburg. Great day. The guys had a blast and the fishing was pretty good too.
One of the several reds that we caught...

My boy Mochizuki...He was big dog that day...

The other guys we were fishing with


Saw a real cool band at the hotel we were staying at in Shreveport...Whiskey Folk Ramblers...Go check em' out here.

Really stoked to be home. This was the longest amount of time that Amanda and I have been apart since we've been married and it sucked. So thankful to be home...

Have a great Easter everyone...

JB's Last Cast

Finally,,,I know, I know...I've been weak on this deal but here ya go...I'll try to get an album up with all the pics up sometime this week as there are a bunch of good ones...

Pretty much the first question I got from my buddies when Amanda and I got engaged was not when the wedding was or where it was at, it was "When and where are the bachelor party?" Of course, I could have chose a Vegas or beach type location but from the get go I knew where I wanted to throw this shin-dig...Buras, LA...I highly doubt most people have never even heard of Buras...So I've attached the below pic (Green arrow)...60 miles south or New Orleans...A couple years ago, a small storm called Katrina made land fall here...Yup, that's right Buras, Louisiana...

And the reason for choosing Buras you ask??? Fishing and great food...

I have to say that I have the bestest of friends on this planet. They manned up, took some time off of work, dropped a few dollars and made the trip...16 of them made it. And I'm thinkin' that most of them did.

Todd G. did an awesome job putting a lot of this together. Both of us leveraged our relationships in the marine industry and put together an insane captains bag together for all the guys...Most have been 15 shirts in total along with a bunch of other gear. I'm sure I'll see some of it on eBay pretty soon...

Of course, there are tons of stories to tell but I don't have time to tell all...I've attached several pics that might sum up the weekend though. I'll tell a brief quip with each...In no particular order because I'm lazy and tired right now...

My buddy Frenchie (Left) was crowned winner of the biggest speckle trout for the weekend...His prize...A shirt of me presented by my pops (right). Let's just say there were 7 dudes wearing those shirts from LAX (CA) to Louisiana. Apparently, they got a few questions. You have to admit, I used to be a studly little dude...
My pops (right) was crowned big winner of the weekend for the redfish with the most spots (10)...See next pic. His prize...A free pair of Costa Del Mar sunglasses presented by big bad Joe Mercurio. Great job pops...
Pops and me...Freakin' great...I hadn't been fishing with my dad in a really long time (that's gonna change though) and it was great. We went out with Ben J. on Sat. and absolutely smoked the reds. Thanks pops for generating my 'Y' chromosome. Greatly appreciated.

Rob (right) won for biggest red for the weekend. His prize...A bottle of Patron. He shared. It was consumed soon after that.
My buddy Frenchie and Rob got along well. But Rob piped up a tad too much therefore bringing the wrath of Frenchie...I think Frenchie may cruise from Texas to the wedding just so he can hang out with Rob more...
100 lbs of Crawfish...Absolutely ridiculous. So good. On a dare, my pops bit the head off a live one. There were only a few laughs watching that go down. If you've never had boiled crawfish before. Please do one day.
Todd and I decided that it would be a great idea to bring a cardboard cut out of Joe Merc down to the event. It was. One, my dad didn't realize who the cut out was until Friday night. And two, Rob violated the cut out and made everyone laugh...Pictured...Frenchie (left), Cardboard Joe (Center) and Capt. Ben Jarrett (Right)

The fishing was incredibly tough because of the high and dirty water of the Mississippi. Fortunately, we had a guide one day and Shags (left) caught some nice fish...Nice hat bro...
This is T-Mike...He's my Cajun friend from Thibodeaux, LA - pronounce (tib-a-dough). He took out Rob, Jeremy and I first day. Can't wait to see him in So Cal in June throwin' down once again with all the homeboys...
The gang minus a couple gents who had to turn it in a tad early because of the festivities the night before. Of course there's always gotta be a dude who flips off the camera...Thanks Travis...
In case you were wondering what Redfish look like once they've gutted and cleaned...Here ya go...I ate redfish three times this week. Those are called halfshells on the left and saltwater quail on the right. The halfshells coupled with Italian bread crumbs and a sauce which I'm not at liberty to disclose will knock you down and slap your mamma...Ask Amanda and the 6 other dudes in my small group who got to sample this week...
Seriously, it was a freakin' blast in the bayou last weekend. I love my friends. There's talk of a yearly trip like this...They are addicted now...

