Everglades Fly Fishing By Canoe with David and David, 2026

This was the third time David and I would venture into the backcountry of the Florida Everglades to fly fish for tarpon, snook, and redfish.   This time was different though - we would be adding David's pre-teen son, li'l David, to our adventures.   

As we've done before, I loaded up the 2014 Subaru Outback with spinning and fly rod combos, camping gear, food, boating supplies, and caffeine, and topped it off with my circa 1970s Sears (Grumman) aluminum canoe, a.k.a the "Silver King". 

Coming from Virginia, I drive about 11 hours and tuck into the Cape Kennedy RV Resort in Mims FL for a no nonsense overnight waystation.  This time, I tested out my new Big Agnes, Copper Spur UL 1-person tent.  Very nice!

For the long drive south, Big Dave had recommended the audiobook Desert Solitaire by Edward Abbey.  Good choice!  It made the time go easily as I listened to his anti-pavement and tourist rants, the beauty of the sparsely developed and un-trammled Arches National Park, and his dirtbag lifestyle in the 1970s.  Highly recommended.

Got up early the next morning and hit the nearby Dunkin' Donuts to re-caffeinate and got a breakfast sandwich and then headed to the Miami airport where I would pick up big Dave and Li'l David.  

I post up about 10 minutes outside the airport and wait for Dave to tell me they're at the baggage claim, then I head to the pick up point.  

Quick hugs and then they jump in, the Silver King turning heads in the arrival loading area, and then we get out and start weaving the dicey neighborhood communities and back roads.  I don't have a FL-specific  Sunpass transponder so we take Rt. 997 and then SW 217 Ave through the through the tropical plant nurseries, cuban roadside food stands and cross the canals that have re-routed the natural Everglades flows. One of these days I need to stop and fish some of these.  I bet there's crazy stuff in there!

After a stop for a late lunch (you got to feed the kid!), we eventually make it to the entrance to the Everglades National Park and, since it's li'l David's first time, we stopped for the obligatory entrance sign photo. Father and son, both pumped to have left snow behind.

We got to our campsite in Flamingo, got the big tent set up, moseyed around the marina to see if we could spot any manatees (nope) and just killed time until dinner.  

Because the no-see-ums and mosquitos show no mercy at dawn and dusk, we decided this time to eat all our dinners and the Flamingo Lodge restaurant.  It was only a little more expensive than just add water camping meals and we wouldn't have to boil water or clean up while donating blood. It also has wifi!  Li'l David upped his quotient of burgers and fries.

Back at the campsite we found some tree frogs had taken up residency between the slats of our picnic table.  Li'l David, a critter hound couldn't have been happier and he immediately captured one hapless creature for a photo op.

Waking up the next morning, I started boiling water for coffee and oatmeal.  I couldn't help admiring the rosy tops of the clouds over top of the bathhouse.

The bathhouse is standard camping fare, but they do have solar-powered hot showers and a utility sink to wash pots and pans near the entrance.  

No-see-ums biting, we made quick work of breakfast, and we headed to the West Lake ramp for our first day of fishing.  Li'l David proclaimed that his goal was to catch 2 tarpon and 5 snook on this trip.  Challenge accepted!

Li'l David had gotten a Princess Peach toy in his happy meal so she became our daily talisman, guiding us to fertile waters.

Although, concerningly, the wind was supposed to become brisk in the afternoon, in the wee hours it was slick calm as we arrived at the head of the West Lake Canoe Trail.

All alone, we loaded the "Silver King" with the day's gear, seat backs, extra paddles, emergency signaling electronics, food, and drinks and got ready to shove off. 

These views are one of the many reasons we love this place!

We let Li'l David burn off some adreneliene with some early quick casts near the put in, saw some big fish rolling, spotted our first gator, and then put our backs into the 4-mile paddle across West Lake.  At the end of the lake, we easily found our first connecting creek, thanks to the park's excellent boating map (ask for one at the entrance kiosk) and new white navigational poles and signage.

The exposed white "socks" made by barnacles on the mangrove roots told us the tide was dropping.

