travel – Velox Seeker

Florida Trip Gear Selection…

With weight and space restrictions forced upon us, careful gear selection was critical. We decided on two reels and two rods apiece. We packed a variety of plastic paddle tails and jigheads. We figured that if necessary we could find a local tackle shop to resupply if we miscalculated. We packed minimal clothing since most hotels have laundry facilities. The only purchase we made specifically for this trip were pairs of Simms ZipIt booties.

Definitely recommend Simms Guide Socks with these.

Our rods of choice were the Shimano Zodias 5-pc travel rods.

Reels of choice were either the Shimano Excense C3000 or a Shimano Twin Power C3000.

For reel sizes, 2500’s work well, but we opted for the C3000 size. They are built on the 2500 frame yet have a bigger spool. A Shimano Vanford 2500FA would be a great choice due to it’s lighter weight.

Water bottle holder, rod holder and pliers are essentials!

We like soft sided zippered boxes like these. They keep everything contained and easily accessible. Four of these will fit inside a Yeti Panga.

We always carry a spare spool of line and leader material.

We opted for Gecko boxes because they are waterproof and inexpensive. We want our jigheads and lures kept dry and out of the saltwater. When we use a lure and need to change, it goes into a separate bag until we can wash them off in freshwater.

Inside the Gecko box is everything we need to fish for a full day. What you see above is our Day 3 selection. We were carrying too much tackle the first day. By day two we were slowly paring things down to lighten our load. We also carried 1.5 liter water bottles and a Gatorade apiece. The Gatorades were very nice after a long day of wading. Especially considering a long walk on the beach back to the car in the blazing sun and heat.

Clothing was as you would expect. Lightweight breathable garments with hoods. We wore buffs and hats, fingerless sun gloves and sun glasses. it was easy to submerse ourselves and let the breeze cool us off.

There were a couple of funny moments. On our first day of wade fishing, we both had sharks on our minds. We were waist deep and I noticed a bow wave coming right at us. I pointed it out to her and we both started backing up towards the shore. Then it dawned on me…bow wave and no dorsal fin showing. It ended up being two manatees that came close enough to check us out before moving on. Pucker factor temporarily high!

On Day 2, we wade fished the back bay. The wind and waves were up, as was the tide. The water was stirred up and visibility wasn’t that great. She was up ahead and leading. We were up on a sand flat and were fishing the deeper troughs. I told her to keep her eyes out for sharks and she responded by saying she hadn’t seen any. I caught movement out of the corner of my eye, and sure enough, a 4-5ft Lemon shark glided right by me in the trough. Yah, I can’t rely on her to spot sharks! Lol.

On Day 3, we were fishing the back bay and were catching Jacks. Those little suckers fight like mad. We spotted another Manatee cruising around and a pod of Dolphins working the troughs we were in. Obviously we got out of their way. It was a neat experience for us Okies. Surprisingly, it didn’t seriously effect the fishing as we were soon into Speckled Trout.

Anyway, I figured I would share the gear we used in case anyone was interested or planning a similar trip. Thanks for reading…

Florida Trip 19MAY2025…

Both of us needed a change of pace. So we booked flights on Allegiant, reserved a rental car and a hotel and packed the necessary gear. Certain times of the year, Allegiant flies round trip from Tulsa to St. Petersburg, and the flights are inexpensive ( $185-ish ).

True to form, this was a Spartan affair, with no frills or major luxuries…at least we weren’t in a tent this time! We packed our travel rods and reels in our Yeti backpacks and combined everything else into one duffel bag.

I used the Salt Strong app, Smart Fishing Spots and the Salt Strong Community for all of my research on what to bring and where to go. We decided that we would target Redfish, Snook and Speckled Trout, but in reality, we’d accept catching anything.

The weather was great and the fishing was better than expected. Doing our research and due diligence really paid off.

We carried everything we would need for the day.

Since we weren’t catching much on the Gulf side, we opted to fish the bay off behind the main beach. Both of us love to wade fish, so this was what we came to do.

It’s mandatory to tie on a new leader after every Snook.