Big thanks to all the sponsors that donated gear to the cause...you've clothed my friends for at least a couple of weeks. And a huge huge thanks to Ryan Lambert of Cajun Fishing Adventures (www.cajunfishingadventures.com) for putting up with all my buddies for the weekend...

56 days to go my friends...See you in the OC shortly...

Out of Office...

Amanda and I leave for our respective bachelor/ette parties tomorrow...I'm headed south below I-10 to the great state of Louisiana and Amanda is off to So Cal.

I will be here for the next few nights...

Eating a couple of these...


Trying and hopefully catching a few of these...
And hangin' with these guys...And a few more...

Cell phone only works for Amanda, so holler back Monday...

Bachelor Party on the Bayou...

Just a few more weeks til' the big weekend with the boys...

17 confirmed with a couple of more in limbo...Jonathon, Todd, Ralph, Dean, Ben S, Ben J, Mike, Mac, Adam, Joe, Jeremy, Rob, Bence, Frenchie, Shags, Jim and Jeff...

Cajun Fishing Adventures...

For those coming, get ready...For those that aren't, we'll be sending photos...

The logo is a redfish with red hair, the pic to the upper right is a red head holding a redfish...Lots of those will be caught and then consumed...

Scratch it off the List

I'm down in Stuart, Florida right now at the Hewes/Maverick/Pathfinder/Cobia dealer meeting representing Yamaha. We didn't have much going today so I had the opportunity to go fishing. Before I go into the actual day, I want to say that one of the things that I have written down to do before I leave this earth is to catch a Tarpon fly fishing. I've never even been Tarpon fishing let alone fishing for one on the fly. Well today the opportunity would present itself to scratch it off the list. It's number 24 on the list of 27 by the way.

Phil (boss man) and I met our captain at the dock at 7am and headed out. Our captain was a real good dude named Mike that was a pleasure to fish with. We fished the beach side of Jupiter Island. Which by the way is where there is an obscene amount of wealth. Tiger and Greg Norman both reside on the island so we saw a few nice places.

We finally found the Tarpon and started fishing. Phil got hooked up but it spit the hook quick after one jump. About another 20 minutes later he hooked up again and this one jumped 3 to 4 times before it finally spit it. Tarpon, by the way are known for their acrobatic displays. So Phil passed the rod off to me.

I was into for about 30 minutes when I finally got hooked up....and it was on!!! It immediately made a huge run and finally made a jump. When it jumped I didn't even realize it was my fish because it was beast. Long story short I fought it for about one hour. We touched the leader, which is considered a catch and said farewell to our friend. I have to say that the fish kicked my butt all over the place. I'm a tad sore right now needless to say. Mike said it probably went for about 100 pounds. Nice!!!

After that, Phil got hooked up and had about the same amount of fight time with some awesome jumps that we got pics of. See below. It was cool because this was Phil's first Tarpon so he was pretty stoked about the whole deal. The people around the meeting were also amazed that I had never Tarpon fished before and got one on my first shot...On a fly no less....

All in all, it was freakin' awesome and I officially get to scratch something off my list....

Here are a few pics from the day. Mike took some pics with his big camera so hopefully I'll get a few more of my fish from him....

Sunrise before the morning's fishing adventure....

Phil spooled up....Great shot....

Captain Mike....Great dude....

Me getting smoked headed towards the beach...I think you can see Greg Norman on the beach rootin' me on....

After 6 months into this new year I finally made it out to the lake on Thursday evening after work. Todd, Gorski, Wu-Tang and I loaded up the G3 after the work day and headed up to Allatoona for a few hours. What a great evening!!! Gorsk and Wu-Tang don't have a lot of time on a boat so they really dug the entire experience. For only a couple hour trip it was a good time...


Team Shimano

Gorski lovin' life...

Todd can pretty much get a bird's nest in anything he casts...

Wu-Tang enjoying a bullet while manning the helm...


I'm down in Florida right now at a dealer meeting and am going fishing tomorrow for some Tarpon and Snook...Hopefully I'll have some awesome pics and stories to share...