We picked our way to creeks and lakes until we found ourselves in a familiar spot where we had caught fish before.  In short order, Li'l David hooked into the first tarpon of his life, and it was a good one!

Amped up, we couldn't convince him that it was another person's turn - the way we normally do it in the Everglades backcountry.  Spotting breaking fish, and getting his spinning rod flipping technique fine tuned, it wasn't long long before tarpon #2 came to hand. 

Interesting, in this spot, we had always done really well for snook, but this time it was the tarpon that were biting.  We were grateful for some expert advice on spinning baits from Mark at Ocean's East in Virginia Beach.  The jigs, white paddle tails and DOA shrimp were to perform their magic over and over again for Li'l David.

OK, Li'l David relented and now it was someone else's turn. Big Dave passed and he let me cast.  With junior in the middle of the canoe, we didn't change positions like we normally do, but after a while, I hooked up too, and Li'l David scooped up my nice little ladyfish.    

For a change in venue, we paddled out into the lake to look for some additional shoreline in the lee to cast to.  It was blowing pretty good and the shoreline we found in the lee was shallow so not very fishy.  We headed once more toward the more sheltered creek, but it was hard to hold position at the mouth and even inside large waves were rolling through the narrow creek.  

Knowing we had several hours of paddling to get home we headed back around 3 pm.

Luckily, with the east wind, on the way home, it was at our back and that was a blessing.  Nevertheless, on day one, we ended up paddling about 20 miles.  On the way back Li'l David helped some, leaving him tuckered out on the way home.

We made our way to the Flamingo Lodge restaurant, and big Dave and I ordered a well-deserved beer while we waited for our pub fare - burgers, wraps and fries.  We decided to eat our dinners here rather than dodge mosquitos and no-see-ums, shoeing vultures while we cooked similarly priced camp food.  The restaurant is relaxed and we lingered over our meals, looking at maps and wind predictions to plan the next day's strategy.  We watched the sun go down.

Eventually, we retreated back to the campsite, completed our nightly hygiene, and drifted off to sleep listening to a soothing and familiar Harry Potter audiobook.  

Getting up in the middle of the night for a pee, I was blessed with an eye-full of the beautiful night sky, replete with the shimmering milky way.  I never get to see that at home with all the light pollution.

Day 2, our destination was Coot Bay.  We slowly picked our way down the long, crater-filled, marly Bear Lake Road to the parking lot at its terminus.  

We unloaded all the gear and walked it down the short path to a tiny dock on the Flamingo canal.  We gently dipped the "Silver King" into the canal and loaded her back up.

There is a no wake zone around the put in, but after a short distance that speed restriction ends and, in a paddlecraft you have to stick to the shoreline edge because flats skiffs zoom through the canal on their way to Whitewater Bay and points beyond. 

In the quiet moments, wildlife abounds.  A large manatee swam lazily past and we got a good look at this hawk before we spooked him.

A perched heron, focused on its hunt for breakfast...

In short order, we made it to the entrance to Coot Bay.

The east wind help us as we paddled across Coot Bay and made our way to the entrance to Mud Lake.  Li'l David made a bunch of casts near the entrance, but to no avail.  As we picked our way through the little connecting creek, we spooked a a number of good size snook loafing in the shallows.  With the tangles of mangrove roots and woody debris, it was impossible to fish effectively, but that didn't stop an amped up Li'l David from trying!  Before long, we made it to the entrance of Mud Lake. 

(On the way back, we would run over a spook a large alligator in this same spot!)

This water trail was less well marked, but this year we came prepared with some brightly colored surveyor's flagging tape to help us find the camouflaged creek entrances.

 Before we started fishing, Li'l David proclaimed that on the trip he wanted to catch 2 tarpon and 5 snook.  He had caught two tarpon yesterday so he was well on his way.  

We took him to our favorite stretch of shoreline and in short order, snook #1 came to hand. 

Big Dave took a turn with the magic wand and he landed a snook on a black fly.

Li'l David kept finding success with a white paddle tail jig.  Snook #2

A brief downpour interrupted the action. We hunkered down and Li'l David sprawled out.