If you struggle to tie the FG knot…buy a DaiichiSeiko Knot Assist 2.0. Thank me later!

We had a great trip and all of our chosen gear worked perfectly. We mainly used Shimano Zodias 5-pc rods in Medium Light and Medium with Shimano Twin Power C3000 or Shimano Exsence C3000 reels. We were spooled up with 10 pound braid and 20 lb monofilament leaders. We threw 7gr-10gr jigheads with various plastic baits to great effect. We did bring TFO Traveler 3-pc rods as backups, but they seemed ridiculously heavy and unwieldy compared to the Zodias rods. They ended up being more of a nuisance than anything. But they gave us peace of mind in the event we broke a rod. I think that if we do another trip like this, we will each pack two Zodias travel rods, since they fit inside the Yeti Pangas.

Would we move to Florida just for the multitude of fishing opportunities? Hell no! Way too much traffic and way too many people. But the funny thing for us was that there were probably 20,000 people on the ocean side of the beach and we fished the back bay for two days and only saw one other person back there.

We will deem this a successful trip and we learned a lot. I definitely see us doing another trip like this.

Merry Christmas and an Update…

First off, I would like like to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and hope they are doing well. Secondly, I’d like to give an update on what is going on and why we have been absent.

My wife and I started the process to have a house built back in August. We are finally in our new house. We had to clear some of our land which entailed removing around 70 trees. That part we did ourselves and I can tell you…I’m getting too old to do stuff like that. We bought a shipping container and converted that into living quarters. We had our old house demolished and used the existing slab to build the new house on. As I’ve mentioned in previous posts, we live on a hilltop. It was cost prohibitive to level a new sight. The estimate for that came in at around $47,000 so we opted for Plan B. Fast forward to Christmas Eve and we now have the keys and are almost moved in.

I say all that to explain why we haven’t been posting. We haven’t had much time. In fact, we have not had a day off since August. We did make a trip to wade fish in Florida back in May. A belated post on that trip is incoming in 2026. But other than that, the fishing has been pretty slim. Factor in the tariffs, and we have not purchased much of anything from Japan. I did pick up a Daiwa Certate and I also picked up a Penn Authority reel in St. Petersburg Florida while we were there. Interesting reel and I will do a post on that in 2026 also.

On a lighter note, we welcomed our third Grandson into the world. It reminds us how fast time goes by and how old we are getting. But we have many things to be thankful for and are truly grateful. Hopefully things return to normal in 2026 and we get to go fishing a lot more. Stay tuned…and Thank You all!

Outing: 15 October 2024

Finally! The weather cooperated and we hit the river again. Saturday was 93F and promised to be the last hot day of summer. This morning we woke up to 41F and a chilly start, but it’s a welcome relief.

We have really missed fishing the river, but it’s been too hot and not enough rain to put it in prime shape. As I’ve stated several times, we don’t like to add undue stress to our beloved native smallmouth, so we leave them alone for the hottest parts of the summer. We also lost the Mother-in-Law at the end of September so we have had to deal with all that as well.

Anyway…we arrived at 0801 with 43F temperature and were geared up and on the river bank by 0815.

My first fish was a Crappie…not quite what I was expecting

It took us a bit to figure out where they were since they weren’t in their usual haunts.

We found them hugging the bottom so it required a longer drop of the lure than normal. This is why we carry a selection of jigheads from 2.0 grams up to 4.5 grams.

My rig for the day…Tenryu Rayz 632L and a Shimano Twin Power C2000S

My wife brought two rods this time. One for jigheads and one for hard minnow lures. Certain stretches of the river require hard lures due to the fact that they just won’t bite a jighead and soft plastic. Don’t ask us why…we are just as baffled as everyone else.

Once the sun was up and had burned off the mist, the bass started cooperating. Plus, it was nice to ditch the coats.

As usual, she caught the biggest fish of the trip. We had a great time and caught quite a few fish and hopefully can squeeze another river trip or two in before the weather turns cold. Even then, trout season will start soon so we have that to look forward too.

Catch you on the next one…and we will try not to make it so long between posts.