Ocean City, MD July 2011

Well, just returned from a week long vacation in Ocean City, MD today - time to BLOG!  Although most time was spent with the family, I was able to get out and do a little fishing.  I'm not the avid salt fisherman but that's not going to stop me.  I stopped down at the local tackle shop near 28th & Ocean Drive, got licensed up properly, asked what to use and was on my way.  My girlfriend caught fish and that's always a good thing.  This allowed me to stay out a little longer - always a good thing.

Couldn't get the kids to go fishing because the ocean was much more appealing to a 12 and 10 year old.  We did have a good time doing other things (i.e. hitting the boardwalk, shopping, eating at every restaurant possible, going to the horse races, enjoying some amusement park rides, taking a sunset boat ride, swimming in the ocean & at the Hilton, visiting the wild horses at Assatique Island, etc.)  Anyway, here are a few of the pictures from our vacation.        

The ride to and from is always fun!  It offers great shots of the kids sleeping.  Tavion could sleep through a thunderstorm and hail the size of golf balls.

Olivia always finds a way to sleep in the strangest positions.  Hey, whatever allows her to rest.

Olivia getting her hair braided on the boardwalk.  "Dad, please stop taking pictures of me" is probably what was going through her mind.

Jess' first flounder of the trip.  In fact, this was the first fish boated that day.  We managed to bring in a total of about 30 croakers and flounder this day.  Not too shabby for my first time playing captain in Big Assawoman Bay.  Hey, that really is the name of this body of water.

My first flounder of the day was nearly a keeper.  It measured just a tad short of the 18 inches necessary.  I didn't plan on keeping any fish anyway.  The bait of choice for this trip were white 4 inch Gulps tipped with a little artificial bloodworm.  You can see it sticking out of this guys mouth.

Jess even decided to handle her own fish!  I was extremely proud of her considering there were a few guys on the trip that wouldn't dare touch these ocean (bay) dwellers.

Another flounder from the bay.  This was from day 2 of the trip.  Today, in the same amount of fishing time (approximately 3 hours) we managed 73 fish total.  There were some flounder, croakers and sea robins in that mixed bag.  Oh ... and it was entirely too HOT to fish any longer than 3 hours.

We had plenty of "doubles" while fishing.  Heck, we even had a few triples and quadruples.  Good times were had by all.  I'm not going to post pictures of everyone but please take my word.  These little croakers hit pretty well.  It's a shame they run out of steam so quickly on the retrieval.

Ugly Sea Robins like the Gulp as well.  These critters should hide on the ocean bottom!  Haha

Now, a trip to Ocean City, MD wouldn't be a trip without Pittsburgh fans visiting the "Salty Dog."  This is the best Pittsburgh (maybe only) bar in Ocean City.

My son ordered the Primanti Brother's Style hamburger (fries and coleslaw on top) during this trip.  Okay, he didn't have the coleslaw but the fries were slapped on top.  It was enough for him to order this Pittsburgh tradition.  Tavion demolished this burger like those hot dog eating contest guys on Coney Island.

The wild horses of Assatique Island were quite interesting.  They walk right up to you on the street, on the ocean, etc. This was probably Olivia's favorite part of the trip.  We have some pictures of a baby horse but I'm still waiting on an email.  I'll try and post some more pictures later.  Well, hope you enjoyed this blog like we enjoyed this vacation.  Until next time  ....