Big Dave and I were sharing a rod since we couldn't fish at the same time.  One person positioned the canoe and worked the shoreline while the other person cast.  Li'l David mostly fished continuously.  I switched the fly to a Giacobba's Blue Claw, which had worked for us well in the past.  After a couple of misses, I had a good hookset and landed another baby T.

David switched to a DOA shrimp lure and got very proficient of skipping it under the overhanging mangroves all the way to the shoreline edge. That prowess contributed to one of his biggest snook of the trip.

I think during the rain, we ate lunch and we did have Li'l and Big David switch places for a little while.  That improved Li'l David's casting angle and the snook came tumbling in.

We worked our favorite shoreline, that had the right combination of shadow and depth, in a conveyor belt style.  

I always like seeing the mangrove "bobby socks" made from encrusted barnacles colonizing the mangrove roots up to the high tide line.

We continued to work the shoreline and Li'l David caught a few more snook.  Ignoring the adult advice "Don't cast there, it's too close to the canoe" - he would hook up, inches between the hull and the shore.  His tally for the day was 6 snook, so he met and exceeded his goals for the trip, all by day two.

Mid-afternoon, we headed back, hugging the shoreline of smallish Mud Lake to stay out of the headwind.  At the east end, it still took us a little while to find our creek entrance.  But perhaps that was a lucky inconvenience because, in the process of paddling back and forth, we flushed a roseate spoonbill, a large, rare, and ultra-vivid pink creature.

Like I said previously, at the mouth of the Mud Lake creek, we spooked a BIG gator - he spooked us too!  We picked our way through the connecting creek and emerged into Coot Bay.  We tried to fish some embayments out of the wind, but it was hard to hold position and fish effectively.  We were unsuccessful.  Finally we committed to the task at hand and pointed the bow of the "Silver King" into the wind.  It was howling steady over 20 mph and if we paused for even a second, we were going backward.  We put our backs into it and even L'il David helped and that lifted our spirits.  We pushed for the white piling marking the entrance to Flamingo canal and finally we could take a breather.  That was a ferocious and tense paddle!  We lazily made our way up the canal while Li'l David took the odd cast.  We passed a fly angler in a peddle kayak, no doubt wary of battling that wind in Coot Bay.

After about a 12 mile paddle, we arrived back at the dock and unloaded the canoe, I retrieved the Subaru and we loaded her back up, securing the canoe to the Thule roof racks.  Li'l David decided to go for a critter walk down the length of Bear Lake Road while I slowly navigated the marl craters, trying not to get stuck or break something.  That road could use a grading!

We went back to the campsite, cleaned up a little and headed back to the casual Flamingo Lodge restaurant for another well-deserved beer and a fish dinner.  Afterwards, we decided to go look for snakes and were reminded to go slow because...   

We didn't see any snakes, so retreated back to the tent and, once again, fell asleep to the gentle intonation of Harry, Hermione, and Ron.

On Day 3, the east wind continued to blow the corn off the cob, so we bailed on the canoe and decided to drive into Miami and see if we could pick up some peacock bass at a public park where I had caught them before. 

On the 20+ mile entrance road into the park, we passed some wet areas alongside the road and this is where we started to see snakes (unfortunately run over).

Perhaps an Everglades ratsnake?  Still alive, but not for long.  😢 

Li'l David inspects a squished water moccasin...

Winding our way through the outskirts of Miami, we stopped for Big Dave to retrieve a field worker's wide brimmed hat - no doubt blown off as they raced the back streets for home the night before.

We also stopped at a cubano market for a coffee where we were closely scrutinized by the non-english speaking proprietor and her lone customer glued to an electronic game of chance.  So much for that cultural experience.  Clearly, we were out of place, but with the kid and dressed in fishing garb, I don't think we looked like ICE agents, but I think they and we both felt better by our exit.

We made it to the park and as promised to Li'l David there were many iguanas to spark his interest.

Even in this reasonably sheltered place, the wind put a chop on the narrow canal and it was tough to sight fish anything.  We saw large white tilapia and some cichlids, but could not get them to eat fly or spin lures.  We did see a few peacocks, but they were moving around fast and it was hard to see them quickly enough to get off a cast.  We spent a few hours trying, but finally gave up before calling it quits.  The promise of a McDonald's lunch kept Li'l Davids spirits high. 

