I've been lucky the last couple years to have been invited on trips to fish in the Chazzahowitzka area.  "The Chazz" is truly unique and represents Old Florida at it's best.  Located just about an hour north of Tampa, The Chazzahowitzka National Wildlife Refuge encompasses over 30,000 acres of river and springs, low country marshland, swamps and a spectacular saltwater estuary where it all meets the Gulf of Mexico.  The estuary is vast and shallow (I mean very shallow) and chock full of rocky bottom making it extremely hard to navigate without extensive local knowledge.

 

I suppose a lot guides charter in the area, but we've been fortunate to book each year with a crew of very well seasoned, local guides who have fished and lived in the area their entire lives.  Their lineage before them did the same and they're all versatile watermen who know how make their living on the water.  By my count there's around 10 of the old school traditional Chazz guides who fish a similar style with similar boats and they all to stick together.  They're all great guys and I'd highly recommend them.

 

They've definitely got it figured out too.  For starters, their boats are as equally unique as the fishery.  This is definitely not the place for your pretty bay boat.  They build their own boats and they are fishing machines.  Most are wooden, flat and/or tunnel bottom hulls around 25' to 28' long, 7' to 8' or so beam and run outboard tiller motors (some jet drive) with a jackplate.  They float in barely anything and can run almost nothing.  

 

Back to the trip now.  The guides pick us up at the Chazzahowitzka River boat ramp around 3:00 p.m. on Friday afternoon.  After a 10 to 15 minute ride we're at the Lodge on Crawford's Creek where the shot guns come out and the skeet range is put to good use.  A prime rib supper is then served followed by some R&R for the rest of the night.  The next day, Saturday, the guides pick up after breakfast and fish you all day long.  That night is a lot of fun with supper consisting of what you caught that day.  There's always plenty of redfish, trout, sheepshead and flounder to go around.  Sunday you fish a 1/2 day and take your catch home after a southern fried chicken lunch.  The guides ferry you back to the ramp by around 3:00 p.m.  It's a great weekend that produces lasting memories.

A Few Pix Of The Lodge...

 

One of those memories for me this year was the big redfish that got away.  It would have been my personal best and I still want to kick a rod around the boat because of it.  The fishing in Chazz is very different from Tampa Bay.  The creeks meander for miles and miles with tons of fishy spots along the way.  Rock bars and holes combined with the right current concentrate the fish.  The guides know every one of them, how to get there, and how NOT to get there.  They fish with comatosed shrimp, employing the ice, newspaper and plastic grating system in small cooler to keep the baits suspended in a state somewhere between this life and the next one.  4/0 J-hooks are fished with a slide sinker and the hook is threaded through the shrimp starting at the tail.  Most of the guides fish straight mono and no leader because it's easier to free snags and less of a chance the line will break off if a fish gets you in the rocks, which they do.

Typical Chazz Fishing Grounds...

 

We were fishing a shallow rocky area when I hooked-up with the big redfish.  I was fishing 10 pound braid and 25 pound leader.  He erupted after the hook set and was massive.  Multiple 50 yard runs later I finally started gaining on the fish but he proved to be too much for the tackle.  There he went, right for the rocks.  I knew I had to stop him so I palmed the spool but I was walking a fine line as anymore of that would break him off anyway.  The fish made it into the rocks and the fight was over.  The 8" of leader I got back looked like it'd been put through a cheese grader.  My mood was equally as bad, but only for a short time.  That's fishing and that's what keeps you coming back, especially to Chazzahowitzka.

Chazz Redfish...

 

The 1st Days Catch...