My First Gulf Trip- Hooked A Big Dolphin!

My nephew and I got up at 5a Saturday and loaded up our yaks and headed out. Stopped on the way and caught a bunch of 4"-5" finger mullet. Launched on our very first Gulf trip at Chickenbone Gulfside.

It was rougher than I wanted but not an issue getting out past the 2nd sandbar. Being our first trip we wanted to stay somewhat close to shore. We both had 2 spinning rods with circle hooks on an 80lb mono leader with no weights. Just drifed around with one baited rod in the rod holder about 40 yards behind me and slinging the other one out and slowly reeling it in with a bumping and jigging motion.

Here's where I screwed up. One rod was my good, heavy action spinning combo with 25lb mono. The other was a smaller spinning reel, (With a drag that doesn't always work well.) spooled with 12lb mono. That was the one I was casting out and jigging hoping for a small king or Spanish.

When the Dolphin hit that mullet it was an explosion of water about 30 yards away from me. I couldnt tell if it was a bull or a cow, but estimate it to of been about 25lbs. She started doing the typical acrobatics out of the water and peeling line out as quick as I have ever seen. It drug me out at least a mile and I wasn't gaining any line back. After about 20 minutes the line broke above the leader swivel and my heart sank. Kevin had a good run on a king but he is still learning about not keeping the drag too tight and that broke off as well.

Sad that I lost that dolphin, but still an amazing hookup on my first time out in open water.