Wedding Bells

Last weekend, Susanna's old roommate and high school friend, Julia, got married to Clarke at the Greenbrier Resort in West Virginia. The AAA 5-diamond resort is absolutely gorgeous. Gardens are bright and colorful, and grass is impeccably maintained. The main building looks palatial - even presidential. It sort of makes sense though, because it houses a bunker built in the 50's (that was secret and in commission until 1992) in which Congress would hide if there was a nuclear attack.

The rooms, on the other hand...they desperately needed renovation. We stayed in a "cottage" due to the lack of normal room availability. The room wasn't dirty by any means - it just looked about 30 years past its prime. Red carpet covered the floors and the walls were adorned with wallpaper straight out of the 1980s. Luckily, we didn't spend a whole lot of time in the rooms.

This was a BIG wedding with around 700 invitations and well over 350 RSVPs. The beautiful ceremony was held in Julia's childhood church in Lewisburg, followed by the wedding at the Greenbrier itself. The food was out of this world. Bacon-wrapped scallops, popcorn lobster, lobster sliders, beef sliders, grouper sliders, BBQ pulled pork sliders, and a raw bar were just a few of the stations. It seemed everywhere we turned, there was another nook with some delicious food.


As with any wedding, there was the obligatory dancing. While fun, one thing was clear: Susanna and I need to take dance lessons. For the time though, our awkward waddling around the dance for sufficed. Susanna's floor length bridesmaids dress didn't help her mobility, but she sure did look amazing! And I look damn good in a tux, if I do say so myself.

After the reception, the night was capped off at the casino. For better or worse, I couldn't remember how to play craps well enough to actually gamble, so my money stayed in my pocket instead of in the casino's. The relatively early night apparently didn't do it for someone, as she was quite sleepy in the car still... 

Weekend on the Water

Newport, Rhode Island. Home of New England's most elegant and historic estates: the Breakers, Rosecliff, and exquisite Cherrywood Manor, the palatial mansion of Marguerite Pewterschmidt. Wait, this isn't Family guy we're talking about... this is my trip!


Last weekend I went back up north for the first time in almost 5 years. I met up with my old college buddy and fishing partner, Dan, for a weekend shark fishing trip out of Newport, RI. It's been a while since I've done big game fishing, and even longer since I've caught anything more than a couple pounds. Luckily, Dan now captains a 50 foot sport fishing boat on the weekends (Commotion Charters), so it was much better than our old style of fishing which included no bathroom, a couple benches to sleep on, and an open air cabin. This boat sleeps 6, has a full bathroom (yeah, a shower too), and an air conditioned salon and galley. Not too shabby.




Our first day consisted of fishing for bait. Good thing when you're talking about catching shark, we aren't going after minnows. No, we're going after bluefish. 3-5 pound bluefish. Unfortunately, the fishing started out pretty slow. It took several hours to catch our first one, but when we did, the fight was everything I remembered. Throughout the day, we probably got about 10 fish on the line, but we had some troubles pulling the hooks out of their mouths and only ended up getting 3 in the boat. It turned out to be OK though since we ended up not even using the live bait.


Day 2 consisted of the actual shark fishing. Surprisingly, we caught as many shark as we caught bait. The owner of the boat got to reel in the first one (picture below), but I got the next two. I wasn't being a rod-hog, but just got lucky. The first one I caught, we intended to have me fight, and fight it did. A 9 foot blue shark has a little strength behind it. The second one actually bit the bait as I was reeling in the line for us to move locations. Lucky me! Unfortunately, the whole trip, I only took about 5 pictures. Another guy on the boat was taking a few more, so hopefully I'll be able to snag some from him.

Sunday was the final day, and we enjoyed the town of Newport. I had my first cup of clam chowder. It was part of a $15 lunch special at Benjamin's which included the New England Clam Chowder, a salad, and 1 1/4 lb lobster. I was a happy man. Another really cool place I found while wandering around was Anchor Bend Glassworks. They make all kinds of hand blown glasswork, much of which is nautical themed. I ended up picking out a glass sailboat. Their stuff is really cool, so if you're looking for a neat decoration, check it out!

This weekend, I'm off to the Greenbrier Resort in West Virginia for Susanna's old roommate's wedding. Another post to follow soon!

Where in the World is your... fishing guide?

If you're friends with me on Facebook, you've probably already seen this. If not, I started a website - www.findthefishing.com! It's a resource for all the fishermen and women out there to help find a fishing guide for their next trip. I take the work out of scouring the web for guides and add all the information I can for every guide I find so you have everything all in one spot. So far, I've focused on building it in a pretty selfish way - only the places I want to fish soon! Miami is done, along with a decent snapshot of Key Largo. Of course, my favorite place ever, Cape Cod, is also mostly done. The DC metro area is done too - that one was easy since there's only three guides there.

Eventually, I'll be expanding features of the website to be more of a 1-stop fishing resource in general, but for now I'm starting small. If you or someone you know is thinking about taking a trip, send them to Find the Fishing first! Help me get the word out!

Speaking of expanding features of the website... I'll be adding a new one next week - another blog! I'm heading up to Newport, RI in a few hours to spend the next three days fishing for striped bass, bluefish, shark, and bluefin tuna with Commotion Charters. It only makes sense to review the guides with whom I fish!