Making our way back to Flamingo, we did indeed stop at McDonalds.  We also hatched a plan to have Li'l David fish from the Flamingo Lodge shoreline with some bait to see what he could catch.  So we stopped at a supermarket and Big Dave bought a mixed bag of frozen seafood - squid, shrimp and clams.

We also visited the NPS museum near the lodge, stamped our national parks' passport, and toured the exhibits, including their famous mosquito-meter.  Today, they considered the conditions bearable - hmmm.

I was interested in the display about the native Seminole method of making traditional wooden canoes.  Meant for poling as much as paddling; I like that bow design. 

The water outside looked rough my friends.  Glad Li'l David was going to be chucking jigs with bait.

While both Davids grabbed the fishing gear and frozen seafood to fish, I went back to the campsite to unload the mess in my car, organize it, and repack it for tomorrow's drive back towards Virginia.  I was glad to get that done.  When finished, I headed back towards the Lodge to pick up father and son. 

I found them walking back and they regaled me with their exploits.  Turns out, on his third cast, Li'l David hooked something big and it started screaming line off the reel.  Then it leapt into the air; it was about a 50 lb. tarpon, which Big Dave said winked at his son, and then summarily snapped the leader!  It happened so fast, they were both speechless.  They tried to repeat the magic, but to no avail. So they started walking back and that's when I found them.  Rather a fitting way to end the fishing trip - with Li'l David wanting more.

We got dinner and then retreated back to the tent, lulled to sleep with the tales of Hogwarts.

It seemed like we had just gotten to the Everglades when it was already time to leave.  We got up before dawn, broke down the tent, packed its contents, did a sweep of the area with headlamps, and left early with the plan of stopping at the Flamingo Welcome Center where we would cook breakfast after the no-see-um hoards had dispersed. 

As we drove, darkness passed into light with the rising sun.

In the wetter parts of the "river of grass", we found a dead snapping turtle and more snakes.

OK, the above picture was staged with a poor water moccasin that had been hit.

We did stop at the welcome center and toured the facility before making breakfast on the picnic table in the parking lot.  It was an enjoyable and entertaining stop - the plan executed flawlessly.  

Twice in two days, we snaked through the neighborhoods the get the Davids to the airport for their flight home to Minnesota.  They were super early, but I needed to make tracks to get as far north as I could in a day.  One last quick goodbye at the airport...

Then it was time to get back on the road.  Florida is a long state!  I got caught in some traffic around Jacksonville but was relieved that I didn't get ensnarled in any backups around Cape Canaveral since the launch of the Artemis moon mission was scheduled that day!  I texted David as I crossed each state border - Georgia, South Carolina...  I stopped at Buc-ees for cheap gas and to use the bathroom and then got the hell out of there.  I hate that place but the gas is cheap!

North Carolina is usually where I face a decision - find a cheap highway hotel to bed down for the night or keep going.  I was feeling OK, so I stopped to get a fast food dinner and some icy caffeine and got right back on the road.  I made it the Emporia around midnight - two more hours to go.  There was almost no traffic on the country roads, but I kept to the speed limit, jockeying tractor trailers in this speed trap zone.  

Downtown Suffolk came into view and then it was just a short distance to I-64 near Bowers Hill - familiar roads and landmarks buoyed me along.  I pulled into the driveway around 2am - after 20 hours on the road, grateful to be home and safe.  I carried what I could in one armload into the house, locked the car, and collapsed in bed.

Li'l David said the best part of the trip was seeing the jumping mullet - not the Everglades backcountry, not the rare wildlife encounters, not even catching tarpon and snook from a canoe (the historic and mighty "Silver King")?!  Ha! The heart and brain of a pre-teen...  Someday, I hope he'll reflect on how special this trip was, spending time with his dad and his "funcle", catching fish and seeing all the critters in a wilderness few of his classmates will ever experience.  If not, this blog will be an eternal reminder.

Peace!