On Saturday, September 9, Reel Blessed Chapter of Fishing’s Future held our 5^th Vamos A Pescar event at Indian Riverside Park. This event is one of my favorites, as it is a saltwater event. We had 63 participants registered, as well as 12 volunteers signed up.

I loaded the car on Friday evening as I had to pick up the bait at Jigz Bait and Tackle at 6:00 a.m. I picked up the bait just after 6:00 a.m. and returned home to pick up Tania. I let Tania sleep in a bit as she still isn’t feeling well. We left our house at about 6:45 a.m. with a full car and filled with excitement for our event.

We arrived at Indian Riverside Park at around 7:15 a.m. Shortly after I started unloading the car, our volunteers began showing up. Because we were using the pavilions at the park, and we didn’t have to set up our canopy and tables, it took 30 minutes to get set up and get ready for the families to arrive. We also had an FWC Officer and FYCCN representative present at the event. I feel it’s good to have the first interaction with law enforcement under favorable circumstances.

At 9:00 a.m., we opened our event with a prayer. I then spoke about the Reel Blessed Chapter of Fishing’s Future and our mission, followed by an introduction to all our volunteers. I then talked about our sponsors so the families know who was responsible for helping make this event possible at no charge to them,

We had 45 participants show up today. Once we finished the introductions and spoke about water safety, I broke the families into five groups, and we handed all the children new rods/reels. The five stations we had were Casting, Rod and Reel care post fishing, Bait and Tackle, Rules and Regulations, and Rod/Reel Set up (where the families set up the rods/reels they just received).

We spent the next few hours preparing the families for their fishing expedition. We finished up all the stations around 10:45 a.m. Next, we gathered all the families and gave them the ground rules for fishing the pier. At this point, all the families and the volunteers went fishing.   

Since Tania and another volunteer, Brandi, went to pick up the lunch from Fit Fixens, I could not go out on the dock to help the families. I stayed at the pavilion to set up for lunch and watch over all our equipment. Tania arrived about 11:30 a.m.. once everything was set up, some other volunteers returned to relieve Tania and me so we could go out on the dock to work with the families.

Tania and I were able to spend about 15 minutes helping the families. It was great seeing so many fish being caught. Since I was not at the dock the whole time, I do not have an exact count; however, from listening to all the stories and seeing the pictures, well over a hundred fish were caught. We had three kids hook up with something larger, which broke them off. Since a few jacks were caught, I am pretty sure those are what broke off the kids. We had at least eight species of fish caught: crevalle jack, blue runner, porkfish, lane snapper, mutton snapper, back grouper, and a palometa.

Even though we still had bait, we called the fishing about noon. It was hot, and you could tell some of the participants were feeling it. We also were watching a storm heading our way, and we used this as an excellent lesson to monitor the weather while they were fishing.

Once we were all off the dock and back at the pavilions, I gathered the families to bless our meal. As with the other events, I asked if anyone would like to bless the meal. Harper, one of the little girls, raised her hand and wanted to pray over the food! It’s great seeing the little ones get involved and be willing to pray before a crowd.

Fit Fixens provided us with an excellent and healthy meal. We had a salad, chicken, rice, a black bean vegetable melody, and dinner rolls. For dessert, Tiki Ice provided everyone with shaved ice. It was great seeing all the families eating a meal together.

After lunch, we did a trash pick-up. We made it a little competition, and the top three kids would get a prize. The kids were so excited to go pick up the trash. We picked up a lot of trash, and the top three kids got a Reel Blessed hat. We were happy to see the kids excited about cleaning up the environment.

We ended our event like we ended all our events. We get the kids to thank the parent/guardian who brought them to the event, tell them they love them, and hug them. This is one of our favorite parts of the events.

All in all, our event went well. We had many happy families. We want to personally thank all our volunteers and sponsors, who, without, we would not be able to serve our community. We are grateful to partner with all of you!

Tania and I pray you all have a blessed and safe rest of your week! May you have tight lines and good times!

Reel Blessed Chapter of Fishings Future is a nonprofit organization that wants to strengthen family bonds through the sport of fishing. We hold our events free to the participants and live off donations and sponsorships. If you would like to learn more about Reel Blessed chapter of Fishing’s Future or wish to donate to help us continue to hold these family fish camps in the Port Saint Lucie area click the links below.